JavaScript Developers Can Now Build Applications On NEAR

JavaScript developers can now build applications on NEAR according to NEAR founder Illia Polosukhin.

Following the release of JavaScript Software Development Kits (JS SDKs) on Monday, 20 million JavaScript developers can now build applications on the NEAR Protocol and construct blockchain smart contracts.

NEAR founder Illia Polosukhin underlined that the move will expose the specialized field of blockchain development to a significantly larger audience at the Korea Blockchain Week (KBW) on August 9 (local time):

“There’s about 20 million JavaScript developers in the world. Probably like every developer one way or another wrote JavaScript in their life. And what we allow you to do is to write smart contracts in JavaScript.”

“Before we had Solidity so for Ethereum and other Layer 2s, we had Rust, which is what Solana and Near are mainly. And so Solidity has probably 100,000 developers who are familiar with it, and those who are active are even fewer. There is even less probably in Rust,” he added.

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NEAR stated that the JS SDK comprises the contract framework itself, JavaScript and TypeScript contract samples, and testing in a statement on August 8.

Polosukhin continued by saying that anyone might use the JS SDKs, from students trying out blockchain technology to business professionals aiming to further their initiatives.

Polosukhin said that a student can build an application without needing to learn a new language or new skills. He also stated that it will be easier for developers to be hired by entrepreneurs, who in turn can build stronger and faster teams that will deliver faster products. Illia Polosukhin also added:

“So kind of the idea from Near is to build a very extensible and powerful system that allows developers to build really anything from simple apps to very complex apps.”

When asked if the JS SDKs would be compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) given that NEAR is a rival to Ethereum, Polosukhin responded that the offering would run exclusively on Near but that it would be possible to create EVM-compatible smart contracts from the SDK, similar to how EVM-compatible scaling Aurora was created on NEAR.

NEAR is a decentralized application (dApp) platform that was introduced in April 2020 and is geared toward users and developers. With a market worth of $4.1 billion, its native token NEAR is now the twenty-fourth largest cryptocurrency.

According to CoinGecko, the asset’s price is $5.44 at the time of writing and has increased noticeably by 42.8 percent over the past 30 days.

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