Cadence for streaming opcodes

[PaulRBerg]

As explained here, in order to prevent UCG, we have to restrict the payment cadences to a few pre-defined options.

For Genesis, I suggest we allow the following cadences:

• Second
• Minute
• Hour
• Day
• Week

They are multiples of each other, which should make it easier to simplify the graph by making guesses and extrapolations regarding user solvency.

Then, in Odyssey, we can consider implementing additional cadences, such as monthly.

Note about terminology: I went with "cadence" instead of other terms (such as "frequency" or "periodicity") because it's the most fit-for-purpose, popular, and widely understood:

• ChatGPT: Cadence of recurring payments
• Claude: Recurring Payment Frequency Terms

Related: #83

cc @sablier-labs/sabvm. We brainstormed this idea at a dinner in Istanbul.

[IaroslavMazur]

"Second" to "Week" feels like more than enough for the Genesis version, indeed.

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Alternatively, wdyt about transforming - internally - the rate per minute-week into rate per second - and keeping another variable (beat/pulse?) signaling how frequently the value in the Stream must effectively be transferred to the recipient, based on the rate per second?
This approach could greatly simplify the background calculations.

e.g. "$0.01/s, with the beat of 1 day" (meaning: transfer the value to the sender once per day, but at the respective streaming rate)

[PaulRBerg]

I'm skeptical that storing more stuff in memory (i.e. the beat) would be helpful. I suspect that normalizing the rates dynamically at run-time would be a more efficient use of compute.

But I'm not sure. This is one of those hairy issues difficult to project. We need to perform benchmarks with real-world code, and adjust our design according to what results we get.

[IaroslavMazur]

Indeed, rigorous tests would be needed to confirm or reject this theory.

[PaulRBerg]

Yeah.

Depending on the VM design, we might even have to put the payment rates on disk.

That'd be a big no no for the additional beat.

[PaulRBerg]

Closing as everybody agrees.