Handling Race Conditions between Imua and Client Chains

Imua integrates with multiple blockchains, each of which can simultaneously exchange messages with Imua. It’s essential to prevent potential race conditions to ensure data consistency across all systems.

The solution to these challenges is twofold: 1) maintain distinct user accounts between client chains and 2) enforce sequential message processing for each client chain.

Firstly, user accounts are uniquely identified by the combination of chain_id and user_address. This means there isn’t a multi-chain account; instead, only single-chain accounts exist. Users with accounts across multiple chains are regarded as distinct users within the Imua system, with each account conducting staking independently.

Moreover, every message exchanged between a client chain and Imua includes a nonce and the chain ID, which dictates the processing sequence on the recipient’s end and prevents message replay attacks from multiple chains.

Message processing logic is implemented in such a way that all error cases are handled gracefully. Messages are either successfully processed or fail to process. Failed messages are queued for retry, which is guaranteed to succeed eventually, ensuring no disruption in subsequent message processing.

For specific actions, like deposits and delegations from the client chain, a response message from Imua provides feedback on whether the action was successfully executed. This response also updates the client chain’s state, ensuring that certain accounting details remain consistent between Imua and the client chain.