Plutus is the smart contract platform of the Cardano blockchain[1][2]. It is a native smart contract language for Cardano, written in Haskell, and is Turing-complete[2]. Plutus smart contracts are effectively Haskell programs, and by using Plutus, developers can be confident in the correct execution of their smart contracts[2]. Plutus is designed to be a secure and flexible language for developing smart contracts, and it is used to write both on-chain and off-chain code that governs the behavior of smart contracts[6]. Plutus offers robust support for formal verification, which allows developers to mathematically verify the correctness of smart contracts before deploying them to the blockchain[6].
Some key features of Plutus include:
- Based on Haskell, a leading purely-functional programming language
- Provides a safe, full-stack programming environment
- Offers robust support for formal verification
- Allows developers to create complex financial applications that can be executed on the Cardano blockchain
- Plutus smart contracts are effectively Haskell programs
To execute the dApp logic, Plutus smart contracts must be paired with an off-chain framework, or a Plutus Application Backend (PAB)[6]. A PAB is responsible for executing the dApp logic and provides functionalities such as querying the blockchain state, handling user inputs, executing smart contracts, building and balancing transactions, and submitting signed transactions to the network[6].
In summary, Plutus is the smart contract platform of the Cardano blockchain, and it is a native smart contract language for Cardano, written in Haskell. Plutus is designed to be a secure and flexible language for developing smart contracts, and it offers robust support for formal verification. Plutus smart contracts are effectively Haskell programs, and to execute the dApp logic, they must be paired with an off-chain framework, or a Plutus Application Backend (PAB).
Citations: [1] https://developers.cardano.org/docs/smart-contracts/plutus/ [2] https://docs.cardano.org/plutus/learn-about-plutus/ [3] https://plutus.readthedocs.io [4] http://www.javiercasas.com/articles/plutus-smart-contracts-1-understanding-cardano-plutus/ [5] https://education.emurgo.io/what-is-plutus-and-what-makes-it-unique/ [6] https://cointelegraph.com/innovation-circle/four-open-source-plutus-application-backend-pab-for-cardano