BuidlGuild Building on Ethereum in the AI Era | Kevin Jones

Sun, Aug 2, 2026, 12:00 AM

In this workshop at ETHGlobal Lisbon 2026, Kevin Jones from BuidlGuidl (who also works at Edge & Node on The Graph protocol and supports the Ethereum Foundation) walks through building apps on Ethereum in the AI era, covering the key tools and then live-building an app. He introduces BuidlGuidl, created by Austin Griffith, and its flagship learning product SpeedRun Ethereum, a set of challenges that validate your understanding of the protocol across NFTs, crowdfunding, the token vendor and ERC-20 patterns, on-chain randomness and oracles, building a DEX with liquidity pools, oracles, over-collateralized lending (like Aave) and liquidations, stablecoins, and newer guides on prediction markets and ZK voting, plus capture-the-flag events and the ETH tech tree. He then covers Scaffold-ETH, the starter kit that was his own introduction to Ethereum, now launchable with a single command (npx create-eth) that bootstraps a full dApp: smart contract, local chain, and a Next.js front end with pre-written components and hooks, all wired together and made AI-friendly by default. Kevin highlights ETH skills (at ethskills.com), an open source collection of Ethereum best-practice skill files (for smart contracts, code reviews, censorship resistance, privacy, and more) that you add to your coding agent so it builds the best app it can. He live-demos scaffolding a project called Lisbon, explaining the choice between Foundry and Hardhat, splitting the terminal into windows for the chain, front end, and deploys, and how the yarn commands and pre-written scripts simplify setup. He shows how Scaffold-ETH parses the deployed contract's ABI into front-end types and an auto-generated debug UI, plus a built-in burner wallet and faucet that avoid MetaMask nonce issues on a local chain. He debugs a dependency error live (recommending copying the error to the AI and using Opus 4.6 for prototyping), then vibe-codes the starter contract into a basic lottery, showing how the bundled .agents, .claude, and .cursor skill folders automatically load BuidlGuidl's best practices (contributed by members like Carlos) so the agent adds ownable, a reentrancy guard, buy-ticket and pick-winner functions, and updates the front end. He tours reusable components (ENS resolution, address inputs, balance and ether inputs) and read and write hooks, and closes with Q&A on ETH skills folders, simulating time on a local chain, and testing in Foundry versus Hardhat. 00:00 Introduction 00:11 Meet Kevin and His Workshops 00:30 Building on Ethereum in the AI Era 00:48 Who Has Used Scaffold-ETH 01:07 Introducing BuidlGuidl and SpeedRun Ethereum 01:56 The Token Vendor and ERC-20 Patterns 02:18 Randomness and Oracles 02:31 Building a DEX and Liquidity Pools 02:48 Over-Collateralized Lending and Liquidations 03:30 Stablecoins, Prediction Markets, and ZK Voting 03:50 Capture the Flag and the ETH Tech Tree 04:14 What Scaffold-ETH Is 04:44 One Command to Bootstrap a dApp 05:24 Introducing ETH Skills 06:17 A Tour of Scaffold-ETH and the Docs 07:12 Why the Pre-Written Front End Helps 07:44 Starting the Project With create-eth 08:29 Choosing Foundry or Hardhat 09:27 Splitting Your Terminal Into Windows 10:09 Why Kevin Uses Cursor 10:33 The Commands to Get Set Up 10:58 Starting the Local Chain 12:04 Deploying the Starter Contract 12:54 How the ABI Powers the Front End 13:47 Loading Up Scaffold-ETH 14:14 Debugging an Error With AI 15:40 The Built-In Burner Wallet and Faucet 16:13 The Debug Contracts Tab 17:05 The Chain Folder and Skill Files 17:57 How the Bundled Skills Work 18:40 Best Practices From the BuidlGuidl Team 19:24 Vibe-Coding a Lottery Contract 20:13 Deploying the AI-Written Changes 20:37 Updating the Front End 20:55 Q&A: Where to Find ETH Skills 21:49 A Tour of the Reusable Components 22:38 The Read and Write Hooks 23:58 Testing the Lottery Page 24:52 Q&A: Testing in Foundry vs Hardhat 25:34 Closing _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 🇵🇹 *ETHGlobal Lisbon 2026* This workshop is specifically for ETHGlobal Lisbon 2026, a 3-day hackathon held July 24-26 at the Carlos Lopes Pavillion, bringing together the most skilled web3 developers, designers and product builders from all around the globe for a weekend-long adventure to advance the Ethereum ecosystem! Watch the full ETHGlobal Lisbon 2026 playlist here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWgAODGnD_is _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ✅ *Follow ETHGlobal* X: https://x.com/ETHGlobal​ Website: https://ethglobal.com YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/ETHGlobal _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _Are you interested in Ethereum development and entrepreneurship?_ 👉 Sign up for the next ETHGlobal event: https://ethglobal.com/events 🎁 Get exclusive access and perks with ETHGlobal Plus! https://ethglobal.com/plus 📣 Want us to throw an event in your city? Tell us where! https://ethglobal.com/city _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _