Part I — Fundamentals
The foundation: what a blockchain is, what problem it solves, and the trade-off that shapes every design. Read this before the other parts.
| # | Section | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Aerial view of the blockchain | The one-sentence definition, the "ownerless" problem, blockchain vs. database, the L1L2apps layers. |
| 2 | Concepts and the trilemma | Chaining and immutability, Byzantine generals and finality, the scalability trilemma, UTXO/account models and wallets. |
Next part: II — Consensus — Proof of Work, Proof of Stake, and how trustless nodes agree.
For dense lookup, see Part VIII — Reference.