Discussion Details

Core
Type
ACTIVE

Hardware Wallets Maintenance

2 comments
Submitted: 1 Apr 2025, 15:03 UTC (Epoch 549)
Updated: 17 Apr 2025, 13:35 UTC (Epoch 552)
ID:5
mi

michal_petro

Budget$284,600 (424,800 ADA)
ADA Rate$0.67
Preferred CurrencyUnited States Dollar (USD)
Contract TypeTime and Materials

Description

Update Ledger and Trezor firmware and integration libraries with new relevant Cardano features or breaking changes. Update also if there are any breaking changes in Ledger and Trezor core firmware code, testing suites, etc.

Update cardano-hw-cli to reflect firmware changes and to reflect user needs

Support Keystone developers while doing the changes above

Provide general cardano hw wallets maintenance, development support and bugfixing.

Order and manage external code audits for Ledger firmware code (Ledger requirement, has to be done by one of 2 certified auditors)

Problem Statement

Hardware wallets Ledger and Trezor and additional supporting tooling (cardano-hw-cli) need to be regularly updated in order to be able to support Cardano blockchain development.

There are 2 aspects of this:

  • regular maintenance, bugfixing and developer support
  • implementation of new Cardano features and breaking changes

HW wallets in scope: Ledger, Trezor, Keystone (from support perspective as Keystone firmware and tooling is developed by the Keystone team)

Currently it is not known which features in Cardano Roadmap will affect hardware wallets integrations.

Proposal Benefit

If implementation of new Cardano features and breaking changes is not completed then hardware wallets may become incompatible with Cardano, stopping users from accessing newer blockchain features or stop working altogether.

If regular maintenance, bugfixing and developer support is not completed, wallets may lack functionalities and development of tooling that is using HW wallets may become impossible or much more difficult.

Key Proposal Deliverables

New feature implementation should be defined ad-hoc based on Cardano Roadmap projects completion. The maintenance part of this project should be executed continuously and the result should be working HW wallets integration and good developer experience for 3rd party developers.

Cost Breakdown

These are suggested caps for the development. Only work that is actually needed and delivered will be charged (time & material). The contract should be valid for 1 year.

New features implementation - 0.6 FTE - 144 work-days - 187,200 USD Maintenance & support - 0.2 FTE - 48 work-days - 62,400 USD External audits - 35,000 USD

Resourcing & Duration

New features implementation part - unknown but from past experience we suggest to allocate 0.6 FTE budget Maintenance & support part - from past experience we suggest to allocate 0.2 FTE budget Duration - 1 year (with regular 1 year extensions at the end of the term) External audits - depending on the size and number of new features implementation

Experience

Vacuumlabs has been developing the Cardano HW wallets integrations (Ledger and Trezor) since 2018.

Maintenance & Support

This should be ongoing activity. Cardano HW wallets development consisted of around ~20 small projects through years 2018-2025

Supplementary Endorsement

The critical maintenance, bugfixing and developer support is currently done by Vacuumlabs for free but this cant last too long. https://github.com/vacuumlabs/cardano-hw-cli/pull/190 https://github.com/vacuumlabs/cardano-hw-cli/pull/188 https://github.com/vacuumlabs/cardano-hw-cli/releases/tag/v1.18.0-rc.1 https://github.com/vacuumlabs/cardano-hw-cli/releases/tag/v1.18.1

We also covered support for developers mainly (mainly SPO tools, various email requests and requests on Cardano Wallets telegram channel)

Roadmap Alignment

Does your proposal align with any of the Intersect Committees?

Technical Steering Committee

Does this proposal align to the Product Roadmap and Roadmap Goals?

Developer / User Experience

Administration and Auditing

Would you like Intersect to be your named Administrator, including acting as the auditor, as per the Cardano Constitution?

Yes

Ownership Information

Submitted On Behalf Of

Company

Social Handles

https://x.com/PetroMichal

Key Dependencies

We will be implementing only features that affect HW wallets and that were delivered to Cardano blockchain through Cardano Roadmap.

Created:4/1/2025
Last updated:4/17/2025
ID:5

Cast Your Vote

Coming Soon!

Comments (2)

Apr 14, 2025, 05:15 AM UTC

Will there be any overlap with the TSC budget? If the TSC budget is adopted, will you participate in the TSC public bidding?

Governance Space on Cardano Blockchain

Are You Ready to Participate?

Building Together to Drive Cardano Forward.