Quick start | Substrate

All of the Substrate tutorials and how-to guides require you to build and run a Substrate node in your development environment. To help you set up a working environment quickly, the Substrate Developer Hub maintains several templates for you to use. For example, the Developer Hub substrate-node-template is a snapshot of the main Substrate node-template binary that includes everything you need to get started with a functional node and a core set of features.

This Quick start assumes that you are setting up a development environment for the first time and want to try out running a single blockchain node on your local computer. To keep things simple, you'll connect to the local node using a web browser and look up a balance for a predefined sample account.

Before you begin

Before you begin, verify the following:

You have an internet connection and access to an interactive shell terminal on your local computer.
You are generally familiar with software development and using command-line interfaces.
You have the Rust compiler and toolchain installed.

You can check whether you have Rust installed by running the rustup show command. If Rust is installed, this command displays version information for the toolchain and compiler. If Rust is not installed, the command doesn't return any output. For information about installing Rust, see Install.

Build the node template

Clone the node template repository by running the following command:
```
git clone https://github.com/substrate-developer-hub/substrate-node-template
```
In most cases, you can clone the main branch to get the latest code. However, you can use the --branch command-line option if you want to work with a Substrate branch that is compatible with a specific Polkadot version. Click Tags to see the list of branches that are compatible with specific Polkadot versions.
Change to the root of the cloned directory:
```
cd substrate-node-template
```
If you want to save your changes and make this branch easy to identify, you can create a new branch by running a command similar to the following:
```
git switch -c my-branch-v0.9.29
```
Compile the node template:
```
cargo build --package node-template --release
```
Because of the number of packages involved, compiling the node can take several minutes.

Start the node

Verify that your node is ready to use and see information about the command-line options available by running the following command:
```
./target/release/node-template --help
```
The usage information displays the command-line options you can use to:
- start the node
- work with accounts
- modify node operations

View account information for the predefined Alice development account by running the following command:

./target/release/node-template key inspect //Alice

The command displays the following account information:

Secret Key URI `//Alice` is account:
Network ID:        substrate 
Secret seed:       0xe5be9a5092b81bca64be81d212e7f2f9eba183bb7a90954f7b76361f6edb5c0a
Public key (hex):  0xd43593c715fdd31c61141abd04a99fd6822c8558854ccde39a5684e7a56da27d
Account ID:        0xd43593c715fdd31c61141abd04a99fd6822c8558854ccde39a5684e7a56da27d
Public key (SS58): 5GrwvaEF5zXb26Fz9rcQpDWS57CtERHpNehXCPcNoHGKutQY
SS58 Address:      5GrwvaEF5zXb26Fz9rcQpDWS57CtERHpNehXCPcNoHGKutQY

Start the node in development mode by running the following command:
```
./target/release/node-template --dev
```
In development mode, the chain doesn't require any peer computers to finalize blocks. As the node starts, the terminal displays output about the operations performed. If you see messages that blocks are being proposed and finalized, you have a running node.
```
... Idle (0 peers), best: #3 (0xcc78…5cb1), finalized #1 ...
... Starting consensus session on top of parent ...
... Prepared block for proposing at 4 (0 ms) ...
```

Connect to the node

Create a simple HTML file with JavaScript and the Polkadot-JS API to interact with the blockchain.

For example, create an index.html file that uses JavaScript and HTML to:
- take an account address as input
- look up the account balance using an onClick event
- display the balance for the account as output
This sample index.html provides a simple example of how to use JavaScript, the Polkadot-JS API, and HTML to get an account balance.
Copy and paste the sample code for the Quick start: Get Balance application into a new file in your text editor and save the file on your local computer.
Open the index.html file in a web browser.
Copy and paste the SS58 Address for the Alice account in the input field, then click Get Balance.

Stop the node

Go to the terminal that displays blockchain operations.
Stop the local blockchain and clear all state by pressing ctrl-c.

Where to go next

In this Quick start, you learned how to compile and run a single blockchain node on your local computer. To start learning how to customize its features, explore the following resources: