Blockchain Developer's Guide
Develop smart applications with Blockchain technologies - Ethereum, JavaScript, Hyperledger Fabric, and Corda
1st Edition
Published on 21. December 2018
564 pages
978-1-78995-773-0 (ISBN)
Description
Build real-world projects like a smart contract deployment platform, betting apps, wallet services, and much more using blockchainKey FeaturesApply blockchain principles and features for making your life and business betterUnderstand Ethereum for smart contracts and DApp deploymentTackle current and future challenges and problems relating to blockchainBook DescriptionBlockchain applications provide a single-shared ledger to eliminate trust issues involving multiple stakeholders. It is the main technical innovation of Bitcoin, where it serves as the public ledger for Bitcoin transactions.Blockchain Developer's Guide takes you through the electrifying world of blockchain technology. It begins with the basic design of a blockchain and elaborates concepts, such as Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs), tokens, smart contracts, and other related terminologies. You will then explore the components of Ethereum, such as Ether tokens, transactions, and smart contracts that you need to build simple DApps.Blockchain Developer's Guide also explains why you must specifically use Solidity for Ethereum-based projects and lets you explore different blockchains with easy-to-follow examples. You will learn a wide range of concepts - beginning with cryptography in cryptocurrencies and including ether security, mining, and smart contracts. You will learn how to use web sockets and various API services for Ethereum. By the end of this Learning Path, you will be able to build efficient decentralized applications.This Learning Path includes content from the following Packt products:Blockchain Quick Reference by Brenn Hill, Samanyu Chopra, Paul ValencourtBuilding Blockchain Projects by Narayan PrustyWhat you will learnUnderstand how various components of the blockchain architecture workGet familiar with cryptography and the mechanics behind blockchainApply consensus protocol to determine the business sustainabilityUnderstand what ICOs and crypto-mining are, and how they workWho this book is forBlockchain Developer's Guide is for you if you want to get to grips with the blockchain technology and develop your own distributed applications. It is also designed for those who want to polish their existing knowledge regarding the various pillars of the blockchain ecosystem. Prior exposure to an object-oriented programming language such as JavaScript is needed.
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Brenn Hill | Samanyu Chopra | Paul Valencourt
Blockchain Developer's Guide
Develop smart applications with Blockchain technologies - Ethereum, JavaScript, Hyperledger Fabric, and Corda
Book
12/2018
Packt Publishing
€57.60
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Content
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- About Packt
- Contributors
- Table of Contents
- Preface
- Chapter 1: Blockchain 101
- Processing a financial transaction
- Ledger
- Concept of a trustless system
- Introducing blockchain
- General elements of blockchain
- Peer-to-peer network
- Block
- Block header
- Addresses
- Wallets
- Transaction
- Nodes
- What does blockchain solve?
- Types of blockchains
- Public blockchain
- Semi-private blockchain
- Private blockchain
- Consortium blockchain
- Byzantine generals problem
- Consensus
- Blockchain in a nutshell
- Benefits
- Banking records
- Medical records
- Government records
- Creative and copyright records
- University degree records
- Challenges
- Complexity
- Network scalability
- Speed and cost
- Double spending
- Summary
- Chapter 2: Components and Structure of Blockchain
- Blocks
- The chain between blocks
- Hashing and signatures
- Digital signatures
- What are digital keys?
