What resources are available to get into these two and related topics?<p>Would be also better if there are papers/books that introduces to these concepts (and toy implementation)?
The book "Mastering Bitcoin" really helped me to understand the blockchain and bitcoin properly. It's available free online here~<p><a href="http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001802/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001802/index.ht...</a><p>The author is putting out a similar book called "Mastering Ethereum" in February, also through O'Reilly.
I recently published an intermediate-level e-book on Bitcoin:<p><a href="http://bitzuma.com/owning-bitcoin/" rel="nofollow">http://bitzuma.com/owning-bitcoin/</a><p>This is the book I wish had existed when I started learning about Bitcoin in 2011. It's a technical deep-dive for a non-expert audience. Only knowledge of high school algebra and a willingness to learn are assumed. Every technical term comes with a definition. Over 300 figures help visual learners understand complex technical topics. Hundreds of footnotes provide jumping-off points and links to online demos. Cross-links allow you to quickly review prior material in later chapters.<p>There are eight chapters:<p>1. Bitcoin from Scratch (the view from 20,000 feet of Bitcoin and its subsystems)<p>2. Authentication (elliptic curve cryptography)<p>3. Authorization (Script, transactions, and contracts)<p>4. Network (block chain, consensus, hard/soft forks, governance, segwit, Lightning Network)<p>5. Privacy (what can and can't be discovered about users of a public block chain)<p>6. Security (what to protect and why)<p>7. Wallets (software for using Bitcoin)<p>8. Bitcoin in Practice (a complete system for using Bitcoin based on the content in the first seven chapters)
Compiled these resources while building my first smart contract. I can't promise they're the best, but I can promise I built something that works following these resources + learned a ton:<p><a href="https://blankslate.io/?note=48627" rel="nofollow">https://blankslate.io/?note=48627</a><p>(if you want just tutorials: <a href="http://truffleframework.com/tutorials/" rel="nofollow">http://truffleframework.com/tutorials/</a>)
Checkout what <a href="https://twitter.com/iam_preethi" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/iam_preethi</a> is tweeting about these topics. Really liked her last article about Etherum: <a href="https://medium.com/@preethikasireddy/how-does-ethereum-work-anyway-22d1df506369" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@preethikasireddy/how-does-ethereum-work-...</a>
Could someone offer a quick explanation as to what kinds of things there even _are_ to learn about blockchains? I mean from a conceptual user perspective of "let's use blockchain for my next product", not from a Bitcoin-dev perspective of "how do we fix this thing in our blockchain implementation".
I just started a new site for teaching this!<p>I've found that smart contracts have a lot of jargon that can be opaque, but the concepts are familiar to web developers (and not that hard to learn).<p>For example, in traditional webdev we use our browser to connect to an app server, which is connected to a centralized database.<p>In Ethereum dev, <i>every node</i> has a copy of the entire database. To write distributed apps, you read from your <i>local copy</i>. That is, for a JavaScript DApp, you use the web3 JavaScript library to connect to a <i>local node</i> you have running on your own machine.<p>Writes are little more involved, because you need the network to agree that your writes are valid. So to perform writes, you submit a transaction to the network.<p>The result is <i>reads are free and writes cost money</i>.<p>Solidity is tricky, but not that bad if you're careful. If you know JavaScript already, you can totally learn to program smart contracts.<p>In any case, my site is here. I'll be making the first course free shortly: <a href="https://www.newline.co/" rel="nofollow">https://www.newline.co/</a>
This article was on HN a few days ago. “Learn Blockchains by Building One” @van_flymen <a href="https://hackernoon.com/learn-blockchains-by-building-one-117428612f46" rel="nofollow">https://hackernoon.com/learn-blockchains-by-building-one-117...</a>
What I am currently attending : <a href="https://www.coursera.org/learn/cryptocurrency/home/welcome" rel="nofollow">https://www.coursera.org/learn/cryptocurrency/home/welcome</a>
Here you go<p><a href="https://github.com/xel/blockchain-stuff" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/xel/blockchain-stuff</a>
There's this course by the people who wrote `Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies`<p>It covers the basics pretty well.<p><a href="http://bitcoinbook.cs.princeton.edu/" rel="nofollow">http://bitcoinbook.cs.princeton.edu/</a>
CS 251: Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies at Stanford
<a href="https://crypto.stanford.edu/cs251/" rel="nofollow">https://crypto.stanford.edu/cs251/</a>
I agree with the recommendation of "Mastering Bitcoin".<p>I recently also started diving into blockchain related tech, and I blog about it here: <a href="http://decentralized.blog/" rel="nofollow">http://decentralized.blog/</a><p>So far mostly about IPFS, but soon more on the working of the different blockchains out there.
