Today we are going to see what is exactly is a Blockchain which can be used in an application from a company’s point of view using its own technology instead of outsourcing it for another company.
What Is A Blockchain?
Blockchain refers to a decentralized system. It is a kind of computer-based public ledger that records cryptocurrency transactions. The data stored on these systems cannot be changed or distorted. As a result, every time you write a new block in this database record is added to the list for all the other blocks. In short, Blockchain technology makes sure there is no misuse of information in any way. This has helped in reducing corruption in different sectors. Also, the process of retrieving transaction records was faster than before. Thus, now people will be able to know how the money was spent without the help of intermediaries.
The word “blockchain” is actually borrowed from the term virtual currency or digital currencies. These two terms refer to different technologies. One of them is a type of financial platform called Blockchain-based payment system with a token or a coin. But the second one is another one that uses cryptography to protect the user’s digital information.
The Blockchains Used By Companies For Their Business Operations
Let is look at some of the examples of companies who use Blockchain for their business operations. There are various enterprises using either Bitcoin (Bitcoin) or Ethereum (Ethereum). They use both cryptocurrencies to transact with the clients, although many businesses prefer Bitcoin. According to a few researchers, approximately $15 billion worth of crypto transactions were made last year.
There are still more entrepreneurs using similar services with less risk as compared to bitcoin transactions. Some even choose to accept ETH transactions for making payments by accepting Ethereum (ETH) coins for doing so. So this method makes things easier for the customers. Many startups also use it as a tool in making money. Most of them don’t depend on such projects. If it were not for the emergence of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, then there would have been many problems associated with online payment methods. That is why they opt for better solutions to pay their bills.
Types Of Applications Using Blockchain
We have already seen the example of several applications of Blockchain technology, but there are five categories where they are widely used today by several businesses. Here are some of these applications for your reference.
1. Tracking System
One of the most popular types of Blockchains is tracking and security. If you want to track something, you just need to purchase some tokens along with having access to that information. We can say that Blockchain facilitates transparency in everything. Even if we consider only accounting and reporting systems, all the other industries use same type of Blockchain. Like e-commerce, health care, banking, education and even software implementation.
2. Transparent Data Storage And Accessibility
A big part of Blockchain is the ability to maintain transparent data storage and accessibility. You can find out if someone owns or even a piece of digital property through Blockchain. Another notable feature is that of non-repudiation for all the facts. Now people can prove that he/she possesses the property rather than relying only on rumors. This means that all individuals can access this information with confidence. All these features are common in all sorts of industry verticals. However, sometimes you don’t need data related to assets and you need certain pieces of information to complete a project. Then Blockchain comes into play for getting those essential details. You can add more transparency and accountability into the development process of such project.
3. Encryption And Security
Crypto encryption is another aspect of Blockchain that helps save passwords and identity related to users. Similarly, the password authentication system allows them to authorize their account and keep their personal information safe. Once again, all of these features are common across different departments and industries which use Blockchain technology in their operation.
4. Proof Of Work(Pow) Based Transactions
Finally, Pow transaction is another significant feature of Blockchain. With the usage of Crypto mining, miners earn Bitcoins based on the transactions on the network. Those Bitcoins are paid to validators. Whenever any member of the group contributes to the validation process by solving cryptographic puzzles or cryptograms, they receive Reward Points or DPOs. Every miner wants his solution to win the reward. It adds trust in Cryptocurrency transactions. People choose to invest in it, thus investing in secure ways can create enormous value.
5. Transparency And Accountability
Transparency and accountability are other crucial factors considered for effective functioning of Blockchain technology. Any client can easily understand whether a specific asset belongs to him/her or it was purchased for another party. Apart from that Blockchain gives a high degree of transparency. Moreover, the history of every transaction can be traced on Blockchain. Again this is mostly applicable for organizations but blockchain can apply to each individual. Therefore, this can make it very efficient for everybody and provides much-needed comfort to anyone.
