Ship code. Grow builders. Make Bitcoin more private - from Southeast Asia.
Code Orange runs workshops, cohorts, and meetups that turn curious Bitcoiners into technical contributors. The fellowship is what happens next: you pick a project, we give you a stipend and a mentor, and you ship real open-source code for 6 months.
We have two tracks because Bitcoin needs both builders and teachers:
| Developer Track | Educator Track | |
|---|---|---|
| You are | A dev who wants to contribute to Bitcoin FOSS full-time or part-time | Someone who wants to teach Bitcoin development in your community |
| You do | Write code, open PRs, review code, work with a mentor | Run cohorts, host workshops, create materials, grow the local scene |
| You get | $512/month + mentorship + Bali hub access | $256/month + curriculum + event support + Bali hub access |
| Duration | 6 months (extendable) | 6 months (extendable) |
| Details | Developer Track → | Educator Track → |
| One-pager | Developer one-pager → | Educator one-pager → |
Many developers who finish a study cohort stop before they become regular contributors, because the first months of open-source work are slow and unpaid. The fellowship pays for that period: a stipend, a mentor and a defined project.
Contributions by Code Orange community members are listed, with links, on the PR tracking dashboard.
The fellowship is that path:
Workshops & Meetups Cohorts Fellowship Independent
────────────────── ────────────────── ────────────────── ──────────────────
Sovereign Bitcoiner Bitcoin Dojo (7wk) 6 months focused OpenSats grant
Self-Custody Decoding BTC (8wk) contribution with HRF grant
Mining Privacy Track (12s) mentor + stipend Spiral grant
Privacy rawBit (10wk) Full-time FOSS
Meetups & Talks career
"I'm interested" "I understand it" "I'm contributing" "I'm independent"
The fellowship bridges the gap between "I finished a cohort" and "I have a track record that gets me a grant."
We're not an online-only program. Fellows can work from our Bali hub - a physical space where Bitcoin developers show up, build together, and learn from each other in person. Remote participation works too, but the IRL component is what accelerates learning.
We're privacy-focused. Our curriculum emphasizes Silent Payments, Payjoin, compact block filters, and wallet privacy.
We grow our own. Applicants who come through our cohorts have already spent 7-12 weeks building technical Bitcoin skills with us, so the fellowship is the next step rather than a cold start. Applicants from elsewhere are welcome too.
Education is not an afterthought. We fund educators with the same seriousness as developers. The developer pipeline only works if someone is running the workshops and cohorts at the front of it. Educators make everything else possible.
Fellows choose a project based on their skills and interests. Our sweet spot is privacy and wallet infrastructure, but we support any Bitcoin FOSS work.
| Project | Language | Area |
|---|---|---|
| rust-silentpayments | Rust | Silent Payments (BIP352) |
| payjoin-rust | Rust | Payjoin Dev Kit (BIP77) |
| BDK | Rust | Wallet development |
| Kyoto | Rust | Compact block filters (BIP157/158) |
| OpenSwap | Rust | CoinSwap protocol |
| Floresta | Rust | Utreexo full node |
| Bitcoin Core | C++ | Protocol, wallet, P2P |
| BTCPay Server | C# | Merchant payments |
| Fedimint | Rust | Federated eCash |
| LDK | Rust | Lightning |
Working on something else? Propose it. If it's Bitcoin FOSS, we'll consider it.
No forms. Send us your proposal - what you want to work on and why. Templates are in templates/.
Developer Track: Start contributing to your chosen project first (even a small PR), then send your 6-month work plan with a maintainer endorsement.
Educator Track: Tell us what you want to teach, where, and to whom. Show us you understand the material well enough to teach it.
Email: fellowship@codeorange.dev
We review applications on a rolling basis. We look at your prior work, your proposal quality, and whether you're a good fit for the community. Expect a response within 2 weeks.
Meet your mentor. Finalize your work plan. Set up your dev environment. Get your first PR in. Join the cohort sync.
Ship code or run events every week. Meet with your mentor weekly. Submit a monthly work report. Participate in bi-weekly cohort syncs with the other fellows. Show up at Code Orange sessions when you can.
Present your work to the community. Document everything. Apply for grants to keep going. Join the alumni network. Help select the next cohort.
Fellowship seats are limited by verified mentor capacity, not by the number of applications. The reusable Fellowship Operating System defines eligibility, the selection rubric, mentor commitments, the Month-3 continuation review, and the alumni handoff.
