For those who are new to AlgoSigner, it’s an open-source, security audited, Algorand wallet extension that makes it easy to use ALGOs for payments, investments, or asset exchange in a secure way. By using AlgoSigner, you can build a number of new DeFi capabilities into your dApp without needing to handle keys or account secrets.

The approach is pretty straightforward: once enabled in the browser, AlgoSigner injects a JavaScript library into each web page that a user visits. When they visit an application that has AlgoSigner enabled, they can trigger and approve transactions like, for example, contributing liquidity to a pool, without needing to share sensitive account information. This kind of functionality can be used for a wide variety of use cases, including the transfer and receipt of Algorand Standard Assets (ASAs).

At a high level, AlgoSigner can be used to:

• Request connectivity to a user’s wallet
• Send transactions to users for approval without handling keys or account secrets
• Process transactions without handing user keys or account secrets
• Transmit signed transactions to Algorand network

What’s New

Since releasing AlgoSigner last year, the PureStake team has added several significant new features as part of the 1.2, 1.3, and 1.4 version updates. Most significantly, AlgoSigner now has support for trading ASAs.

• Support for finding, opting into, and exchanging ASAs in the UI
• Support for advanced signing scenarios for dApps like atomic, multi-signature, and application transactions
• Support for the addition of custom networks for developers and private network operators
• Additional security features, like logout and a second security audit by an external party

What’s Coming

PureStake is committed to delivering a stream of new features and enhancements in 2021. Here are some of the things we plan to work on this year:

• A simplified signing process for dApps that eliminates the friction with managing encoding transformations necessary today
• Grouped or bulk transaction signing - review and approve a set of transactions sent in from a dApp together in one signing action. Cuts down password re-entry for users and simplifies signing scenarios.
• Ledger hardware wallet support
• Support for Rekeyed accounts
• Storing known/frequent addresses as contacts
• Improved UX around password re-entry, cutting down the number of times a password needs to be entered
• Connection sharing for dApps - reuse the users AlgoSigner API connections in your dApp instead of configuring your own

To add the AlgoSigner extension to your browser, download it from the Chrome Web Store.

If you want to start building AlgoSigner into your dApp, check out our integration guide, a sample dApp project, and an interactive dApp for testing and troubleshooting.