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Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

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41–50 of 76 posts

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#42

I recently was researching bitcoin, blockchain, etc, and I found it surprisingly difficult to find good but relatively short resources! I synthesized what I found into some slides that you might find helpful[1]. Apologies if this seems like self-promoting my own slides -- and I should say I am not at all an expert here -- but I created them mainly because I had trouble finding a "primer", so maybe they can help other…

hey - that's pretty cool. thanks for doing this. could you remake your slides for the web ? the slides are repeated (because of the transitions)

Thanks - I took out a bunch of extraneous transition slides (except in one place where I think it's helpful to see).

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He doesn't. That dude is a farce, I have no idea how he has convinced so many smart people to be on his show.

Probably by being a good interviewer.

No he's probably not boring rather. He's over-hyped because he's well connected in the Valley & known to heavy-weights like Sacca & Naval.

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#45

I recently read the white papers of both bitcoin and ethereum. I would definitely read bitcoin's white paper first. I actually read the annotated versions from Fermat's Library: - http://fermatslibrary.com/s/bitcoin - http://fermatslibrary.com/s/ethereum-a-next-generation-smart...

That site is obnoxious. I have habit of highlighting text as I read it. Every time I click on the text to highlight a huge tab pops in and out on the left side. Who thinks up this crap.

I do the same thing, reading articles on sites like medium is a nightmare since it demands I tweet my currently selected text. Annoying!

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#46
Aside from many 'theoritical' reading suggested by others here, I found that this tutorial is incredibly helpful: https://medium.com/@lhartikk/a-blockchain-in-200-lines-of-co...

I myself have also made the PHP version of the code implemented there. You could see it here: https://github.com/azophy/naivechain-php

Hope it helps

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#47

I wrote a three-part study on the Blockchain phenomenon a year ago, based on real experience with Ethereum. It's intended for web developers. It ends with an unusual conclusion. - https://marmelab.com/blog/2016/04/28/blockchain-for-web-deve... - https://marmelab.com/blog/2016/05/20/blockchain-for-web-deve... - https://marmelab.com/blog/2016/06/14/blockchain-for-web-deve...

> you must use an assembly-like language, which isn’t even Turing-complete. Yikes.

And then you go on to talk about how the contracts written in 'Turing Complete' languages are gagged and can't call APIs.

So why "Yikes"? Using turing complete DSLs for contracts is both unnecessary and problematic.

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#48

I recently read the white papers of both bitcoin and ethereum. I would definitely read bitcoin's white paper first. I actually read the annotated versions from Fermat's Library: - http://fermatslibrary.com/s/bitcoin - http://fermatslibrary.com/s/ethereum-a-next-generation-smart...

That site is obnoxious. I have habit of highlighting text as I read it. Every time I click on the text to highlight a huge tab pops in and out on the left side. Who thinks up this crap.

I have this habit too, and always wondered about it. Wish someone would have done a study on it.

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#49
I first learned about Bitcoin when Steve Gibson did an episode of his podcast Security Now on the topic:

https://www.grc.com/sn/sn-287.htm

If you have an understanding of basic cryptography primitives, then I think it's an excellent introduction, especially if you learn well via audio.

Re: Ask HN: A good primer on cryptocurrencies?

#50
I was looking for a good primer and I found the original Bitcoin paper itself to be a pretty good starting point: https://bitcoin.org/en/bitcoin-paper

Furthermore, I suggest the Princeton cryptocurrency intro course on coursera [1]. If you have CS background, you can skip the explanations of hashing etc and concentrate on the mechanics and incentives in cryptocurrencies, which are illustrated quite nicely.

[1] https://www.coursera.org/learn/cryptocurrency

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