Blockchain platforms, such as Ethereum, don't rely on a central authority to allow a set of actors to maintain a ledger
of transactions. Additionally it is possible to deploy scripts, called
smart contracts, which get executed whenever certain transactions occur. This talk, initially hold on the
2th Oktober 2018 @camunda in Berlin, explores if smart contracts could be used as basic building blocks for executing collaborative business processes between mutually untrusting parties.
How to Effectively Monitor SD-WAN and SASE Environments with ThousandEyes
Smart Contracts Nothing but Decentralised Workflows?
1. Smart Contracts Nothing but
Decentralised Workflows?
Why compiling BPMN into Solidity could make sense
2. My Background
● 2013 First Analysis of Bitcoins ability to act as currency.
● 2017 Master Thesis ~ “A blockchain based version control system for
documents“
● 2018 Initial thoughts on linking “smart contracts” to Business Process
Automation
● 2018+ Active research in this area
3. This talk is about
● Cutting through the jungle of blockchain projects.
● Exploring the core of “smart contracts”
● Show which value BPMN could add to the
Blockchain Ecosystem
4. This talk it not
● A detailed discussion about how blockchain works.
● About Bitcoin
● Including any crypto investment advice
● Even close to cover the topic completely
6. What does a blockchain do again?
No new technology at all - but a smart combination of multiple existing once!
● Blockchain is a technology that combines a data structure (or database) and a
peer-to-peer network.
● Each block in the blockchain includes a group of transactions
● The creation of a new block requires solving a computationally hard cryptographic puzzle.
● Some nodes in the network are responsible for mining blocks.
● With each cryptographic puzzle a hash value is created that links blocks in the database.
● Any attempt to change a transaction in a block would require the computational costs of
recreating all subsequence blocks.
7. How is the Ethereum Blockchain difference?
● Ethereum, also allow to deploy scripts, called smart contracts, that are executed
whenever certain transactions occur.
● Smart contracts are executed over an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)
13. Most Famous Implementation:
“The Decentralized Autonomous Organization”
Goal
“Codify the rules and decision making apparatus of an
organization, eliminating the need for documents and people in
governing, creating a structure with decentralized control.”
https://medium.com/@pullnews/understanding-the-dao-hack-fo
r-journalists-2312dd43e993
14. The DAO Launch
● Launched on 30th April, 2016.
● Largest crowdfunding in history, raised over
$150m from more than 11,000 enthusiastic
members.
● 50 investment opportunity to vote for by
members.
15. The DAO Hack
● $70M were drained on June 18, 2016, by making
the smart contract return Funds multiple times
before it update its own balance.
● One of the Flaw:
○ The DAO coders had also failed to consider
the possibility of a recursive call.
https://coincodex.com/article/50/the-dao-hack-what-happened-and-what-followed/
16. Relevant Etherium Properties
● Turing-complete
● Own programming language “Solidity”
○ syntax resembles the one of JavaScript.
○ Similar classes in Java-like object-oriented style
○ strongly-typed language
● Immutability of deployed code & complete computations
● No central authority
○ Cannot fail, be stopped or censored
17. ● Lack of transparency
● Vulnerable to Errors (only write
operation!)
Smart Contract Properties
19. Caterpillar Project
“Caterpillar accepts as input a process model specified in BPMN and generates a set of smart
contracts that captures the underlying behavior.”
20. Background
● Title
○ CATERPILLAR: A Business Process Execution Engine on the Ethereum Blockchain
● Published
○ 10 Jul 2018
● By
○ Orlenys López-Pintado, Luciano García-Bañuelos, Marlon Dumas, Ingo Weber, Alex
Ponomarev
● Universities
○ Institute of Computer Science, University of Tartu, Estonia
○ CSIRO, Sydney, Australia
○ School of Computer Science & Engineering, UNSW Australia, Sydney, Australia
21. What does it do
● BPMN-to-Solidity compiler covering the full
spectrum of BPMN
● The full state of the process instance is
recorded on the blockchain
● External entity can query the state of a given
process instance, i.e. the set of activities that
are currently active (executing) for that
particular instance.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1808.03517.pdf
24. Technical Limitations
● Slow & Expensive to use
● Tradeoff between efficiency and the ability to run
inter-linked business processes entirely on the blockchain.
● Collaborative BPMN processes executed outside of the
realm of any involved party.
25. This talk was about
● Cutting through the jungle of blockchain
projects.
● Exploring the core of “smart contracts”
● Show which value BPMN could add to
the Blockchain Ecosystem