- Example block data
- Example Ethereum block
- Bitcoin block
- Global state
- Block time and block size
- Blockchain miners
- Blockchain validators
- Smart contracts
- Blockchain speed
- How to calculate blockchain throughput
- Comparisons with traditional networks
- Summary
- Chapter 3: Decentralization Versus Distributed Systems
- Distributed systems
- Resiliency
- Fault tolerance and failure isolation
- Consensus and coordination
- Backups
- Consistency
- Peer-to-peer systems
- Decentralized systems
- Principles of decentralized systems
- Open access
- Non-hierarchical
- Ecosystem diversity
- Transparency
- Downsides
- Speed
- Censorship resistance
- Chaos and non-determinism
- Summary
- Chapter 4: Cryptography and Mechanics Behind Blockchain
- Principles of security
- Historical perspective - classical cryptography
- Types of cryptography
- Symmetric cryptography
- Asymmetric (public-key) cryptography
- Signatures
- Hashing
- The avalanche effect
- Collisions
- Hashing a block
- Hashing outside PoW
- Summary
- Chapter 5: Bitcoin
- The history of Bitcoin
- Why Bitcoin is volatile
- Keys and addresses
- Currency units
- Vanity addresses
- Base58 check encoding
- Transactions
- Types
- Pay-to-Public-Key Hash
- Pay-to-Script Hash
- Blocks
- Genesis block
- Bitcoin network
- Types of nodes
- Full node
- Lightweight nodes
- Other nodes
- Network discovery
- Finding peers
- DNS seeds
- Static IPs
- Wallets
- Types
- Deterministic wallet
- Deterministic wallets
- HD wallets
- Non-deterministic wallet
- Summary
- Chapter 6: Altcoins
- Introducing Altcoins
- Tokens
- Ethereum
- Omni Layer
- NEO
- Waves
- Counterparty
- Alternative currency
- Monetary alternatives
- Consensus alternatives
- Litecoin
- Ether
- Ripple
- Bitcoin Cash
- Acquiring cryptocurrency
- Mining of cryptocurrency
- Bitcoin mining
- Mining difficulty
- Mining pools
- Altcoin mining
- Cryptocurrency exchanges
- Cryptocurrency wallets
- Summary
- Chapter 7: Achieving Consensus
- Practical Byzantine fault tolerance algorithm
- Byzantine faults
- How PBFT works
- Proof of Work
- How the PoW problem works in Bitcoin
- Proof of Stake
- The nothing-at-stake attack
- Variations
- Delegated Proof of Stake
- Tendermint consensus
- Proof of Authority
- Establishing authority
- Proof of Elapsed time
- Summary
- References
- Chapter 8: Advanced Blockchain Concepts
- Blockchain and banks
- Unbanked - going pure crypto
- Fixing pegs
- Buying options
- Why regulated exchanges?
- Unbanked and unincorporated?
- The DAO
- Decentralizing an organization
- Putting a corporation on a blockchain
- Cutting out the middle man
- Providing capital
- Social purpose - blockchain as leveler
- Banking the unbanked
- Silk road LLC - privacy and ethics
- Tracking all the things
- Defeating some privacy issues with zero-knowledge proofs
- Unwrapping the concept of zero-knowledge proofs
- Summary
- Chapter 9: Cryptocurrency Wallets
- Introduction to cryptocurrency wallets
- Transactions in cryptocurrency wallets
- Types of cryptocurrency wallets
- Currency support
- Tenancy
- Software wallets
- Hardware wallets
- Paper wallets
- Brain wallet
- Usage frequency
- Key derivation
- Non-deterministic wallet
- Deterministic wallets
- Hierarchical deterministic wallets
- Mnemonic codes
- Key generation process in HD wallets
- Child key derivation
- Private key generation
- Extended keys
- Summary
- Chapter 10: Alternate Blockchains
- Various uses of blockchain
- Government
- Healthcare
- Medical research
- Supply chain
- Copyright
- Fine art
- Shipping
- Energy
- Computation and data storage
- Identification and social security
- Enterprise
- Ripple
- Transactions
- Stellar
- Tendermint
- Monax
- Summary
- Chapter 11: Hyperledger and Enterprise Blockchains
- History of Hyperledger
- Hyperledger projects
- Hyperledger Burrow
- Hyperledger Sawtooth
- Sawtooth architecture
- Transaction families
- Transactions and batches
- The key pieces
- Hyperledger Fabric
- Architecture choices and features
- Organizational focus
- Private channels
- Assets
- Smart contracts
- Advantages of Fabric
- Hyperledger Iroha
- Hyperledger Indy
- Tools in Hyperledger
- Hyperledger Caliper
- Hyperledger Composer
- Hyperledger Cello
- Hyperledger Explorer
- Hyperledger Quilt
- Relationships between the tools
- Which Hyperledger project should you use?
- Using Hyperledger
- Summary
- Chapter 12: Ethereum 101
- Introducing Ethereum
- Components of Ethereum
- Ethereum accounts
- Ethereum network
- Ethereum public MainNet
- Ethereum clients
- Geth
- Installing Geth
- Managing accounts
- Ethereum gas
- Ethereum virtual machine
- Execution environment
- Ethereum block
- Block header
- Ommers or uncles
- Messages
- Ethash
- Ether
- Procuring ether
- Trading
- Summary
- Chapter 13: Solidity 101
- Basics of Solidity
- The basics of working on Solidity
- Using the compiler
- Programming in Solidity
- Laying out a Solidity file
- Importing files
- Commenting
- Tags
- Structure of a contract
- State variables
- Functions
- Function modifiers
- Events
- Types
- Value types
- Boolean
- Integers
- Address
- Array value type
- Literal
- Enums
- Function
- Function Modifiers
- Reference types
- Structs
- Data location
- Mapping
- Units and global variables
- Summary
- Chapter 14: Smart Contracts
- Why smart contracts?
