The City of Joy witnesses its first Ethereum Hackathon
A distributed, decentralized revolutionary technology came into existence a couple of years back, which disrupted the power of centralized organizations and was all set to change the direction of the business models globally and become a crucial phenomenon among organizations. Blockchain technology has gathered eyeballs and has been adopted by multiple industries across the world and has become popular among multiple firms in India. Now they are on a constant process to customize the technology and tailor-make it to fit into their product and service offerings.
Taking a cue from the increasing demand in the market, a Kolkata based tech startup, Math & Cody has decided to go ahead with various developer tools around the disruptive technology.
Taking a leap into this dimension further, Math & Cody, a Kolkata based blockchain startup conducted a 3-day workshop at the prestigious Jadavpur University about Ethereum blockchain. The workshop comprised of around 30 students from the University. The core objective of the workshop was to enlighten the students around the blockchain technology know-how and create awareness and build interest.
Theoretical concepts, in-depth understanding of the blockchain technology, decentralized applications, and hands-on practical tasks were the key highlights of the workshop. It was followed by a demonstration by the Team Math & Cody around the dApp and a full-day hackathon.
The workshop covered the following areas of blockchain development -
- Blockchain basics, the protocols and differentiating factors from other technologies ruling the market
- Managing transactions and how to create an identity ‘key-pair’ on Ethereum blockchain
- Generate proof of ownership without providing/disclosing your sensitive data
- Understanding Bitcoin/Ethereum Main and Test Networks and use them for development
- Understanding the different stages of a blockchain transaction lifecycle
- Understanding the value of a private, public and permissioned blockchain
- Be prompt enough to decode and encode the different digital assets and create a digital identity
The other aspects of the workshop included a smooth transition from Bitcoin to Ethereum blockchain. The students were asked to build a dApp (decentralized application) that would allow the user to send and receive an encrypted email with a legit Ethereum wallet address.
The purpose behind the exercise was to showcase the ability to encrypt and store data on the digital front using the RSA algorithm on the Ethereum blockchain. Also, the students were taught how to build the back-end infrastructure for the Ethereum based e-mail system with a pre-developed front-end such that the infrastructure could be curated and fused in for any kind of modern web applications.
A hackathon of its kind was open to the students of Jadavpur University only and a project was given to them upon the completion of the workshop. The project was called ‘Ethmail’, whereby the students had to integrate their learning throughout the workshop and facilitate a decentralized application. The students were divided into teams such that there was efficiency in executing the project and a simulation of a real-world hackathon could be experienced.
The module largely encompassed the representation of an idea accompanied by a prototype model. The project was time-bound. Total time of around 6 hours was given for coding and development purposes. Another 1 hour for testing the same. The ownership aspect of the property built was given to the teams and they were permitted to make the project available on the blockchain marketplace upon completion.
In a nutshell, this was a major move on team Math & Cody’s end to conduct a workshop that eventually culminated into a hackathon as the response received was stupendous. It opened newer avenues for further workshops, hackathons and webinars revolving around the blockchain technology.
Team Math & Cody believes that there is a big void in the tech market space for trained manpower in the blockchain ecosystem. They wish to conquer the void by providing support to students who have an inkling towards this field.
As the future knocks the next door, Math & Cody plans to bring a set of researchers and technology enthusiasts on board to demonstrate their work in progress’ (WIP) around the disruptive technology and garner expert comments and recommendations around it. Likewise, collaborate with people across the country and unite them under a similar plan of action and bring in a movement.
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