If you're interested in Ethereum Smart Contracts I wrote:
<a href="http://ethereumdev.io/" rel="nofollow">http://ethereumdev.io/</a>
These videos by Jordan Leigh are really great for Ethereum concepts and development.<p><a href="http://decypher.tv/series/ethereum-development" rel="nofollow">http://decypher.tv/series/ethereum-development</a>
I've posted all my research on the subject here: <a href="https://www.insp3ct.re/blog/blockchain-security-reference-guide/" rel="nofollow">https://www.insp3ct.re/blog/blockchain-security-reference-gu...</a>. It's focused on the security side of blockchain & cryptocurrencies, but it starts out with a solid primer on how the technology works. I also did a conference talk at DerbyCon on the subject, which is included in the blog post. Should be really good to get you started.
I manage a website and Facebook page dedicated to resources: <a href="http://blockchainsaw.com" rel="nofollow">http://blockchainsaw.com</a> and <a href="http://facebook.com/bitcoinresources" rel="nofollow">http://facebook.com/bitcoinresources</a>. The FB page is updated a lot throughout the day and contains more than Bitcoin stuff.
If blockchain concepts are new for you, here are my favorite starting places to learn:<p>Why Bitcoin Matters (2011, NYT) - <a href="https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/01/21/why-bitcoin-matters/?_r=0" rel="nofollow">https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/01/21/why-bitcoin-matters/...</a><p>What is blockchain, really? An intro for regular people. (2017, Medium) - <a href="https://medium.com/@wen_xs/what-is-blockchain-really-an-intro-for-regular-people-e51578d98a96" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@wen_xs/what-is-blockchain-really-an-intr...</a><p>Re: “Smart contracts” - here’s a few 101 pieces on ethereum:<p>A Beginner’s Guide to Ethereum (2017, Coinbase blog) - <a href="https://blog.coinbase.com/a-beginners-guide-to-ethereum-46dd486ceecf" rel="nofollow">https://blog.coinbase.com/a-beginners-guide-to-ethereum-46dd...</a><p>Ethereum is the Forefront of Digital Currency (2017, Coinbase blog) - <a href="https://blog.coinbase.com/ethereum-is-the-forefront-of-digital-currency-5300298f6c75" rel="nofollow">https://blog.coinbase.com/ethereum-is-the-forefront-of-digit...</a><p>Dan Romero has compiled an excellent "reading list" for digital currencies: <a href="https://medium.com/@dwr/digital-currency-reading-list-6219f1623bfd" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@dwr/digital-currency-reading-list-6219f1...</a><p>And here's a 101 for developing a decentralized app (dApp): <a href="https://medium.com/@AndreaCoravos/dapps-101-how-do-i-start-developing-on-ethereum-da0d38ed973f" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@AndreaCoravos/dapps-101-how-do-i-start-d...</a>
As a quick and visual introduction, I would recommend the great "Ever wonder how Bitcoin (and other cryptocurrencies) actually work?" youtube video from 3Blue1Brown
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBC-nXj3Ng4&t=3s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBC-nXj3Ng4&t=3s</a>
Also an important question: How to get quickly tokens for a ETH test network to be able to do anything. Last time I tried I wasn't successful because all these places where you could get some free tokens didn't work and the only thing possible was to mine them yourself which still took a day or two.