- Automating processes and resolutions between parties
- Real-world example
- Increased transparency
- Ending centralized data
- Increased fairness
- Smart contract approaches
- Example Ethereum smart contracts
- The promises
- Security considerations
- Dealing with threats in smart contracts
- Limitations of smart contracts
- Data quality and mistakes
- Legal validity
- Stability of meaning
- Summary
- References
- Chapter 15: Ethereum Accounts and Ether Tokens
- Introducing Ethereum accounts
- Ethereum state transition function
- Genesis block
- Transaction receipts
- Elements
- Post-transaction state
- Gas used
- Set of logs
- The bloom filter
- Structure
- Transaction sub state
- Suicide set
- Log series
- Refund balance
- Messages
- Calls
- Ethereum block validation
- Uncles validation
- Block difficulty
- Block finalization
- Disadvantages of Ethereum-based tokens
- Summary
- Chapter 16: Decentralized Applications
- What makes an application decentralized
- Defining a decentralized application
- Decentralized apps and blockchain
- Using blockchain does not make an application decentralized
- Major decentralized blockchain applications
- Aragon
- district0x
- What is a district?
- Ethereum name service
- Civic/uPort
- Gnosis
- Steemit
- CryptoKitties
- Summary
- References
- Chapter 17: Mining
- Cryptocurrency mining
- The mining process
- Algorithms
- Mining hardware
- CPU-based mining
- GPU-based mining
- FPGA-based mining
- ASIC-based mining
- Miner types
- Cloud mining
- Hardware mining
- Mining rigs
- Mining pools
- Pay-per-share - PPS
- Proportional - PROP
- Pay-per-last-N-shares - PPLNS
- The double geometric method - DGM
- Shared maximum pay per share - SMPPS
- Equalized shared maximum pay per share - ESMPPS
- Recent shared maximum pay per share - RSMPPS
- Capped pay per share with recent backpay - CPPSRB
- Bitcoin pooled mining - BPM
- Pay on target - POT
- SCORE
- Popular pools
- Mining software
- Summary
- Chapter 18: ICO 101
- The current state of the ICO market
- Increasing volume of ICOs
- Typical aspects of an ICO campaign
- Whitepaper
- Private placement
- Pre-sale
- Good pre-sale practices
- Public sale
- Capped sale
- Uncapped sale
- Dutch auction
- Influencer marketing
- PR campaigns
- Content marketing
- ICO reviewers
- Smart contract and prototype development
- Code audits
- Bounty campaigns
- Airdrops
- Road shows
- Issues with ICOs and blockchain projects
- Proof of product-market fit and traction
- Low barrier to entry
- Does a project really need the blockchain?
- Misleading token practices
- Legality
- Utility versus Security
- Other considerations
- Sustainability
- Advantages of ICOs
- Liquidity
- Lack of gatekeepers
- Minimal investment sizes
- Notable scams
- Onecoin
- Pincoin and iFan
- Bitconnect
- Other problems
- Major hacks
- The DAO
- Parity
- Securing an ICO
- SSH key locked servers
- DNS security
- Intrusion detection
- Purchase related domains
- Monitor social channels
- Multi-signature wallets
- Code audits
- Conclusion
- References
- Chapter 19: Creating Your Own Currency
- Understanding types of cryptocurrency
- Tokens based on existing blockchains
- Creating a new blockchain from scratch
- A forked blockchain with one's own genesis block
- Litecoin's development
- The process
- Creating one's own cryptocurrency
- Setting up Litecoin
- Platform selection
- Preparation
- Dependency installation
- Build instructions
- Setting up our own coin
- Port selection
- The setting of block-related parameters
- Amount limit
- The coinbase maturity number
- Genesis block creation
- Wallet address
- Checkpoints
- Creatives and graphics
- Summing up
- Summary
- Chapter 20: Scalability and Other Challenges
- Scalability and decentralization
- Blockchains in business
- Usability
- Lack of protection
- 51% attacks
- Network forks
- Catastrophic bugs
- Lack of interoperability
- Low availability of blockchain skills
- Privacy
- Energy consumption
- Summary
- References
- Chapter 21: Future of Blockchain
- Ongoing fragmentation and specialization
- Video games
- Real estate
- Logistics
- Licensing
- Industry consortiums
- A large number of total-loss projects
- Legal and regulatory evolution
- Security token offerings
- Aggregate and insurance products
- Technological stabilization
- Ethereum and Hyperledger
- Service consolidation and product offerings
- Cross-chain communication
- Intersecting with AI and IoT
- Blockchain-intersecting AI
- Blockchain-intersecting IoT
- Summary
- Chapter 22: Understanding Decentralized Applications
- Decentralized autonomous organization
- User identity in DApps
- User accounts in DApps
- Accessing the centralized apps
- Internal currency in DApps
- Disadvantages of internal currency in DApps
- What are permissioned DApps?
