Understanding the various terms used in our smart contracts can involve a significant time investment for developers looking at the codebase for the first time. Due to this fact, we need resources in various formats to ensure they can get up and running quickly. We believe, in order to complement the technical documentation on docs.makerdao.com, that highlighting sections of the codebase and annotating it with comments can surface relevant information developers need while reading the raw contracts in order to understand the contracts better.
Examples of how annotations may be useful for developers:
Highlight terms to display their definitions
Ex: ink
, art
Explain various input parameters in-depth
Ex: Explain the precise role of users defined as gal
or guy
within input parameters.
Link to sections of other smart contracts from where function calls typically originate from
Ex: heal
in Vat
is called from Vow
Additional context to Maker specific design practices that other smart contract developers might not be accustomed to
Ex: Show the event log signature produced by the note
modifier on a function.
Help developers navigate through scenarios that result in calls across multiple smart contracts
Ex: Keepers participating in collateral auctions kick the process with bite
on Cat
, bad debt is settled in Vat
, accounted for in Vow
, and a series of transactions on flip
until they receive collateral they purchased for a discount.
Superimposing the operational view of the system on all functions will help developers build richer mental models of the Maker Protocol.
Ex: Annotating a function's auth
modifier and mentioning the smart contracts authorized to call it.
Annotations will also serve as an open and collaborative discussion layer that helps developers discuss and evolve their understanding of the smart contracts over time.
​Hypothesis is a web-based tool that we use to annotate the codebase hosted on our Github org.
Check out the annotations of the Vat smart contract here. ​
Hypothesis annotations can be viewed by expanding a sidebar on the top right corner of your browser window.
There are three options to view annotations on a webpage:
Install the chrome extension from the web store.
Follow instructions to setup a bookmarklet​
Append https://via.hypothes.is to a URL.
MakerDAO
restricted group- everyone is allowed to read annotations but only approved members can contribute here.
Public MakerDAO group that is open for everyone to both read and contribute.