Novice Ethereum / Dapp Question

eaks77

Hello everyone,

I've been involved in ethereum for the past couples months mining.... and I hate to admit, I'm not sure I fully understand the intent of Ethereum and Dapps. I'm hoping to understand more with the communities help.

Just some background... I am not a developer, coder, engineer... etc. I understand computers and tech well enough, but i'm lost when it gets to the back end.

BUT... I am currently in the process of creating a company revolving around an application and web based software. Everything right now is hosted and ran through a server. We will eventually need to upgrade to a Virtual Private Server or to a designated / private server. What I'm interested in... is how Ethereum can play a part in this? Is ethereum like a cloud based network, but supported by miners? Can I somewhat eliminate the server and run my app on Ethereum? If i actually understand that correctly... what are the advantages and disadvantages?

I've looked up other apps that run on the ethereum network and they're very focused around ethereum. My app/software is geared towards a specific industry to optimize operational efficiencies.

I look forward to your feedback. Thanks!

eaks77

I'll take it from the silence that i'm clearly out to lunch!.........?

HippoClip

You could think of ethereum as a distributed system to replace a cloud server. However, you probably would not want to do general computation using an ethereum contract like you would a normal server in the cloud. This would be inefficient and probably rather expensive.

As I understand it ethereums strength is that it enforces the correct execution of the contract/program you put in the blockchain in a publicly verifiable way. So if your application has a component that would benefit from that kind of guarantee then you could put that component into ethereum. The remainder of your software you probably want to run as you would otherwise and have interact with the ethereum component somehow.

Of course, it is very hard to say how you could precisely use ethereum without knowing more about your concrete application.

eaks77

Hey HippoClip,

Thank you very much for the response!

To be honest, the whole concept of Ethereum and Contracts still confuses me! What would be an example of a contract?

I think my Application would be considered general computation.... Users scheduling requests for another company to view and fulfill.