CSE446: Blockchain & Cryptocurrencies

Lecture – 13: Ethereum - 2

Agenda
• Ethereum network
• Ethereum EVM
• Ethereum Transactions
• Gas and Gas price
Ethereum network
Network architecture overview
Pool participant Pool participant

Light node
Pool participant
Light node
Mining pool
provider
Full node
Full node
Light node

Solo miner Full node Full node

Solo miner Full node

07 Ethereum Basics - Gallersdörfer, U., Holl, P., & Matthes, F. (2020). "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering". Lecture Slides. TU Munich. CC BY-SA 4.0 34

07 Ethereum Basics - Gallersdörfer, U., Holl, P., & Matthes, F. (2020). "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering". Lecture Slides. TU Munich.
Ethereum network node types
• Full nodes are the foundation of the Ethereum network
• Each full node holds a copy of the entire blockchain and syncs it with other nodes
• Transactions must be sent to a full node which distributes it among the network
participants
• A light node is a client that is connected to a full node for the sake of not having to
sync and download the entire blockchain
• For most private people, light nodes are the most comfortable way of interacting
with the Ethereum blockchain
• One of the most common light nodes is https://myetherwallet.com (always triple
check the domain)
07 Ethereum Basics - Gallersdörfer, U., Holl, P., & Matthes, F. (2020). "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering". Lecture Slides. TU Munich.
Ethereum implementation
• To connect to the Ethereum network, you will need to download an
Ethereum implementation
• Not all Ethereum nodes are using the same code base
• Since the specification for an Ethereum node is open source, basically
anyone could create a different implementation
• The two major Ethereum implementations are: Geth and OpenEthereum

07 Ethereum Basics - Gallersdörfer, U., Holl, P., & Matthes, F. (2020). "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering". Lecture Slides. TU Munich.
Node discovery
• Both Geth and OpenEthereum have a maintained list of default peers hardcoded into their
source
Peercode
discovery
• Otherwise, it would be possible that no nodes are found, and the sync will always fail
Both Geth and OpenEthereum have a maintained list of default peers hardcoded into their source
• The Geth
code. client comes
Otherwise, with
it would 6 hardcoded
be possible that no peers
nodes are found, and the sync will always fail.

• Once
The aGeth
node is selected,
client comes witha6hello message
hardcoded peers:is sent to make an initial connection with the node

1. Looks up
New Node

3. ack 2. hello message

Hardcoded Node

07 Ethereum Basics - Gallersdörfer, U., Holl, P., & Matthes, F. (2020). "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering". Lecture Slides. TU Munich.

Once a node is selected, a hello message is sent to make an initial connection with the node.
Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)
• The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) is a simple but powerful, Turing
complete 256bit Virtual Machine that allows anyone to execute arbitrary
EVM Byte Code
• Turing completeness means you can write programs (contracts) that can
(for the most part) solve any reasonable computational problem or write
sophisticated logic
• It allows anyone to execute arbitrary code in a trust-less environment in
which the outcome of an execution can be guaranteed and is fully
deterministic
Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)
• Smart contract code is usually written in a high level programming
language such as Solidity
• This code gets compiled to something called the EVM bytecode which
gets deployed to the Ethereum blockchain
• This is very similar to a programming language like Java where the code
gets converted to JVM Byte code
• The Ethereum runtime environment only understands and can execute
the bytecode
Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)
Solidity Code

Ethereum Compiler

EVM Bytecode

Ethereum Virtual Machine

Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) Ethereum Network

Ethereum Compiler

EVM Bytecode

Ethereum Virtual Machine

Ethereum Compiler

EVM Bytecode

Ethereum Compiler

Ethereum Virtual Machine

EVM Bytecode

Ethereum Virtual Machine

Ethereum Compiler

Ethereum Compiler
EVM Bytecode

EVM Bytecode

Ethereum Virtual Machine

Ethereum Virtual Machine

Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)

https://ethereum.org/static/e8aca8381c7b3b40c44bf8882d4ab930/302a4/evm.png
EVM

https://cypherpunks-core.github.io/ethereumbook/13evm.html
EVM Bytecode
• EVM bytecode is the instruction sets for the EVM
• The EVM instruction set offers most of the operations you might expect,
including
• Arithmetic and bitwise logic operations
• Stack, memory, and storage access
• Control flow operations
• Logging, calling, and other operators
• Access to account information (e.g., address and balance) and block information
(e.g., block number and current gas price) (Blockchain state information)

https://cypherpunks-core.github.io/ethereumbook/13evm.html
Ethereum blockchain
• Like Bitcoin, there are three major sub-components in the Ethereum
blockchain
• Transactions
• Blocks
• Blockchain
Ethereum transactions
• On Ethereum there are mainly two transactions
• External transactions
• Internal transactions
• An external transaction
• is generated by a user, serialised and sent to the Ethereum network, put on
the blockchain (just like Bitcoin)
• Includes payment (regular) transactions and contract creation & contract call
(execution) transactions
Ethereum external transactions
• Regular transactions
• a transaction from one account to another (either to an EOA or to a contract
account)
• Contract deployment transactions:
• to deploy a smart-contract
• a transaction without a 'to' address, where the data field is used for the contract
code
• Execution of a contract:
• a transaction that interacts with a deployed smart contract
• In this case, 'to' address is the smart contract address
• Data field contains the relevant value for the contract (function)
 Ethere
Ethereum external transactions: structure
• nonce: A count of the number of transactions
sent by the sender (EOA) number, used to
prevent message replay
• gasPrice: The price of gas (in wei) the
originator (sender) is willing to pay
• gasLimiti: The maximum amount of gas the
originator is willing to buy for this transaction

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
 Ethere
Ethereum transactions
• to: Recipient’s/contract address
• value: Amount of Wei transferred from the
sender to the receiver
• v,r,s: The three components of an ECDSA
digital signature of the originating EOA
• data: optional field to include code to
create a contract or data for calling a
function of an existing contract

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
Ethereum transactions types
• Internal transactions
• Contracts A can call a function in Contract B
• These are not serialised and not put on the blockchain!
• When these transactions transfer value (Eth) to another account, the
account update is stored in the blockchain

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
 Transaction Types
Ethereum transactions types

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
 Transaction Flow
Ethereum transactions types

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
 Transactionexecution
Ethereum transaction Execution

From Lecture Slides of Blockchains & Cryptocurrencies Course at Johns Hopkins University
Question?