The term "transaction" is used in Ethereum to refer to the signed data package that stores a message to be sent from an externally owned  account (managed by a human) to another or to interact with a smart contract. 

Ethereums Messages and Transactions 

In Ethereum, the state is made up of objects called "accounts", with each account having a 20-byte address and state transitions being direct transfers of value and information between accounts. An Ethereum account contains four fields:

-The nonce, a counter used to make sure each transaction can only be processed once
-The account's current ether balance
-The account's contract code, if present
-The account's storage 

Ethereum Accounts 

As the goal of Ethereum is to create an alternative protocol for building decentralized applications, it creates an abstract foundational layer. This layer is a blockchain with its own Turing-complete programming language. This allows anyone to create smart contracts and decentralized applications where they can then create their own rules for ownership, transaction formats and state transition functions. 

Ethereum's Functionality 

There are five main design pillars that Ethereum bases it self upon. 

Ethereum's Design 

- Ethereum Accounts
- Transactions
- Messages
- Ethereum State Transition Function
- Code Execution
- Blockchain and Mining
- Ethereum's Functionality
- Ethereum's Design

University of Minnesota - Twin Cities

Ethereum is alternative protocol to Bitcoin for building decentralized applications.   

It is open-source, has smart-contract functionality, and allows users to create their own arbitrary rules for ownership, transaction formats and state transition functions.

Ethereum

Buterin, Vitalik. (2013). A Next-Generation Smart Contract and Decentralized  

Application Platform. https://ethereum.org/en/whitepaper/


Ethereum Whitepaper

Key Ethereum Terms

- Token Systems
- Financial derivatives and Stable-Value Currencies
- Identity and Reputation Systems
- Decentralized File Storage
- Decentralized Autonomous Organizations
- Further Applications


Ethereum Applications

- Modified GHOST Implementation
- Fees
- Computation and Turing-Completeness
- Currency and Issuance
- Mining Centralization
- Scalability


Ethereum Concerns

- Ethereum Whitepaper
- Ethereum Name Service (ENS)
- Go-Ethereum for electronic voting system using clique as proof-of-authority

Ethereum References

The Ethereum governance refers to the way and process to make changes to the protocol, this protocol isn't controlled by someone. Therefore, decisions under the protocol are extremely important since so many people and project depends on it, that's why either decision making or core changes, this process considers social and technical criteria and it's also supported totally by the community.

Ethereum Governance

Is an updated version of the Ethereum network that aims to improve several features of the existing network
Some of the features of Ethereum 2.0 include:
- **Proof of Stake**: replaces *Proof of Work*
- **Sharding**.
- **Virtual Machine Update**.
- **Scalability**.
- **Security**.

Ethereum 2.0

Ether is the native cryptocurrency used fundamentally for payment transaction fees on the Ethereum network, then after the **Merge** it's also used for validate and propose blocks on Mainnet. The pricing mechanism for Ethereum's computing power is facilitated by the ether cryptocurrency. In order for transactions to be validated on the blockchain, users are required to pay ether, known as gas fees, which depends on computing power required for running a transaction


Ether (ETH)

Ethereum supports Proof of Stake and uses validators instead of miners, blocks are randomly selected by a validator to propagare this block to the network and consequently add it to the network through the assembly process. Unlike other blockchain, Blocks support of creation of smart contracts using a system of gas for the execution of them.

Ethereum Blocks

It's the runtime Environment for executing smart contracts and running transaction on the Ethereum Virtual Machine, designed to be Turing Complete, which means the EVM can run any program given enough resources. It allows developers to write and deploy smart contracts than are self-executing based on the agreement reached by the user.
The EVM exist as a single entity maintained by thousand of connected computers running an Ethereum Client software.

Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)

A Ethereum node is a device that is connected to the Ethereum network and helps maintain the network by validating transactions and blocks. A node can be any device, such as a personal computer, a server, or a mobile device, that runs **Ethereum client** software and connects to the Ethereum network.

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