Certified Blockchain Solutions Architect (CBSA)

Explore blockchain fundamentals and understand what a blockchain is, its components, and essential terminology for the CBSA exam.

Blockchains are cryptographically secure, shared, distributed ledgers that replicate immutable transactions across nodes. They can be private or public, emphasize trust, and write once without updating or deleting past records.

Explore blockchain terminology and core concepts, from distributed ledgers and immutable blocks to cryptocurrency, dapps, smart contracts, and DAOs. Learn how encryption, forks, tokens, wallets, and public keys underpin systems.

Explore the key blockchain components: cryptography, peer-to-peer networking, a shared digital ledger, consensus algorithms, validity rules, and virtual machines, and how they enable secure, distributed node networks and world state.

Explore module three exam objectives in detail, line by line, with whiteboard sessions, demos, and review questions to test your knowledge and progress to the next lesson.

Explore blockchain consensus fundamentals, including proof of work, proof of stake, delegated proof of stake, and byzantine fault tolerance. Emphasize safety, liveness, and mining incentives.

Explore what cryptocurrency is and why enterprises may or may not need it, including mining, ICOs, and the distinction between a blockchain platform and a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin or Ether.

Explore the differences between public, private, and permissioned blockchains, and how transparency, compliance, and enterprise use shape their design. See examples like Bitcoin, Etherium, Hyperledger, Corda, and Ripple.

Explore how blocks are written to a blockchain, containing transaction data and a hash chain. Includes the Merkle root, nonce, genesis block, and mining.

See how blocks are written to a blockchain through a live demo, exploring blocks with transactions, nonces, hashes, and the previous hash, and how changing inputs alters the output.

Walk through a bitcoin-style transaction from wallet to recipient, illustrating how a broadcasted, validated transaction becomes a block with a hash and immutably added to the blockchain.

Explore cryptography concepts such as private and public keys, symmetric versus asymmetric encryption, and how wallets from web to paper secure transactions with encryption, multi-signature, and unique addresses.

learn to set up the litecoin core wallet, sync the local blockchain, and send or receive litecoin between Coinbase and the core wallet, using a blockchain explorer for verification.

Compare databases and blockchains, from centralized relational and non-relational systems with CRUD and fast performance to decentralized, write-once, immutable networks with timestamped transactions.

It compares permissioned and public blockchains, highlighting use cases across finance, logistics, government programs, real estate titles, and digital identity, with transparency for public blockchains and privacy for private ones.

Explore common use cases for private and permissioned blockchains, compare public versus private ledgers, and examine governance, industry verticals, smart contracts, business models like B2B and B2C.

Explore the essential steps to launch your own blockchain, from defining the use case to platform choices, proof of concept testing, design of nodes, APIs, and production deployment.

Explore how hard forks, soft forks, and SegWit affect blockchain health and consensus, including block height triggers, protocol upgrades, and impacts on miners and transaction capacity.

Explore why mining is essential only for proof-of-work consensus, how mining nodes perform work to confirm transactions and deter fake ones, and contrast with proof-of-stake and byzantine fault tolerance.

Explore the byzantine generals problem and how byzantine fault tolerance enables secure consensus in blockchain, comparing proof of work with private blockchains like hyperledger using raft or zooKeeper.

Explore key blockchain consensus methods, including proof of work, proof of stake, delegated proof of stake, and related trade-offs like energy use, on-chain governance, and nothing at stake issues.

Explore hashing as a mechanism that converts input into a 256-bit output, where identical inputs yield identical outputs and any change yields a different result, enabling tamper-proof blockchain data integrity.

Explore how hashing converts input data into a hash, where inputs yield the same output and small changes produce different hashes, with blocks linked by nonces and hashes on blockchain.

Explore how private and public keys secure blockchain communications, distinguish symmetric from asymmetric encryption, and examine PKI, x509 certificates, and identity validation.

Discover how smart contracts and dapps automate agreements on blockchain, define rules, and execute value transfers with autonomy, security, speed, and cost savings.

