go-ethereum/README.md
2014-02-21 00:47:07 +01:00

3.9 KiB

Ethereum

Build Status

Ethereum Go developer client (c) Jeffrey Wilcke

Ethereum is currently in its testing phase. The current state is "Proof of Concept 2". For build instructions see the Wiki.

Ethereum Go is split up in several sub packages Please refer to each individual package for more information.

  1. eth
  2. ethchain
  3. ethwire
  4. ethdb
  5. ethutil

The eth is the top-level package of the Ethereum protocol. It functions as the Ethereum bootstrapping and peer communication layer. The ethchain contains the Ethereum blockchain, block manager, transaction and transaction handlers. The ethwire contains the Ethereum wire protocol which can be used to hook in to the Ethereum network. ethutil contains utility functions which are not Ethereum specific. The utility package contains the patricia trie, RLP Encoding and hex encoding helpers. The ethdb package contains the LevelDB interface and memory DB interface.

This executable is the front-end (currently nothing but a dev console) for the Ethereum Go implementation.

If you'd like to start developing your own tools please check out the development package.

Build

For build instruction please see the Wiki

Command line options

-c       Launch the developer console
-m       Start mining blocks
-genaddr Generates a new address and private key (destructive action)
-p       Port on which the server will accept incomming connections (= 30303)
-upnp    Enable UPnP (= false)
-x       Desired amount of peers (= 5)
-h       This help

Developer console commands

addp <host>:<port>     Connect to the given host
tx <addr> <amount>     Send <amount> Wei to the specified <addr>

See the "help" command for developer options.

Contribution

If you'd like to contribute to Ethereum Go please fork, fix, commit and send a pull request. Commits who do not comply with the coding standards are ignored. If you send pull requests make absolute sure that you commit on the develop branch and that you do not merge to master. Commits that are directly based on master are simply ignored.

To make life easier try git flow it sets this all up and streamlines your work flow.

Coding standards

Sources should be formatted according to the Go Formatting Style.

Unless structs fields are supposed to be directly accesible, provide Getters and hide the fields through Go's exporting facility.

When you comment put meaningfull comments. Describe in detail what you want to achieve.

wrong

// Check if the value at x is greater than y
if x > y {
    // It's greater!
}

Everyone reading the source probably know what you wanted to achieve with above code. Those are not meaningful comments.

While the project isn't 100% tested I want you to write tests non the less. I haven't got time to evaluate everyone's code in detail so I expect you to write tests for me so I don't have to test your code manually. (If you want to contribute by just writing tests that's fine too!)