Note: This blog post is meant for beginners. If you have experience with web3 and blockchain, you might not find this as useful, but I encourage you to maybe stick around anyway.

Hello everyone! This is my third blog post in the series, and today we’re going to execute our very first transaction on a test Ethereum network. But before we start, let’s get a basic understanding on what networks are.

A network is essentially a specific blockchain environment where transactions happen, smart contracts are run, and Ethereum accounts interact.

There’s the Mainnet, which is the main public Ethereum blockchain. Here, real transactions take place using actual Ether (ETH). All activities on this network involve real assets and have significant economic impacts. On the other hand, test networks (testnets) are for testing purposes. They simulate the Ethereum environment, allowing developers to experiment and test their smart contracts before going live on the Mainnet. The Ether on these test networks is valueless meaning, no, you can’t transfer it to the Mainnet. 😄

Some popular testnets include Ropsten, Rinkeby, Goerli, and Sepolia. There are also private networks, which are privately maintained using Ethereum technology and are specifically made for a group of users or a particular organization.

Setting up your wallet

• First, head over to the Chrome Web Store and download the MetaMask Wallet

• After downloading, agree to the terms, set up a strong password, and check the box that says, “I understand that MetaMask cannot recover this password for me.” Then, click on “Create a new wallet.”
  

• Next, you’ll see a key phrase. This is super important—it’s a set of twelve words that act as a master key to your wallet. Keep this phrase secure because anyone who gets their hands on it can access your funds. It’s also known as a mnemonic.

Once you’ve set that up, you should see an account showing 0 Ethereum.

Understanding Networks and Transactions

MetaMask lets you use different networks. For our practice today, we’re using a test network called Sepolia. Test networks are great because they simulate the real Ethereum network without involving real money, which means you can practice without risk.

• Enable Test Networks: Go to the advanced settings in MetaMask and turn on test networks.
• Switch Networks: You can switch from one network to another to see how balances and transactions differ.
• Switch Accounts: You can also click on “Account 1” to create another account, naming it “Account 2.”

Note: Both of these accounts will share the same secret phrase. However, they will have different private keys. If someone has access to a private key, they can access that account, but with the secret phrase, they can access both accounts.

First Blockchain Transaction

We’re going to use a Testnet faucet, which is a service distributing free tokens used on Ethereum test networks like Ropsten or Goerli. These help developers simulate transactions without any real-world value.

In this demo we are going to use Google’s Ethereum Sepolia Faucet to get some test Ethereum, known as Sepolia ETH.

– Navigate to Ethereum Sepolia Faucet and enter your wallet address, which you can get by clicking the ‘copy to clipboard’ button below your account name.

– To prevent bots from using all the ETH in a faucet, you can only send a small test amount. These faucets are essentially real nodes run by google providing a test environment for developers.

– Click on `Receive 0.05 Sepolia ETH`

– Now, just wait a bit to receive your ETH.

Interacting with Blockchain

Once the transaction is complete and you have 0.05 ETH in your wallet, you can view your transactions on platforms like Sepolia Etherscan by pasting your wallet address there. This site lets you track all the activity associated with your or other wallets on the Sepolia network.

You can see the account balance, transactions, and the address of the sender, etc below. We will discuss the transactions in detail in the next blog post. For the mainnet, we can similarly use Etherscan.

And that’s it for now! We’ve set up a wallet, practiced transactions on a test network, and learned how to use a testnet faucet.