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Deconstructing Blockchains: Concepts, Systems, and Insights

Published: 25 June 2018 Publication History

Abstract

Popularly known for powering cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, blockchains is seen as a disruptive technology capable of impacting a wide variety of domains, ranging from finance to governance, by offering superior security, reliability, and transparency in a decentralized manner. In this tutorial presentation, we first study the original Bitcoin design, as well as Ethereum and Hyperledger, and reflect on their design from an academic perspective. We provide an overview of potential applications and associated research challenges, as well as a survey of ongoing research projects. We mention opportunities blockchain creates for event-based systems. Finally, we conclude with a walkthrough showing the process of developing a decentralized application (ĐSApp), using a popular Smart Contract language (Solidity) for the blockchain platform of Ethereum.

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    cover image ACM Conferences
    DEBS '18: Proceedings of the 12th ACM International Conference on Distributed and Event-based Systems
    June 2018
    289 pages
    ISBN:9781450357821
    DOI:10.1145/3210284
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

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    Published: 25 June 2018

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    Author Tags

    1. Bitcoin
    2. Blockchain
    3. Distributed Ledger Technology
    4. Ethereum
    5. Hyperledger
    6. Smart Contracts

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    DEBS '18 Paper Acceptance Rate 12 of 31 submissions, 39%;
    Overall Acceptance Rate 145 of 583 submissions, 25%

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