Contracts page on Bitcoin Wiki [0] is classic, unfortunately to understand most of it one has to know how script and various extensions (lock time etc.) work. Generally I'd advise reverse engineering how Bitcoin works, something like this [1] in JavaScript. There is also high level description of some contract types [2] but it's basically the same content as on Bitcoin Wiki.<p>[0]: <a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contract" rel="nofollow">https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contract</a><p>[1]: <a href="https://curiosity-driven.org/low-level-bitcoin" rel="nofollow">https://curiosity-driven.org/low-level-bitcoin</a><p>[2]: <a href="https://curiosity-driven.org/bitcoin-contracts" rel="nofollow">https://curiosity-driven.org/bitcoin-contracts</a>
Start out with Bitcoin, and make sure you understand it well. For example it has its own stack-based language (mini smart contracts of sorts), you need to understand how that works, the different types of payments such as P2SH, etc.<p>The O'Reilly book is good, you should also look at code in your preferred language, ideally the C++ in which Bitcoin core is written.<p>Last but absolutely not least - you should buy some Bitcoin and send it to someone, or buy something with it. I'd also recommend going through the trouble of running Bitcoin-Qt and downloading the whole blockchain (which takes several days and requires lots of disk space).<p>Once you understand all this, the smart contracts thing will be a lot clearer, and you might even have a different opinion on it.
I recently created a platform that has my hand-picked resources for bitcoin, cryptocurrency, blockchain:
<a href="https://symphosis.com" rel="nofollow">https://symphosis.com</a><p>It has resources for other concepts like Design, UX, JavaScript, Startups, etc.
For explanation of both, watch this Video: <a href="https://anders.com/blockchain/" rel="nofollow">https://anders.com/blockchain/</a>
and then click on the "fork on github" link ;)
Most of the grit of blockchain work is in the flows and practices used to build apps / dapps around existing blockchains. There aren't any books that you can read or comprehensive Medium blogs that cover this content.<p>Core blockchain dev, i.e. at a protocol level requires serious chops, not the kind of thing you can just pick up in a few months.<p>I'd recommend brushing up on broad blockchain concepts and not just intensely studying a single chain / platform. If you want to get into the industry your best bet is to find a company willing to hire you and let you learn hands on.
Check out hyperledger and solidity.<p><a href="https://github.com/hyperledger/hyperledger/blob/master/hyperledger_Overview_Comparison_Guide.md" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/hyperledger/hyperledger/blob/master/hyper...</a><p><a href="https://learnxinyminutes.com/docs/solidity/" rel="nofollow">https://learnxinyminutes.com/docs/solidity/</a><p>I found this visual tutorial on blockchain helpful.<p><a href="https://youtu.be/_160oMzblY8" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/_160oMzblY8</a>
I second the references to "Mastering Bitcoin", and also add my blog post "Getting up to Speed on Ethereum" [1] that takes you from "I kinda understand bitcoin" to "I understand ethereum at a deep level and know about the big projects being built on top of it" over a few days.<p>[1] <a href="https://medium.com/@mattcondon/getting-up-to-speed-on-ethereum-63ed28821bbe" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@mattcondon/getting-up-to-speed-on-ethere...</a>
“Tutorial: Blockchains and Databases” at the 43rd International Conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB) in Munich on 29 August 2017:
<a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7lNUaak0bK1ZDhkak05VHA0d00/view" rel="nofollow">https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7lNUaak0bK1ZDhkak05VHA0d00...</a>
W3kit let’s you interact with smart contracts and deploy your own Ethereum node with ease. This way you can focus on writing and testing smart contracts and not the underlying infrastructure.<p>The blog also has tutorials to get you started and teach Ethereum concepts.<p><a href="https://blog.w3k.it" rel="nofollow">https://blog.w3k.it</a>
If you're interested in the nitty gritty of the mechanics of Bitcoin, check out my blog post: <a href="http://www.samlewis.me/2017/06/a-peek-under-bitcoins-hood/" rel="nofollow">http://www.samlewis.me/2017/06/a-peek-under-bitcoins-hood/</a>
Solid material at "stackoverflow":<p><a href="https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com" rel="nofollow">https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com</a><p><a href="https://ethereum.stackexchange.com" rel="nofollow">https://ethereum.stackexchange.com</a>
If you're looking for a toy implementation, I just released <a href="https://github.com/robinmonjo/coincoin" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/robinmonjo/coincoin</a><p>It focuses on Blockchain and Digital Transactions
Related, how does the blockchain structure look on paper? As in a data structure? What fields does it have?<p>I have a project idea, but I want to build the data structure from scratch as opposed to cargo culting something on top of Ethereum.
