Welcome to Picks of the month, where I share a few things I have found useful the last month.

It can be anything from blog posts and software tools to books and techniques.

#1 Oslo Blockchain Day

I recently attended Oslo Blockchain Day, which is a one-day conference all about blockchain in Oslo.

The conference was a 4-track, high speed (lots of ~20-minute talks, my favorite length) conference with a bunch of well-known blockchain experts.

I got a much deeper understanding of what makes blockchain special. This is reflected in that I reposted my earlier blockchain posts with new explanations and new content.

I also got a lot to think about when it comes to enterprise usage of blockchain. What can it do? How can it solve problems? In short, I was inspired to reflect a lot more on blockchain technology from an innovation standpoint (which is my job).

I also got myself a signed copy of “The Internet of Money” by Andreas Antonopoulus

I’m glad I went, and I think I will try to attend next year as well! It was well worth it!

All three parts of my blockchain blog series:

Part 1: What is Blockchain (this post)
Part 2: What can Blockchain solve?
Part 3: Exciting Blockchain Projects

#2 MQTT.fx

MQTT.fq is a desktop MQTT client that works on Windows, Linux, and Mac. It’s probably the best tools I have for debugging MQTT.

I can connect the MQTT.fx client to my MQTT broker and see that all messages from my IoT devices are coming through. I can also send messages to the broker to test devices that respond to certain messages. It is very handy when working with IoT devices that use the MQTT protocol.

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