Glossary
Key terms and definitions used throughout Proof of Chance.
Core Concepts
Proof of Chance
A platform dedicated to transparent, verifiable, and fair blockchain-based chance mechanisms.
Daily Lottery
The flagship Proof of Chance product—a fully on-chain lottery system running daily draws on Solana.
On-Chain
Data or actions that are recorded on the blockchain, making them publicly visible, immutable, and verifiable.
Lottery Terms
Lottery
A chance-based game where participants purchase tickets for a chance to win a prize from a shared pool.
Ticket
A purchased entry into a lottery. Each ticket gives proportional odds of winning based on total tickets sold.
Prize Pool
The total amount of funds collected from ticket sales, distributed to winners (minus protocol fees).
Lucky Secret
A private phrase chosen by a participant. A hash of the lucky secret plus random salt is stored on-chain and later revealed during the upload window.
Winner
A participant selected deterministically by the on-chain algorithm to receive a share of the prize pool.
Attestation
An on-chain statement that a participant has uploaded their lucky secret to the provider. Used to prevent censorship.
Upload Window
The time period after ticket sales close when participants reveal lucky secrets and submit attestations.
Entropy Fingerprint
The aggregated hash of verified lucky secrets, used as a public entropy source for winner selection.
Technical Terms
PDA (Program Derived Address)
A deterministic address derived from seeds and a program ID. Used to create accounts owned by a smart contract without requiring private keys.
Smart Contract
Self-executing code stored on the blockchain that automatically enforces the rules of the lottery.
Anchor
A framework for building Solana programs (smart contracts) in Rust with enhanced developer experience.
SOL
The native cryptocurrency of the Solana blockchain, used for transaction fees and as payment in lotteries.
Lottery States
Open
The lottery is actively accepting ticket purchases.
Closed
The end time has passed; no more tickets can be purchased.
Upload
Participants are revealing lucky secrets and attesting on-chain.
Settled
Winners have been determined and prizes can be claimed.
Refunded
Refunds were issued because attestations or uploads were missing by the deadline.
Security Terms
Audit
The process of examining lottery operations to verify fairness and correctness.
Reentrancy Guard
A security pattern that prevents a function from being called again before the first call completes.
Access Control
Mechanisms that restrict who can perform certain actions in the smart contract.
Oracle
A service that provides external data to smart contracts, such as random numbers or price feeds.
Financial Terms
Protocol Fee
A small percentage of the prize pool retained by the protocol for operational costs.
Claim
The action of withdrawing won prizes from the lottery contract to your wallet.
Refund
The return of ticket purchase price when refunds are issued (for example, if no attestations occur).
Blockchain Terms
Transaction
An atomic operation on the blockchain that modifies state, such as purchasing a ticket.
Slot
A unit of time on Solana (approximately 400ms) during which one block can be produced.
Signature
A cryptographic proof that a transaction was authorized by a specific wallet.
Block Explorer
A web interface for viewing blockchain data, such as transactions and account states.