I have listed various different products, tools, and resources. If anyone is interested do checkout <a href="https://cryptostack.xyz" rel="nofollow">https://cryptostack.xyz</a>
Intro:<p>1. <a href="https://medium.freecodecamp.org/explain-bitcoin-like-im-five-73b4257ac833" rel="nofollow">https://medium.freecodecamp.org/explain-bitcoin-like-im-five...</a><p>2. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIxwTx7o_B4" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIxwTx7o_B4</a><p>3. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBC-nXj3Ng4" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBC-nXj3Ng4</a><p>4. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_160oMzblY8" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_160oMzblY8</a><p>5. <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/244-the-quiet-master-of-cryptocurrency-nick-szabo/id863897795?i=1000386194955&mt=2" rel="nofollow">https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/244-the-quiet-master-of-...</a><p>6. <a href="http://investorfieldguide.com/hashpower/" rel="nofollow">http://investorfieldguide.com/hashpower/</a><p>Build Your Own Blockchain:<p>1. <a href="https://dev.to/aunyks/lets-build-the-tiniest-blockchain" rel="nofollow">https://dev.to/aunyks/lets-build-the-tiniest-blockchain</a><p>2. <a href="https://hackernoon.com/learn-blockchains-by-building-one-117428612f46" rel="nofollow">https://hackernoon.com/learn-blockchains-by-building-one-117...</a><p>3. <a href="https://github.com/jamesob/tinychain" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/jamesob/tinychain</a><p>Resource List for an Advanced Understanding (Multidisciplinary Approach):<p>1. <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UiMS4Br7LkTIRdEOPjCukOxG6gIdCJTOgXbeOPBHrcE/edit#" rel="nofollow">https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UiMS4Br7LkTIRdEOPjCukOxG...</a><p>---<p>Additionally, here is some advice from Balaji Srinivasan (source: <a href="https://www.producthunt.com/live/balaji-s-srinivasan" rel="nofollow">https://www.producthunt.com/live/balaji-s-srinivasan</a>):<p>1. First, I'd master database and cryptography fundamentals, with something like Dan Boneh's course for the latter<p>2. Then, I'd read the Bitcoin.org and Ethereum documentation<p>3. Then, you should write short Python or Go scripts to do things like printing out the blockchain, formatting and signing a transaction by hand, managing private keys, that type of thing. This will give you a feel for the raw data structures.<p>4. After doing all this, I'd take a look at application libraries like Ryan Shea and Muneeb Ali's new blockstack.org<p>The reason I'd do it in this order is that you would learn fundamentals first before proceeding to the cutting edge.
I compiled some of the resources I used to start understanding it.<p>It it a bit focused on ethereum, but I guess it is useful for starting to understand blockchain and smart contracts in general regardless<p>---<p>Watching<p>- "GOTO 2017 • Blockchain: The Slowest (and most Fascinating) Database in the World • Stefan Tilkov”
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li3rfBAP_fE" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li3rfBAP_fE</a><p>Explains how the blockchain works and walks through most of the technical terms you will need to know<p>- "Ethereum Vs. Bitcoin: What Sets Them Apart? | CNBC”
<a href="https://youtu.be/0UBk1e5qnr4" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/0UBk1e5qnr4</a><p>Uses the blockchain explanation to give you an idea of how the smart contract idea differs Ethereum from Bitcoin<p>- "Vitalik Buterin explains Ethereum"
<a href="https://youtu.be/TDGq4aeevgY" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/TDGq4aeevgY</a><p>3 minute macro explanation of what is Ethereum from its inventor Vitalik Buterin<p>- "DEVCON1: Ethereum for Dummies - Dr. Gavin Wood”
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_LK0t_qaPo" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_LK0t_qaPo</a><p>Ethereum's CTO Dr. Gavin Wood explains in a very macro way the Ethereum concept with an idea of how the “Global Computer” works and what is the “Ethereum Virtual Machine”<p>- Devcon2: Ethereum in 25 Minutes
<a href="https://youtu.be/66SaEDzlmP4" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/66SaEDzlmP4</a><p>Vitalik Buterin give and overview of the Ethereum protocol and shows what is an Ethereum transaction, what is Gas (and how computation time is actually paid for miners), how the state machine works and what you can do with it<p>- DEVCON1: Ethereum in the Enterprise Environment - Taylor Gerring
<a href="https://youtu.be/HXNWhXuMNpw" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/HXNWhXuMNpw</a><p>Expose core concepts about the blockchain and the Ethereum platform that are valuable to enterprise and how companies can leverage that using web technologies<p>---<p>Reading<p>- Coinbase - A beginner’s guide to Ethereum
<a href="https://blog.coinbase.com/a-beginners-guide-to-ethereum-46dd486ceecf" rel="nofollow">https://blog.coinbase.com/a-beginners-guide-to-ethereum-46dd...</a><p>- Fat Protocols
<a href="http://www.usv.com/blog/fat-protocols" rel="nofollow">http://www.usv.com/blog/fat-protocols</a><p>- The difference between App Coins and Protocol Tokens
<a href="https://blog.0xproject.com/the-difference-between-app-coins-and-protocol-tokens-7281a428348c" rel="nofollow">https://blog.0xproject.com/the-difference-between-app-coins-...</a><p>- What’s the Difference Between an ‘ICO’ and a ‘Token Launch’?
