Course Project

Overview

The Blockchain Dev Decal course project is your opportunity to design, build, and ship a real decentralized application (DApp) from the ground up. Over the semester you will move from concept to deployed product — writing smart contracts in Solidity, connecting them to a web frontend, and presenting your work to the broader Blockchain at Berkeley community.

Projects are completed in teams of 2–4. Every team member is expected to contribute meaningfully to both the on-chain and off-chain layers of the project.

Project Phases

Phase 1 — Proposal (Week 4): Submit a one-page project proposal describing your idea, the problem it solves, a high-level architecture diagram, and your team's breakdown of responsibilities. Proposals are reviewed by course staff for scope and feasibility.
Phase 2 — Smart Contract Milestone (Week 8): Your core Solidity contracts must be written, tested with Hardhat or Foundry, and deployed to a testnet (Sepolia or Base Sepolia). Submit your test suite and a short write-up of your contract architecture and any security considerations you addressed.
Phase 3 — Frontend Integration (Week 11): Connect your contracts to a web interface using ethers.js or wagmi. Users should be able to interact with your DApp through MetaMask without touching a terminal. Submit a live demo link and a short walkthrough video.
Phase 4 — Final Demo & Writeup (Week 14): Present your project at the end-of-semester showcase. Submit a final technical writeup covering architecture, design decisions, known limitations, and what you would do differently with more time.

Technical Requirements

At least one deployed, verified Solidity smart contract on a public EVM testnet.
A test suite with ≥ 80% branch coverage on your contract logic.
A working web frontend that connects to a wallet and calls your contracts.
No use of upgradeable proxy patterns unless explicitly approved — keep the scope focused and auditable.
A documented threat model: what can go wrong, and what mitigations did you implement?

Project Ideas

You are encouraged to come up with your own idea. Below are a few starting points if you're looking for inspiration:

A decentralized voting system with on-chain tallying and anonymized ballots.
A token-gated study group platform where NFT ownership grants access.
A simple AMM (automated market maker) with a custom bonding curve.
An on-chain prediction market for campus events.
A DAO governance framework for a student organization treasury.
A cross-chain bridge prototype between two EVM-compatible testnets.

Grading

The project is worth 40% of your final grade, broken down as follows:

Proposal — 5%
Smart Contract Milestone — 10%
Frontend Integration — 10%
Final Demo & Writeup — 15%