🧑‍🏫Web3 Analytics 101: Async Course

An open course that teaches students how to understand and analyze blockchain data using SQL.

Overview

This course is designed for students who want to answer questions with data, provide context to protocol growth and change, and understand what is happening behind the scenes.

The goal of this course is to take interested students and teach them the requisite knowledge to be a data analyst in web3. Our goal is that students emerge from the course with an intermediate level of knowledge. We define that as being able to confidently tackle challenges with tools such as Flipside, Dune, Footprint, Dapplooker, etc. While a "beginner" analyst may be limited to high-level overviews, an "intermediate" analyst is able to push beyond surface-level analysis, extracting insights from curiosity-directed exploration.

In short, a successful course will produce a cohort of talented analysts creating great content and actively competing in bounty programs.

We will explore Ethereum data throughout this course as it has the most robust tooling and data available. Core concepts can be applied across a range of EVM-compatible chains and alternate blockchains.

Register for the Course

Please register using the Web3 101 Async Course Registration Form.

Course Outline

The following is intended to set expectations about the content of this course, while the content covered will go into more depth than what is listed.

Segment 0

We will be compiling vetted resources that students can dive into, on their own time, to get up to speed with the main topics that this course covers: blockchains and crypto, data analysis using SQL, working in web3, etc.

Finally, find some MetricsDAO resources here:

• Submission Showcase

• Active Bounties

• What is xMETRIC?

Segment 1 - The Basics

Establishing foundational knowledge

• Blockchain, distilled, and what is Ethereum?

• Data

  • What tools are out there?

    • We will primarily use Flipside and Dune. I suggest signing up for both websites (for free) and familiarizing yourself with them!
  • Accessing curated datasets and using SQL to explore blockchain data.

• Why do this kind of work?

  • The analytics ecosystem and work2earn.

Segment 2 - Building Blocks

Expand technical abilities with live use-cases.

• Available data

  • Exploratory analysis and understanding what we're looking at.

  • Observing trends with high-level aggregations.

  • Comparing Ethereum transactions in data tables to block explorers.

• Domain knowledge - understanding your subject

• Exploring data through visual representations

Segment 3 - Leveling Up

Introducing intermediate SQL techniques and diving into (more) raw transaction data.

• SQL Aggregations - benefits and pitfalls

• Data, uncurated

  • Moving beyond ez_ tables working with JSON message objects.

Segment 4 - Dune

Expert session led by Dune Wizard chuxin.eth.

• SQL syntax: Dune Engine V2 vs. V1

• Column-oriented data

• Using Dune abstractions

• Cross-chain analysis

Segment 5 - Tying it all together

In the closing session of the course, Forg, GJ and Rob discuss:

• Creating professional outputs

• Breaking into web3 data.