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Backend Components

Backend Services​

Harvest​

  • Role: Custom business logic that complements Hasura.
  • Responsibilities:
    • Imports/Exports
    • Generating publications
    • Permissions and validation
    • Keys and Tally ceremonies
    • Election status monitoring
    • Third-party integrations
  • Path: step/packages/harvest
  • Technologies: Rust, Rocket, Hasura (GraphQL Actions)

Windmill​

  • Role: Consumer service that handles background business logic and scheduled tasks.
  • Responsibilities:
    • Ballots, Ceremonies, Tally Sheets
    • Audit Logs, Key Handling
    • User Management, Statistics
  • Subservices:
    • services/ballot_styles: Ballot display
    • services/ceremonies: Key and tally ceremonies
    • services/consolidation: Audit logs, result packaging
    • services/tally_sheets: Manual tally support
    • services/vault: Vault secret management
  • Path: step/packages/windmill
  • Technologies: Rust, Hasura, GraphQL, Postgres, AWS Secret Manager, HashiCorp Vault

Beat​

  • Role: Publishes scheduled events and review board tasks to the queue.
  • Path: step/packages/beat
  • Technologies: Rust

Velvet​

  • Role: Finalizes elections by decoding ballots, tallying, generating reports, and marking winners.
  • Path: step/packages/velvet
  • Technologies: Rust

Braid​

  • Role: Implements a verifiable mixnet for anonymizing votes.
  • Technologies: Rust
  • Path: step/packages/braid

Strand​

  • Role: Core cryptographic library used by Braid.
  • Key Components:
    • ElGamal & Distributed Key Generation
    • Shuffling (Mixnet)
    • ZKPs (Schnorr, Chaum-Pedersen)
    • Signature & Symmetric encryption
  • Technologies: Rust
  • Path: step/packages/strand