Hello everyone!

Recently I fullfilled a wish of @peak.open about writing a review of the Open Genie platform. When I browsed further through the list of wishes, I saw there was another wish about writing a review, this time about the Token Routes project. If you have totally no idea about what I am writing, then please check out my previous article about Open Genie. Sorry for all these links, but I am sure they are worth mentioning so you can find all information you need. Now, let's find out what this Token Routes project is all about.

What is Token Routes

In one of the articles of @peak.open, they describe their Token Routes project as follow:

Moving from one token in one location to another token in a completely different place?? We have your tool.

It's indeed a situation we all have experienced. As the crypto-space is growing everyday. New tokens and projects are being created while others are being buried. One of the problems is to swap a certain token to another token is often not that easy. Especially when we're talking about tokens with a smaller marketcap, it's not always that easy. If I get it right, the Tokens Routes project is a solution to this problem. Instead of having to do your own research in finding the most optimal route in terms of costs and fees, this project is doing it for you! Seems amazing, isn't it?

That's atleast what was my first impression, when starting to try out the tool myself, it's even better than I thought in the previous alinea. My first reflection would be that it would be utilizing a blackbox principle. But that's not true. The Tokens Routes project isn't chosing the route itself, it is proposing the most optimal route, together with some other possible ways as well. This way, the user still can choose himself which router he would like to take. I think this is way better than just providing a block-box route where you don't have any information. Kudos for presenting multiple ways!

Team behind the project

Token routes is a project of the @peak.open projects. These are open source projects built by the PeakD team. If you're on Hive for a longer time, you'll definitely know these guys as they have built a lot on Hive. Like polls, sting chat to name a few. Definitely check out peak.open to get an idea which individuals are behind these projects! In my previous post, I tagged the individuals behind Open Genie. I am not completely sure the team is exactly the same so I am not going to tag them here.

How to utilize Token Routes

Firsly, you have to go to https://hivehub.dev/routes than you will see the following screen:

Let's break down what the different options are to fill in. To make it easier, I took a screenshot and numbered all the fields, like this:

1) Amount: Here you can add a number of tokens you'll want to swap.
2) From: In this field you have to choose the token you want to swap. To be clear, this is a token you have somewhere in a wallet at the start.
3) To: In this field you'll fill in the token you want to have after the swap.
4) Located: Here you need to add the locations of where your owned tokens are and where you want to get the desired tokens. These could be certain chains or centralized or decentralized exchanges.
5) Max Steps: Here you can add a maximum. Personally I just leave it at the 'best of each' option. Let the Token Routes propose me the most optimal route instead of I limiting it.
6) Exclude locations and services: Here you can excluse, so tell the Token Routes to not use a particular chain / exchange. Personally I haven't used this option so far. This could be chosen for example when there are some legal restrictions about a particular chain.
7) Calculate routes: Press this button when you're ready with your setup.

Personally, I am often swapping between hive and swap.hive and vice-versa. Usually I utilize beeswap but it will be interesting to see what Token Routes is proposing to me. As an example I will use the Token routes application to show me the most optimal routes to swap 100 Hive -> 100 swap.hive

After waiting about 5-10 seconds, the following routes were shown:

As you can see, the most optimal route at this moment in time is beeswap. Luckily it's the one I am utilizing nearly always. Although there's a remark to be made. The Token Routes is showing the most optimal route at this moment in time. So, it could be that a second later, there is another, better option.

When you click on a particular route, like for example the fourth optimal one, you get more details about the steps and the fees:

As you can see the Token Routes tool is really handy when you want to swap tokens from one to eachother. Especially if you're often swapping around a lot, it's definitely worth to check it out!

Feedback

Before I head over to my own feedback, I saw in an article of the team that they are looking to further improve the tool. Further updates which are planned amonst others are:

• More data for better results
• Speed improvements
• More locations (More swap sites and LP pools on other chains)
• More tokens
• More UI upgrades
• More customizations (Save routes and new filters)

When I visited the website for the first time, it didn't really show any information about what the project is about. I had to search myself to find some information. Luckily @peak.open has written some articles about the project themselves. But still, I would recommend to add some information to the webpage as well. If the information is there, than it's probably well hidden as I couldn't find it. I wrote down this feedback at the start of this article. After trying out the tool myself, I have to admit it's quite obvious. But still an alinea as 'introduction' what the goal of the tool is, would be nice in my opinion.

I know Token Routes is a project of the @peak.open Team, but I was wondering which individuals are working on this particular project. I couldn't find it. Here again, I am not sure if it's becuase I didn't search enough or info just isn't available. Ofcourse this isn't necessary, but I always like to know which individuals work on a tool / project I utilize. Could see it as a personal preference.

Conclusion

In my opinion the Token Routes project is a great tool to find the most optimal swap route from one token to another. Especially if you're often swapping around decent amounts of tokens, it's good to know how the route with the smallest amount of fees could be found.

Have you already tried out the Token Routes tool?

Thank you for reading!