Coins vs. Tokens (What is a SNGLS token?)
<a href="https://medium.com/@SingularDTV/whats-the-difference-between-an-ico-and-a-token-launch-7105edbb2112" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@SingularDTV/whats-the-difference-between...</a><p>---<p>Source of links, links and more links<p>- /r/ethereum - getting started
<a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/61y5ix/welcome_to_rethereum_the_reddit_front_page_of_the/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/61y5ix/welcome_to...</a><p>- The Quiet Master of Cryptocurrency — Nick Szabo (Scroll to "Selected Links from the Episode”)
<a href="https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/" rel="nofollow">https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/</a><p>- What The Fuck Is Ethereum? ("I am a total nerd" option)
<a href="http://whatthefuckisethereum.com/#nerd" rel="nofollow">http://whatthefuckisethereum.com/#nerd</a><p>---<p>Extra reading<p>- Money, blockchains, and social scalability
<a href="http://unenumerated.blogspot.com.br/2017/02/money-blockchains-and-social-scalability.html" rel="nofollow">http://unenumerated.blogspot.com.br/2017/02/money-blockchain...</a><p>- Does your dapp need a token?
<a href="https://medium.com/@simondlr/does-your-dapp-need-a-token-39412fd3c62c" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@simondlr/does-your-dapp-need-a-token-394...</a><p>- Ethereum documentation
<a href="http://www.ethdocs.org/en/latest/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.ethdocs.org/en/latest/index.html</a><p>- Ethereum Wiki - FAQ
<a href="https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/FAQ" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/FAQ</a>
I started this a few months ago where you can learn smart contract development by doing projects: <a href="https://www.zastrin.com" rel="nofollow">https://www.zastrin.com</a>
If you want to stay updated on current news, I can recommend the <a href="http://blockchainweekly.net/" rel="nofollow">http://blockchainweekly.net/</a> newsletter.
Blockgeeks is great for beginner material and to understand the basics. <a href="https://blockgeeks.com/" rel="nofollow">https://blockgeeks.com/</a>
Check out the blockstack stuff. They have a to-do list tutorial available. Decentralized app development is kinda an etherem vs blockstack situation right now.
Preethi Kasireddy has done a pretty good job with her blog: <a href="https://www.hashhack.it" rel="nofollow">https://www.hashhack.it</a>
We recently launched a site to help people go from zero to hero with Blockchain technology. Feel free to sign up for the weekly newsletter here:<p><a href="http://www.theblockchainhq.com/newsletter/" rel="nofollow">http://www.theblockchainhq.com/newsletter/</a><p>We plan on covering "Getting started with Blockchain development" very soon as there it still an opportunity here to make this much easier.
Might be worth learning about DAG, Tangle and IOTA too, here is their latest whitepaper:
<a href="https://iota.org/IOTA_Whitepaper.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://iota.org/IOTA_Whitepaper.pdf</a>
shameless plug, but walk thru this example: <a href="https://simplecoin.life/ico" rel="nofollow">https://simplecoin.life/ico</a>