You must have noticed how the cryptocurrency market became a desirable way of earning money, in the last decade. So many people are talking about it and considering it a passive way of earning money, if not dedicating themselves to it fully. The job of blockchain developer is wanted more, day by day. The companies all over the world have been turning to develop blockchain solutions, and therefore are in constant need of developers. The labor market cannot offer as many as are needed.
In other words, within the blockchain industry, there is an obvious need for people who are ready to improve their skills and learn new things constantly. That’s why those who enthusiastic enough about this newly popular technology and possess the knowledge of any programming language (JavaScript and such) can jump on this train and start learning more about blockchain.
Becoming a blockchain programmer is certainly not something you do in a day, but it is certainly a good investment for your future as a potential skill to be included in your portfolio and add to your labor market competitiveness.
To give an idea on how to this, here a fresh 2020 guide.
Start from the basics
We are living in the advanced technology era and all the knowledge in the world is available on the Internet. So, if you cannot afford to go and study the matter in University, you can always learn by yourself. If this is the case, start from the basics, like what is cryptography. Cryptography as a word and the science that borrowed the name to cryptocurrencies is certainly a good first step towards understanding blockchain. Although the knowledge is not necessary to become a blockchain developer (because it is possible to use existing cryptographic methods), this is a solid introduction on how to protect and secure the data handled in the blockchain. At the same time, cryptography as a topic has been famous long enough that you will not lose anything by knowing it, even if one day it turns out that blockchain is not the technology of the future. There are countless authors that wrote on this subject, so reading a book about it is certainly a good start.
Although blockchain surpasses application in the world of finance and cryptocurrencies those who are ambitious enough to go to the depth of technology are often advised to also get basic knowledge in the crypto economy. Many webinars, quality texts, and courses on this subject can be found online. The process of trading cryptocurrencies and software that analyzes the market, such as cryptosoft are also a good source of information.
It is only natural than to pay attention to the nature of decentralization, distributed systems, and consensus. The material on these topics will also include terms such as decentralized applications (apps), smart contracts, proof of work, digital signatures, wallets, private keys, ICO, and others. These are the terms that need to be clearly understood, without having to search the internet for their definition all the time.
Learn about the most promising cryptocurrencies
So far, bitcoin and Ethereum have the reputation of the most popular of all cryptocurrencies, and currently the most promising, it is quite reasonable to start by getting acquainted with them to deepen your knowledge. After that, all other cryptocurrencies become easier to understand.
As for written sources about bitcoin, the obligatory reading material for understanding both currencies is their white papers. Development tips are also available on the official bitcoin website, and Andreas Antonopoulos’ book Mastering Bitcoin is something like a bible about the mentioned currency. Of course, there are also courses offering knowledge on a subject, if you prefer this way of learning.
As for Ethereum, if for nothing else, dig some information on it because it had popularized smart contracts – a protocol that enables the existence of everything blockchain contains.
Anyway, one of the key things about ethereum is learning Solidity, a programming language for writing smart contracts that is important for making decentralized applications and running ICOs.
Being familiar with how different types of blockchain behave
Once you move from theory and step into practice, the next step is to build a bridge between user experience and smart contracts, ie. creating decentralized applications. After all, technical skills are what makes a good developer.
The development of decentralized applications, the so-called dApps, consists of a series of steps that require a high degree of knowledge in the field of computer programming. Most of the major components that make up a blockchain are developed using one or more major programming languages, such as C, C ++, Python, or JavaScript.
It is for this reason that you must have a certain degree of knowledge of computing in general and blockchain technology, more specifically.
This simply means that first of all you need to become a good blockchain programmer to know how different types of blockchains behave and what are the main features that can be exploited within dApps. Each of them can work better in different aspects, depending on the way they are conceived and designed, such as safety, scalability, usability, etc.
From this, it can be concluded that it is necessary to first assess the choice of blockchain on which to develop dApp, based on both the necessary characteristics and the type of goal to be achieved. An important assumption is that the blockchain must be programmable, ie. It must allow you to “build” new types of applications on it using smart contracts.
With this article, it wasn’t our intension to give you a complete guide about the learning process itself but to convince and show you that to learn something new you need to follow a certain path and have initiative. In this case, Google is your friend. It will easily provide you with the number of books, forums, social network profiles from people who write and publish stuff about this subject.
Learning is more connected to the will than the availability of resources.
