Software Engineering Applications enabled by Blockchain Technology: A Systematic Mapping Study

The novel, yet disruptive blockchain technology has witnessed growing attention, due to its intrinsic potential. Besides the conventional domains that benefit from such potential, such as finance, supply chain and healthcare, blockchain use cases in software engineering have emerged recently. In this study, we aim to contribute to the body of knowledge of blockchain-oriented software engineering by providing an adequate overview of the software engineering applications enabled by blockchain technology. To do so, we carried out a systematic mapping study and identified 22 primary studies. Then, we extracted data within the research type, research topic and contribution type facets. Findings suggest an increasing trend of studies since 2018. Additionally, findings reveal the potential of using blockchain technologies as an alternative to centralized systems, such as GitHub, Travis CI, and cloud-based package managers, and also to establish trust between parties in collaborative software development. We also found out that smart contracts can enable the automation of a variety of software engineering activities that usually require human reasoning, such as the acceptance phase, payments to software engineers, and compliance adherence. In spite of the fact that the field is not yet mature, we believe that this systematic mapping study provides a holistic overview that may benefit researchers interested in bringing blockchain to the software industry, and practitioners willing to understand how blockchain can transform the software development industry.publishedVersio

BlockNet Report: Exploring the Blockchain Skills Concept and Best Practice Use Cases

In order to explore the practical potential and needs of interdisciplinary knowledge and competence requirements of Blockchain technology, the project activity "Development of Interdisciplinary Blockchain Skills Concept" starts with the literature review identifying the state of the art of Blockchain in Supply Chain Management and Logistics, Business and Finance, as well as Computer Science and IT-Security. The project activity further explores the academic and industry landscape of existing initiatives in education which offer Blockchain courses. Moreover, job descriptions and adverts are analyzed in order to specify today's competence requirements from enterprises. To discuss and define the future required competence, expert workshops are organized to validate the findings by academic experts. Based on the research outcome and validation, an interdisciplinary approach for Blockchain competence is developed. A second part focuses on the development of the Blockchain Best Practices activity while conducting qualitative empirical research based on case studies with industry representatives. Therefore, company interviews, based on the theoretical basis of Output 1, explore existing Blockchain use cases in different sectors. Due to the interdisciplinary importance of Blockchain technology, these skills will be defined by different perspectives of Blockchain from across multiple mentioned disciplines. The use cases and companies for the interviews will be selected based on various sampling criteria to gain results valid for a broad scale. The analysis of the various use cases will be conducted and defined in a standardized format to identify the key drivers and competence requirements for Blockchain technology applications and their adoption. On the one hand, this approach ensures comparability, on the other hand, it facilitates the development of a structured and systematic framework.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2102.0322