- Popular DApps
- Bitcoin
- What is a ledger?
- What is blockchain?
- Is Bitcoin legal?
- Why would someone use Bitcoin?
- Ethereum
- The Hyperledger project
- IPFS
- How does it work?
- Filecoin
- Namecoin
- .bit domains
- Dash
- Decentralized governance and budgeting
- Decentralized service
- BigChainDB
- OpenBazaar
- Ripple
- Summary
- Chapter 23: Understanding How Ethereum Works
- Transactions
- Timestamp
- Nonce
- Block time
- Forking
- Genesis block
- Peer discovery
- Whisper and Swarm
- Ethereum Wallet
- Serenity
- Payment and state channels
- Proof-of-stake and casper
- Sharding
- Summary
- Chapter 24: Writing Smart Contracts
- Solidity source files
- The structure of a smart contract
- Data location
- What are the different data types?
- Arrays
- Strings
- Structs
- Enums
- Mappings
- The delete operator
- Conversion between elementary types
- Using var
- Control structures
- Creating contracts using the new operator
- Exceptions
- External function calls
- Features of contracts
- Visibility
- Function modifiers
- The fallback function
- Inheritance
- The super keyword
- Abstract contracts
- Libraries
- Using for
- Returning multiple values
- Importing other Solidity source files
- Globally available variables
- Block and transaction properties
- Address type related
- Contract related
- Ether units
- Proof of existence, integrity, and ownership contract
- Compiling and deploying contracts
- Summary
- Chapter 25: Getting Started with web3.js
- Introduction to web3.js
- Importing web3.js
- Connecting to nodes
- The API structure
- BigNumber.js
- Unit conversion
- Retrieving gas price, balance, and transaction details
- Sending ether
- Working with contracts
- Retrieving and listening to contract events
- Building a client for an ownership contract
- The project structure
- Building the backend
- Building the frontend
- Testing the client
- Summary
- Chapter 26: Building a Wallet Service
- hooked-web3-provider and ethereumjs-tx libraries
- Introduction to LightWallet
- HD derivation path
- Building a wallet service
- Prerequisites
- Project structure
- Building the backend
- Building the frontend
- Testing
- Summary
- Chapter 27: Building a Smart Contract Deployment Platform
- Calculating a transaction's nonce
- Introducing solcjs
- Installing solcjs
- solcjs APIs
- Using a different compiler version
- Linking libraries
- Updating the ABI
- Building a contract deployment platform
- The project structure
- Building the backend
- Building the frontend
- Testing
- Summary
- Chapter 28: Building a Betting App
- Introduction to Oraclize
- How does it work?
- Data sources
- Proof of authenticity
- Pricing
- Getting started with the Oraclize API
- Setting the proof type and storage location
- Sending queries
- Scheduling queries
- Custom gas
- Callback functions
- Parsing helpers
- Getting the query price
- Encrypting queries
- Decrypting the data source
- Oraclize web IDE
- Working with strings
- Building the betting contract
- Building a client for the betting contract
- Projecting the structure
- Building the backend
- Building the frontend
- Testing the client
- Summary
- Chapter 29: Building Enterprise Level Smart Contracts
- Exploring ethereumjs-testrpc
- Installation and usage
- The testrpc command-line application
- Using ethereumjs-testrpc as a web3 provider or as an HTTP server
- Available RPC methods
- What are event topics?
- Getting started with truffle-contract
- Installing and importing truffle-contract
- Setting up a testing environment
- The truffle-contract API
- The contract abstraction API
- Creating contract instances
- The contract instance API
- Introduction to truffle
- Installing truffle
- Initializing truffle
- Compiling contracts
- Configuration files
- Deploying contracts
- Migration files
- Writing migrations
- Unit testing contracts
- Writing tests in JavaScript
- Writing tests in Solidity
- How to send ether to a test contract
- Running tests
- Package management
- Package management via NPM
- Package management via EthPM
- Using contracts of packages within your contracts
- Using artifacts of packages within your JavaScript code
- Accessing a package's contracts deployed addresses in Solidity
- Using truffle's console
- Running external scripts in truffle's context
- Truffle's build pipeline
- Running an external command
- Running a custom function
- Truffle's default builder
- Building a client
- Truffle's server
- Summary
- Chapter 30: Building a Consortium Blockchain
- What is a consortium blockchain?
- What is Proof-of-Authority consensus?
- Introduction to parity
- Understanding how Aura works
- Getting parity running
- Installing rust
- Linux
- OS X
- Windows
- Downloading, installing and running parity
- Creating a private network
- Creating accounts
- Creating a specification file
- Launching nodes
- Connecting nodes
- Permissioning and privacy
- Summary
- Other Books You May Enjoy
- Index