Blockchain Usage In Enterprise Level Solution
Now let us talk about enterprise level examples of technology utilizing Blockchain. To make things clear, let us take Amazon Web Services. They are among the leaders when it comes to adopting Big Data driven infrastructure for running their businesses. While working with this giant IT service firm, Jeff Bezos discovered that it wasn’t necessary that everyone should become a programmer to develop machine learning projects. He wanted to build a simple platform which could collect massive data and implement analytics. Amazon needed a platform which could store a huge amount of customer data and analyze it. So they started building this platform called Microservices architecture.
Microservices Architecture
The reason behind starting microservices architecture was the fact that it was difficult to manage all this data and come up with insightful insights. Nowadays there are numerous programming languages which allow developers to do this work. The problem with designing this architecture was that it had multiple layers. In contrast to that, AWS engineers decided to use Java, NodeJS, Terraform and Docker for developing this infrastructure management system. Because they knew that these language combinations offered the best results for managing all these protocols in a single environment.
Docker and Kubernetes are two tools used by the Linux engineers. Unlike other architectures, Docker and Kubernetes don’t offer too much flexibility. Hence, AWS team has decided to adapt it into the framework itself. Besides, when creating Docker containers, developers can use their preferred editor to edit code and deploy it to their desired place. Developers are given control over container’s settings as they are deployed. Finally, a developer takes advantage of all kinds of resources created within the container and utilize them.
After successfully deploying the initial layer on top of this structure, AWS decides to go ahead by adding additional layers again. Hence, in the next step Amazon introduces Lambda functions into the workflow. Soon, they move towards giving developers a choice to build server less function engines. Initially, it was known as lambda. Lambda function is mainly available for API calls but now it has extended features like batch processing and interactive tasks. Furthermore, it is being built for testing purposes to handle scalability issues. Later on, Amazon also supports multi-region deployments and lets developers choose between CPU, GPU, memory and network components.
Overall, IoT devices and AI services rely heavily on the Containerization concept. Although most cloud providers provide this technology today, IBM is one of those big players whose presence is strong. They don’t restrict themselves to providing only managed services; they also provide end-to-end Cloud Native Computing Platform. Just recently I had the chance to sit down with one of our senior representatives and discuss this emerging trend with her. She explained it with great clarity while explaining how she understood the benefit of such model and what benefits it brings to end consumers.
Blockchain vs Other Technologies
In the early days, IT teams used monolithic architecture, i.e., having separate computers with multiple processors and RAM. Since then they developed the idea of modular computing. Well-known ones are Apache Hadoop, Spark, RDS, MySQL etc. Each of these solutions has a main purpose. Only a limited number of programs run on these platforms. When we go beyond these borders, we get Distributed Databases, Graph QL and Stream Processing. Let’s compare these three technologies.
Distributed Database Approach
As the name suggests this approach does not rely on central servers but has several nodes scattered in different parts of the world. Usually, databases have tables spread across clusters or even geographical locations.
This technology is commonly used when storing large amounts of unstructured data because it saves time and space and reduces cost. It is primarily used in E2E, OO and WGIS applications.
Graph QL Approach
This approach works on the basis that all relevant entities on the graph need to be updated automatically. At present, it is quite common to find products that support advanced functionality like search, filtering and sorting. Such requests are fairly straightforward to solve using standard SQL queries. But since there are so many APIs available, this technique becomes complex. And there are some limitations to deal with errors. Nevertheless, its popularity is growing day after day because it addresses all business needs even if you work with real objects.
Stream Processing Approach
With the recent boom of Artificial Intelligence (AI), stream processing became especially appealing. It essentially processes streaming data through lightweight algorithms. Such technology can be applied in such fields as web application performance monitoring, video surveillance etc. You can find plenty of open source frameworks that have good packages with ease of integration with Python, PHP, Ruby and Postman. Moreover, they have been standardized by Facebook and Google. Recently, Netflix introduced Stream Processing as a component of QA automation.
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