Distribution lifecycle

Think of a Sync distribution as a short story with three chapters: create, serve, and claim. Each chapter is powered by a predictable set of accounts and APIs so you always know what’s on-chain, what lives in the dashboard, and what your team is responsible for.

The moving parts

@fractalshq/jito-distributor-sdk. Low-level Solana builders. Use this when you need handcrafted control over every instruction or want to audit our work.
@fractalshq/sync. The managed layer teams rely on. It talks to the Sync API, enforces auth, returns ready-to-sign transactions, and pipes status back to your dashboard.
Managed auth (@fractalshq/auth + @fractalshq/auth/react). Gives every dashboard action and SDK call a wallet-backed identity without forcing you to wire granular on-chain access yourself.

Chapter 1 — Create

Choose a cohort (CSV, API-imported list, or manual splits) and the token you want to payout.
Sync compiles that list into a Merkle tree, derives distributor + clawback PDAs, and prepares token accounts.
You receive one transaction that already includes compute unit boosts, memos, and Lighthouse assertions. Sign it as-is from any wallet or server signer.

Cost hint: Creating a vault ATA (2,561,280 lamports) plus the clawback account (2,039,280 lamports) totals 0.00460056 SOL. At $110/SOL that’s about $0.51 USD to stand up a new distribution.

Chapter 2 — Serve proofs

Sync stores the Merkle tree.
The dashboard shows claims / on-chain stats to review.

Chapter 3 — Claim

Recipients visit the hosted claim page or call the SDK.
Claims cost are pegged to $0.50 USD

Accounts cheat sheet

Distributor PDA — stores the Merkle root, admins, vesting timeline, and funding amount.
Vault ATA — SPL token account owned by the distributor; this is where you deposit the allocation.
Clawback PDA — destination for leftovers after clawbackStartTs; the contract enforces a 24-hour buffer after that timestamp before clawbacks can execute, so plan on waiting at least a day before reclaiming funds.
Recipient leaf — address, amount, and proof index that live off-chain yet are signed to prevent tampering.

Where to dive deeper

Create distribution walks through the exact instruction stack.
Claim flow describes the (coming soon) widget, SDK helper, and every error surface.