Digesting smart contracts in Ethereum blockchain networks

Abstract

Blockchain relies on a peer-to-peer trusted model over a transparent publicly-available distributed ledger. Much has been said about this particular definition, about the technology, its benefits, potential for new market niches, and revolutionary possibilities. Functional aspects are typically put forward, whereas non-functional sides like performance issues and, above all, security threats are left in a second line. The excitement on this technology yields most of the literature to report success cases and final results. However, there are fewer works focusing on practical technology revisions that provide the insights into blockchain fundamental technology. To effectively widespread this technology it is needed to digest the basic tools that enable the creation of a blockchain application and that enable one to join a particular blockchain network of her/his interest. This paper describes and analyzes, from a practical point of view, the implementation of Solidity smart contracts and their deployment on an Ethereum blockchain network. Moreover, it discusses in the end limitations of the technology as far as its security issues is concerned.