Newsletter

Alby Buzz: new JavaScript API for lightning web apps and Nostr integration

• 3 min read
Alby Buzz: new JavaScript API for lightning web apps and Nostr integration

Hello Alby Community!

Welcome to the 11th edition of Alby Buzz, where you find out about everything new at Alby, the lightning app ecosystem, and are the first to learn about what's coming next.

News from the bitcoin lightning app ecosystem

  • LQwD introduced V2 of its platform with many features around lightning node management
  • BTCPay Server released 1.7.2 of its software including a few improvements and bug fixes.
  • Breez closed a $4.5M funding round to accelerate lightning as a Service (LaaS).
  • Orange Pill App added lightning payments to its web app.
  • PlebLab launched PlebDev a course about building a lightning app using HTML, CSS, Javascript, LNbits, React & more.
  • Lucent Labs announced Bolt Node, a bitcoin and lightning infrastructure provisioning product that allows practitioners to set up and scale bitcoin native infrastructure dynamically.
  • Zebedee revamped their mobile app with avatars, credit or debit card based top up and a gift card shopping functionality.
  • Stacker News released donate to rewards feature, turbo tipping, tip dialog shortcuts, and more smaller updates
  • Core Lightning v22.11 is out with a new plugin manager, performance optimization, and a new filter API functionality.

Legends of Lightning tournament winners

The Legends of Lightning tournament took place over 9 weeks and was a huge success (source: bolt.fun):

  • 🗓 65+ Events
  • 🛠 41 Workshops
  • 🤝 11 Conferences & Meetups
  • 💬 10 Spaces, Discussions, and Virtual Hangouts
  • 🍕 4 Hackathons & Building Sessions
  • 🛣 2 Tracks

The 2022 winners of the Global Adoption Track

The 2022 winners of the Building For Africa Track:

Congrats to all the participants! What a great event!

Read more

New JavaScript API for lightning web applications

Beyond offering powerful tools for instant, effortless compensation, Alby presents exciting opportunities for those developing lightning web apps.

The most recent update of the Alby Extension provides easy access to all lightning node APIs via a JavaScript interface (node info, channel info, balances, fee reports, etc.) for web apps. Developers can now build the next node management app as a client-side JavaScript application. No macaroons and no gRPC interfaces.

Dive into how the Alby Extension is helping web developers to create an exciting new era of lightning apps.

Read more

Showcases

To give an impression of what is possible with these new APIs, the Alby team created showcases of web apps:

Try it out yourself by connecting your LND or CLN node to Alby visit these apps.
Or have a look at the code and edit it directly on Replit.

Direct Alby account top-up with MoonPay

At Alby, we are proud to be strong advocates for open, collaborative, and innovative initiatives on bitcoin and the lightning network. It is from this motivation that we are happy to announce our partnership with MoonPay, a top-notch exchange service provider. Until now, there has never been an easier way to go from purchasing your bitcoin to transacting with it on the web.

Read more

What's new in Alby

  • v1.21.0 includes the new WebLN/WebBTC interface, making it easier than ever to build full lightning web applications accessing LND and CLN nodes. It comes with a permission system that gives the user control over which API calls and what information should be accessible to the specific web app.
  • v1.20.0 completes the Nostr integration and now supports NIP04 encryption and decryption. You can store your private Nostr key in the Alby extension locally and avoid giving it out to websites.  

Meet the Makers

Great conversations happened with:

That's it from the hive this month. For more, visit our website and follow Alby on Twitter. We love your feedback! Big or small, feature requests or bug reports, we read them all! Please visit the feedback board to help us out.

HAPPY NEW YEAR