What is canopy?

Canopy is the official Go implementation of the Canopy Network Protocol, a blockchain system designed around a recursive model where new chains can bootstrap themselves into existence using other chains as a foundation. The idea is that each chain in the network can help secure and launch additional chains, creating a growing web of interconnected blockchains that do not depend on any central authority. The codebase is organized into five core modules. The Controller acts as a central coordinator that connects all the other parts together. The Finite State Machine handles the rules for how transactions change the blockchain's stored data from one block to the next, deciding what counts as valid. The Byzantine Fault Tolerant consensus module lets nodes in the network agree on new blocks even when some participants are unreliable or acting dishonestly. The peer-to-peer networking layer handles encrypted communication between nodes directly, without a central server. Finally, the persistence module manages storage: saving the current state, indexing past transactions, and making sure data can be verified quickly. The project is currently in Betanet, meaning it is live and testable but not yet at full mainnet release. A road-to-mainnet document on the project's website tracks the remaining milestones. Running the software requires either building the Go binary directly with a make command, or spinning up a local test network using Docker Compose. The repository includes unit tests runnable with Go's standard testing tools. Contributions are welcome. The project asks that large or architectural changes be discussed on their Discord server first, and that all code follow standard Go formatting conventions. Pull requests should be submitted against the development branch rather than main.