Trace the history of blockchain by highlighting key dates: Satoshi's white paper in 2008, Bitcoin release in 2009, and Etherium and Hyperledger in 2015, essential for exam readiness.

Identify the two primary blockchain programming languages: solidity for Ethereum and Go for Hyperledger Fabric.

Discover common testing and deployment practices for blockchain applications, balancing the software development lifecycle with agile, waterfall, and spiral models, and planning secure peer-to-peer designs and interfaces.

Watch MetaMask demo showing how MetaMask acts as a web3 browser to run Ethereum dapps without a full node, view transactions with explorers, and explore test networks and gas concepts.

Explore how blockchain creates value through smart contracts, tokens, security, privacy, and efficiency. Leverage CapEx and OpEx reductions, improved privacy, risk reduction, and faster time to market for enterprises.

Explore blockchain architecture by examining the four pillars: shared data, smart contracts, immutable ledgers, and distributed nodes, and how enterprise blockchains use channels and privacy to balance performance and decentralization.

Explore the Corda transaction lifecycle across three states: transaction builder, signed transaction, and ledger transaction, highlighting signatures, notaries, and multi-node inspection and resolution.

Explore enterprise blockchains for applications, including Ethereum, Hyperledger Fabric, Corda, Ripple, Quorum, and EOS, and learn ledger types, consensus, and crypto concepts with emphasis on Ethereum and Hyperledger for exams.

Learn how bitcoin improvement protocols (VIPs) shape the bitcoin network by distinguishing standard track, process, and informational VIPs, and how community input and GitHub review drive changes.

Explore Hyperledger and Hyperledger Fabric, understand the project and gene code, with a whiteboard walkthrough and a bonus on Hyperledger concepts.

Understand Hyperledger as a Linux Foundation open source consortium with governance that coordinates multiple enterprise blockchains under an infrastructure frameworks and tools umbrella, including fabric and Aurora.

Explore Hyperledger Fabric, a modular enterprise blockchain with plug-and-play identity, ledger, and smart contracts, plus a three-phase endorsement, ordering, and validation workflow powered by voting-based consensus.

Discover how Hyperledger chaincode functions as a smart contract for Hyperledger Fabric, focusing on init and invoke, the chain code interface, and the requirement to install go.

Explore hyperledger fabric architecture and the transaction flow, covering MSP, certificate authority, enrollment certificates, endorsing peers, ordering service, blocks, channels, and ledgers.

Deploy Hyperledger Fabric on AWS using the blockchain template, configure a VPC and security groups, launch an EC2 instance, and explore the Hyperledger Explorer to visualize the network.

Explore module five by introducing etherium, its purpose, and core components; review the EVM and demonstrate a browser-based development demo.

Explore Ethereum overview: the permissionless blockchain for smart contracts, ether as native token, ERC-20 tokens, gas, EVM, nodes, and dapps.

Explore how the Ethereum virtual machine executes smart contracts written in solidity, uses gas to fund EVM execution, and supports accounts, contracts, and semi Turing complete capabilities.

Explore how to interact with the blockchain through browser-based tools like Mist, Metamask, and Parity, highlighting full node considerations and lightweight dapp access without a full Ethereum node.

Develop Ethereum development skills using Solidity to write smart contracts for the EVM, connect with web3.js, and test on nets like Rob Stein with front end tools.

Explore the Ethereum block explorer demo to view blockchain activity, block height, miner pools, gas, and rewards, and learn to view transactions using Metamask.

Complete module six by reviewing main course points, preparing for the exam, and practicing with additional review questions before closing the course and moving to the next lesson.

Review the main topics, highlighting blockchain as a globally shared data structure and transactional backend built on trust, the peer-to-peer network, forks, the Byzantine generals problem, and hashed blocks.

Sign up for the CBSA exam via Pearson under the Blockchain Training Alliance. Achieve a 72 pass on 70 questions in 90 minutes to receive your certificate and token.

Perform a quick pre-test with a downloadable 15-question practice exam that displays questions on slides without answers and reveals the correct responses on the next slide, taking about ten minutes.