Blog Urbit Community Update - March 2022
Jeremy Tunnell at
The year is almost a quarter of the way over, but given how much has happened in less than three months you’d think we were further along in the year than we actually are.
The last month has seen the emergence of a native cross-platform mobile app with push notifications, a flurry of new grants, the launch of a new L2-specific planet store, the kickoff of Hoon School Live, and lots more. Let’s dive in.
0 – EScape mobile app
Following the success of their Groups-fork called “EScape”, Uqbar has released a native mobile app for both iOS and Android complete with push notifications. Kudos to ~fabnev-hinmur and the Uqbar (https://uqbar.network) team for shipping this!
iOS:https://apps.apple.com/nl/app/escape-by-uqbar/id1610194217?l=en
Android:https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=network.uqbar.escape&hl=en_US&gl=US
1 – Bounties
Want to earn some address space? Several bounties are live onhttps://urbit.org/grants and are open for applications. A couple of these came from us at the Urbit Foundation, but ~nocsyx-lassul of Tlon and ~librex-dozryc of the Mars Review have also posted their own, and we expect ~lomder-librun of Holium will have several listed in the next week. If you’ve got your own idea for a bounty, learn how to post it here:https://urbit.org/grants/bounties#post-a-bounty
Books — An app that allows you to privately annotate your crypto transactions and provides personal analytics across your wallets.https://urbit.org/grants/books
eth-provider — Help us decentralize Urbit’s means of accessing the Ethereum network.https://urbit.org/grants/eth-provider
Port Maintenance — Work with ~nocsyx-lassul, the creator of Port, to extend Port with critical new features that accelerate Urbit’s adoption.https://urbit.org/grants/port-maintenance
Digital Editor — The Mars Review of Books is an upcoming magazine that’ll feature content in print and on Urbit only, with the first issue coming in May. Work with ~librex-dozryc to run his Urbit infrastructure.https://urbit.org/grants/digital-editor-MROB
2 – Apprenticeships
If you’re just getting started with Urbit development and could use some mentorship, an apprenticeship is a great way to go. You’ll get to work on a real-world problem with an experienced Urbit developer and even get to earn Urbit address space for the experience. There are two open apprenticeships right now: one to work with the crew at Tirrel on their Studio product (https://urbit.org/grants/apprenticeship-studio-email), and another to work with ~dasrun-fadben on our Bitcoin capabilities by extending the Bitcoin provider API (https://urbit.org/grants/apprenticeship-extending-bitcoin).
Alternatively, if neither of these seem like the right fit, you can sign up to get matched directly with a mentor — learn more here: https://urbit.org/grants/apprenticeships#get-started
3 – L2 planets for sale
Since the L2 launch last month we’ve seen several new stores pop up, most notably the newly-launched Azimuth Shop (https://azimuth.shop). Here’s their press release:
Azimuth.shop is the newest and coziest place to obtain factory-sealed Urbit IDs. Its revolutionary L2-optimized design orients around the sale of planet "credits", enabling the purchase of unlimited IDs in a single Ethereum transaction. Credits are linked to your Metamask login, redeemable for any planet listing, and freely transferable between accounts for seamless gifting.
To celebrate its launch, planet credits are temporarily priced at 0.001 ETH. Damn! Thanks Tlon.
Azimuth.shop is developed by ~master-midref, operated by ~master-malwyl and owned by ~del. Join the party at ~rosdel/chau-sara
Alternatively, our friend ~sitful-hatred at subject.network sells planets in Bitcoin (https://subject.network/buy/), and ~tamdys is selling them on Gumroad in fiat (https://tomdys.gumroad.com/). Excuses for not being on the network are drying up.
4 – Media
The Stack Podcast (https://orbisledger.news/) dropped new episodes with the Urbit Foundation’s own Neal Davis and Anthony Arroyo, as well as Logan Allen of Tirrel and Noah Kumin of the Mars Review.
Justin Murphy’s Other Life Podcast (https://link.chtbl.com/otherlife) is continuing the Urbit Series with new releases featuring Soph and the Remilia Collective, Ted Blackman, and Sam Frank.
Also of note, the crew at Uqbar (https://uqbar.network) released several blog posts a couple of weeks ago about Urbit and the Uqbar network:https://uqbarnetwork.medium.com/
5 – Events
Next week (March 24th, 1600 UTC) we’ve got another Developer Call hosted by Neal Davis featuring a talk from ~rabsef-bicrym about his work at Quartus, the software development arm of the Dalten Collective. Details here:https://urbit.org/events/2022-03-24-developer-call-urbit-three-ways-with-quartus
“Urbit Outside” is back, this time in Cupertino, on April 2nd. Bring blankets and a water bottle! Details here:https://www.meetup.com/urbit-sf/events/284543053/
On April 5th the second Swedish meetup is taking place in Stockholm (https://urbit.nu/meetup2) with some IRL appearances from the UF and Dalten Collective. To keep up to speed with all the community-run meetups, join ~siddef/uf-meetups.
Pssst…we hear that something cool is going down in NYC from 5/19-5/22 — you’ll probably want to be there. Shoot a DM to ~ladtem-filmyr for an invite and details.