Book Image

Blockchain across Oracle

By : Robert van Molken
Book Image

Blockchain across Oracle

By: Robert van Molken

Overview of this book

Blockchain across Oracle gives you the professional orientation to Blockchain that you need as an Oracle developer in today’s changing world. Written and prepared for you by Oracle Developer Champion Robert van Mölken, this book gets you up to speed with the details of the Blockchain - core concepts, how to implement Oracle’s Blockchain Cloud Service, industry implications for the Blockchain, and how the Blockchain will affect your Oracle customers. Robert van Mölken introduces you to the history and concepts of the Blockchain. You’ll really get to understand the Blockchain inside and out, as an Oracle developer or solution architect. You’ll understand the Blockchain flow, and how the hashes and chains create a new decentralised paradigm for you as an Oracle developer. You’ll gain insights into how the Blockchain affects Oracle developers and customers in this modern and disruptive era. You’ll see how the Blockchain concepts work in this new world where Assets, Transactions, Security, and Privacy, can all be sustained across a decentralized system for your customers. Then you'll find a detailed look at the cutting-edge Oracle middleware solutions. You’ll learn about Hyperledger Fabric, the opensource Blockchain framework used by Oracle as its core, and how to set up your own Oracle Blockchain Network. You’ll design and develop a smart contract, and learn how to run it on the Oracle Blockchain Cloud Service. The final part of the book looks at how the Blockchain will affect your customers across various industry sectors. By studying industry trends in the financial services sector, healthcare industry, and the transport industry, you’ll discover how the options and possibilities for you and your clients are being transformed by the Blockchain across Oracle. You’ll complete this professional orientation by looking at Blockchain trends and future directions.
Table of Contents (24 chapters)
Title Page
Packt Upsell
Contributors
Preface
3
Blockchain 101 - Assets, Transactions, and Hashes
4
Blockchain 101 - Blocks, Chains, and Consensus
Index

Chapter 1. An Introduction to the Blockchain

This chapter serves as an introduction to the blockchain and its underlying technology. It requires minimal technical knowledge. It summarizes the content that you can expect to encounter in the upcoming chapters that go into greater depth. In this chapter, I will explain the blockchain technology is on a more architectural level, rather than describing every detail of each component or layer.

When you ask 10 people what they think the term blockchain means, you might not be surprised to get 10 different and conflicting answers, as use of the term blockchain can be a bit confusing. A lot of people connect it to Bitcoin (https://bitcoin.org/) or other virtual (crypto) currencies. Some people talk about the Ethereum Application Platform (https://ethereum.org), some about smart contracts (executable code), but most of the time, blockchain is explained as a distributed, shared ledger.

In essence, a blockchain is a system of maintaining digitally-distributed ledgers in a way that allows individuals who do not fully trust each other to agree on updates to the shared ledger. Blockchains use peer-to-peer protocols rather than a central authority or third party to distribute and verify transactions between entities. There is no single point of failure, so entities can appear, disappear, or malfunction without affecting the group.

In this chapter, you will learn about the following topics:

  • What is a blockchain and how does it work?
  • What is the architecture behind the blockchain ecosystem?
  • What are the differences between public and private blockchains?
  • How secure is a blockchain, and what about an individual's privacy?
  • What kind of applications can run on a blockchain?