Book Image

Solidity Programming Essentials

Book Image

Solidity Programming Essentials

Overview of this book

Solidity is a contract-oriented language whose syntax is highly influenced by JavaScript, and is designed to compile code for the Ethereum Virtual Machine. Solidity Programming Essentials will be your guide to understanding Solidity programming to build smart contracts for Ethereum and blockchain from ground-up. We begin with a brief run-through of blockchain, Ethereum, and their most important concepts or components. You will learn how to install all the necessary tools to write, test, and debug Solidity contracts on Ethereum. Then, you will explore the layout of a Solidity source file and work with the different data types. The next set of recipes will help you work with operators, control structures, and data structures while building your smart contracts. We take you through function calls, return types, function modifers, and recipes in object-oriented programming with Solidity. Learn all you can on event logging and exception handling, as well as testing and debugging smart contracts. By the end of this book, you will be able to write, deploy, and test smart contracts in Ethereum. This book will bring forth the essence of writing contracts using Solidity and also help you develop Solidity skills in no time.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
Title Page
Copyright and Credits
Packt Upsell
Contributors
Preface
Index

MetaMask


MetaMask is a lightweight Chrome browser-based extension that helps in interacting with Ethereum networks. It is also a wallet that helps in sending and receiving Ether. MetaMask can be downloaded from https://metamask.io/. Since MetaMask runs in a browser, it does not download the entire chaindata locally; instead, it stores it centrally and helps users connect to their store using the browser. Let's take a look at the following steps:

  1. MetaMask should be added as an extension as shown in the following screenshot:
  1. Accept the privacy notice and terms of use and a small icon will appear next to the go button. MetaMask allows you to connect to multiple networks. Connect to the Localhost 8545private network as shown in the following screenshot:
  1. Provide a password to create a new key that is used by MetaMask to identify the user. It is stored in a key vault at the MetaMask central server as shown in the following screenshot:
  1. Click on the Account icon and import all already created accounts...