Applying blockchain to improve the integrity of the software development process

Software development is a complex endeavor that encompasses application and implementation layers with functional (refers to what is done) and non-functional (how is done) aspects. The efforts to scale agile software development practices are not wholly able to address issues such as integrity, which is a crucial non-functional aspect of the software development process. However, if we consider most software failures are Byzantine failures (i.e., where components may fail and there is imperfect information on which a component has failed.) that might impair the operation but do not completely disable the production line. In this paper, we assume software practitioners who cause defects as Byzantine participants and claim that most software failures can be mitigated by viewing software development as the Byzantine Generals Problem. Consequently, we propose a test-driven incentive mechanism based on a blockchain concept to orchestrate the software development process where production is controlled by a similar infrastructure based on the working principles of blockchain. We discuss the model that integrates blockchain with the software development process, and provide some recommendations for future work to address the issues while orchestrating software productio

Blockchain- and IPFS-Based Data Distribution for the Internet of Things

Distributing data in a tamper-proof and traceable way is a necessity in many Internet of Things (IoT) scenarios. Blockchain technologies are frequently named as an approach to provide such functionality. Despite this, there is a lack of concrete solutions which integrate the IoT with the blockchain for data distribution purposes. Within this paper, we present a middleware which connects to IoT devices, and uses a blockchain to distribute IoT data with guaranteed integrity. Furthermore, the middleware also offers that data is distributed in real-time via a second channel. We implement our solution using the Ethereum blockchain and the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS)