I'm currently a front-end dev - HTML, Javascript, CSS, PhP. I'd like to get into blockchain, but I don't know where to start. Any advice? Should I start by learning Plutus? If so, where should I start? Are there any online tutorials?
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8 Answers
Smart contracts on Cardano are actually developed using Haskell which is then compiled into Plutus Core by the Plutus Tx compiler. Plutus Core is a very low-level programming language and programming wouldn't be fun.
The best place to start learning is to participate in the Plutus pioneers program.
More Haskell resources:
If you are not familiar with Haskell, grab a book such as Learn You a Haskell for Great Good!, as it will be very helpful.
If you want to focus on the Haskell features required for programming smart contracts, have a look at the Mongolia class recordings: Haskell and Crypto Mongolia 2020
Also see this YouTube playlist: Haskell for Imperative Programmers
answered May 26, 2021 at 9:58
Have a look at the Plutus Pioneer Program:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnPTB0CuBOBypVDf1oGcsvnJGJg8h-LII
As a dev myself, I'd suggest you wait another year or two for the libraries and tools to stabilize and become more straightforward. Right now it can be a headache just to get a local dev environment running.
That being said, you can start using the Plutus and Marlowe Playgrounds to start hands-on learning about smart contract code.
To add onto what has already been provided, if you want to try and learn more of the theory of Haskell and Haskell like languages (Category Theory and Type Theory), I'd recommend the fantastic courses by Bartosz Milewski:
- Category Theory for Programmers Textbook
- Category Theory for Programmers Part 1 Video Lectures
- Category Theory for Programmers Part 2 Video Lectures
- Category Theory for Programmers Part 3 Video Lectures
This series is a bit dry but it is extraordinarily helpful in understanding how to structure your code so that you can let the language do 90% of the work for you.
A good start to learn Plutus is at https://playground.plutus.iohkdev.io/tutorial/index.html
The general idea from a frontend perspective is that you write the onchain and the offchain part of the contract in Plutus. You can then compile what they call the PAP ( Plutus Application Backend ) which will provide api endpoints to interact with your contract from the frontend.
I recommend the fantastic book Haskell Programming from first principles by Christopher Allen and Julie Moronuki. In my opinion this is a great resource to start for someone completely new to pure functional programming.
After learning the basics of Haskell, I recommend participating in the Plutus Pioneer Program. The lectures are openly available on YouTube. There will also be a second iteration of the course later this year.
I'm also a Javascript developer. I would recommend the path that I made. I started with PureScript through PureScript book (other alternative is FP Made Easier), which is a language that compiles to JavaScript and is very beginner friendly. That way you can pratice Haskell-like code right now. When you feel confident in PureScript you can move to Haskell and begin the Plutus Pioneer Program, the differences between Haskell and PureScript are minimal.
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