Developer track
| Track overview | The short version - who it's for, the six-month arc |
| Detailed spec | Full rulebook: milestones, what good looks like, renewal |
| Project menu | Suggested codebases, difficulty-rated |
| Application | The form |
| Monthly report template | Due the 5th |
Educator track
| Track overview | The short version - pick your format |
| Detailed spec | Credit table, caps and floors, tiers, renewal |
| Facilitation playbook | How to run a session well when you are not the expert in the room |
| Session log template | Log within 48 hours |
| Application | The form |
| Monthly report template | Due the 5th |
Both tracks
| Evaluation rubric | Exactly how fellows are assessed at month 3 and month 6 |
| Payment and reporting | Stipends, rails, short months, pausing |
| FAQ | The questions people actually ask |
| Operating system | How the program itself is run |
| Fellowship agreement | The contract |
| Developer | Educator | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly stipend | $512 USD | $256 USD |
| Payment method | Bitcoin - Lightning, on-chain or eCash, your choice | Bitcoin - Lightning, on-chain or eCash, your choice |
| Duration | 6 months | 6 months |
| Time commitment | 15-20 hrs/wk (part-time) or 35+ (full-time) | 10-15 hrs/wk |
| Extension | Possible based on performance | Possible based on performance |
| Metric | Per Developer Fellow (6mo) | Per Educator Fellow (6mo) |
|---|---|---|
| Total cost | $3,072 | $1,536 |
Fellows' work plans set their own targets (see the examples below). We report what fellows actually produce, with links, rather than projected output.
Two cohorts per year:
| Cohort | Applications Open | Starts | Ends |
|---|---|---|---|
| H1 | November 1 | January 15 | July 15 |
| H2 | May 1 | July 15 | January 15 |
Vague proposals don't get accepted. Here's what real fellowship work plans look like:
Project: rust-silentpayments + Bitcoin Core SP support 6-month targets:
- Month 1: Add 15+ test cases covering BIP352 edge cases (mixed input types, label collision, multiple recipients)
- Month 2: Implement label management module in rust-silentpayments
- Month 3: Optimize scanning performance - benchmark and improve tweak cache
- Month 4-5: Review and test the open Bitcoin Core Silent Payments PRs (see tracking issue #28536)
- Month 6: Write integration guide for wallet developers adopting Silent Payments
- Total expected: 8+ PRs merged, 1 published guide
Project: rust-payjoin / Payjoin Dev Kit 6-month targets:
- Month 1: Add BIP77 (async Payjoin) integration tests for relay failure scenarios
- Month 2-3: Implement Payjoin sender support in a wallet that doesn't have it (BDK-based)
- Month 4: Submit 2+ PRs to rust-payjoin improving error handling and documentation
- Month 5: Write "Adding Payjoin to Your Wallet" tutorial for PDK
- Month 6: Help onboard the next Privacy Track cohort to Payjoin concepts
- Total expected: 6+ PRs merged, 1 wallet integration, 1 published tutorial
Project: Floresta / Kyoto 6-month targets:
- Month 1: Fix 3+ open issues in Floresta labeled "good first issue"
- Month 2-3: Implement compact block filter caching optimization in Kyoto
- Month 4: Add Silent Payments scanning support to Kyoto using CBF
- Month 5-6: Benchmark privacy properties of Floresta vs Kyoto vs full node, publish results
- Total expected: 8+ PRs merged, 1 published benchmark
Initiative: Run Season One of The Privacy Sessions (12 biweekly drop-in sessions) 6-month targets:
- Month 1: Recruit 15+ participants. Host S1-S2 (Silent Payments: build a sender and a scanner against the BIP352 test vectors)
- Month 2: Host S3 (Review Club on the Bitcoin Core Silent Payments PRs) and S4 (chain analysis)
- Month 3: Host S5-S6 (coin selection, Payjoin). Check contribution targets before each session
- Month 4: Host S7-S8 (light clients, network privacy). Mid-season review of proof-of-work evidence
- Month 5: Host S9-S10 (CoinJoin & OpenSwap, Lightning). Begin training a successor facilitator
- Month 6: Host S11-S12 (ecash, contribution sprint). Hand off to the trained successor. Present season results
- Total expected: 12 sessions hosted, 15+ participants, 10+ participants with upstream proof of work (tests, reviews, docs or merged PRs), 1 trained successor
(First cohort launching H2 2026. This section will be filled with real people and real PRs.)
We built this by studying what works elsewhere and stealing shamelessly. Credit where it is due:
- Btrust Builders - the proof-of-work database and the "grant-ready by graduation" framing
- Chaincode Labs / BOSS Challenge - structured monthly progression with active-contributor mentorship
- Bitshala - study cohorts as the unit of community, and weekly written assignments
- Vinteum - regional developer residency model
- Summer of Bitcoin - mentor matching and structured project selection
- Base58 - practical, production-focused technical teaching
If you run a program like this and want to compare notes or share fellows, open an issue.
Everything here is CC0. Take it. Adapt it. Build your own fellowship in your own community.
Code Orange Dev School | Singapore | github.com/code-orange-dev