Cover image: iStock

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Barka da zuwa...

Ẹ kú ilé …

Welcome back …

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Time: 6:34 AM ☀️

Location: 🇳🇬

Lately, my alarm clock has been useless😅…

Yes, it has. I literally “wake” the “dude” up every Blessed day. I’d probably have to return it to the mall and ask for a refund or “ask” it to pay me for doing its job…

That was in a lighter mood though 😊

Still on the road to $30,000...

We’ll be kicking off with the BLOCKCHAIN SECTION of etherscan.io…

…The Blockchain as we all know is a public ledger that records transactions in a peer-to-peer network. The Blockchain section on the other hand provides us with detailed information about all transactions as they happen in real time.

It has ten (10) sub-sections viz; Transactions, Pending Transactions, Contract internal transactions, Beacon Deposits, Beacon Withdrawals, View Blocks, Uncles, Top Accounts, and Verified Contracts.

1. TRANSACTIONS

Let’s dive into this section. A general overview of the transactions is displayed on the upper region of the page. These include;

TRANSACTIONS (24H)
PENDING TRANSACTIONS (LAST 1H)
NETWORK TRANSACTIONS FEES (24H)
AVG. TRANSACTION FEE (24H)

Image: Transaction

The lower region of the page gives us detailed information on all transactions in the blockchain. These include;

Txn Hash: Transaction Hash or ID.
Block: The block number of that particular transaction.
Age: The time elapsed since the transaction was mined and confirmed
From: Sender’s wallet address
To: Receiver’s wallet address.
Value: Amount of ETH or other tokens transferred in the transaction.
Txn Fee: Transaction fee paid for gas.

Users can single out a particular transaction they are interested in by clicking on the view (eye symbol) beside the transaction in order to get more information. This is shown below:

Image: Additional info

2. PENDING TRANSACTIONS

As seen in the picture, it has the same information as the ‘Transaction’ section with an addition of a few more columns viz;

Nonce: This is a unique number assigned to each transaction, which helps to prevent double-spending.
Gas Limit: This column displays the maximum amount of gas that can be used by this transaction
Last Seen: Indicates when Etherscan last detected this pending transaction on the network.
Gas Fee: Same as Txn fee.

3. CONTRACT INTERNAL TRANSACTIONS

These are transactions that are initiated by a contract interacting with another contract. This is done by using the ‘CALL upcode’.

4. BEACON DEPOSITS

Context: Ethereum transitioned from Proof of Work (PoW) to a Proof of Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism (The Merge), thus merging the initial mainnet to the Beacon chain.

The Beacon deposits section of Etherscan shows and tracks all deposits of the required 32 ETH (notice that all transactions have the same amount) made by prospective validators into the Beacon Chain Smart Contract. Here, we’ll find the usual candidates in transactions viz; Txn Hash, Block, Age, Value, and From. The new additions are;

Eth2PubKey: This is the public key associated with each deposit. It is used to identify the validator node that corresponds to each deposit.
Signature: Generated by the depositor's Ethereum address and is used to prove that the deposit was made by the owner of that address,
Valid: This column indicates whether each deposit has been successfully processed by the Ethereum network. A deposit marked as "Yes" indicates that it has been successfully added to the Beacon Chain and is now being used to secure the network.

5. BEACON WITHDRAWALS

Similar to deposits, it tracks the withdrawals made in the Beacon Chain Deposit Contract. The following information can be found here;

Index: This column displays a unique number assigned to each withdrawal, which helps to prevent double-spending.
Block: This column displays the block number in which the withdrawal was included.
Age: This column displays the time elapsed since the withdrawal was processed.
Validator Index: This column displays a unique number assigned to each validator, which helps to identify the validator node that corresponds to each withdrawal.
Recipient: This column displays the Ethereum address that received the withdrawn funds.
Value: This column displays the amount of Ether or other tokens withdrawn in the transaction.

6. VIEW BLOCK

Network utilization is how much of the available gas limit is used by transactions in each block of the network. It helps the users to measure the level of activity and congestion in the network.
Block: Displays the block number in which the transaction was included.
Age: Displays the time elapsed since the block was mined.
Txn: The number of transactions included in the block.
Fee Recipient: Displays the Ethereum address that received the transaction fees for this block.
Gas Used: Displays the total amount of gas used by all transactions in this block.
Gas Limit: Displays the maximum amount of gas that can be used by transactions in this block.
Base Fee: Displays the minimum fee required to include a transaction in this block.
Reward: Displays the total amount of Ether rewarded to miners for mining this block.
Burnt Fee: Displays the total amount of Ether that was burned as part of EIP-1559.

7. FORKED BLOCKS

A forked block is a block that is excluded from the main blockchain as a result of chain reorganization. Chain reorganization occurs when two or more miners solve a block at the same time. This leads to having multiple versions of the blockchain hence, the network has to choose one version. The version that is chosen/selected becomes part of the main blockchain and the other(s) are discarded. The discarded blockchain is referred to as a forked block.

It is made up of the following;

Height: Displays the height of the forked block.
Age: Displays the time elapsed since the forked block was mined.
Txn: Displays the number of transactions included in the forked block.
Uncles: Displays the number of uncle blocks included in this forked block.
Fee Recipient: Displays the Ethereum address that received the transaction fees for this forked block.
Gas Limit: Displays the maximum amount of gas that can be used by transactions in this forked block.
Difficulty: Displays the difficulty level of mining this forked block.
Reward: Displays the total amount of Ether rewarded to miners for mining this forked block.
ReorgDepth: Displays how many blocks were reorganized as a result of this fork.

8. UNCLES

An Uncle is a block that is not included in the main blockchain but is still valid. It consists of the following;

Block Height: Displays the height of the uncle block.
Uncle Number: Displays a unique number assigned to each uncle block.
Age: Displays the time elapsed since the uncle block was mined.
Miner: Displays the Ethereum address that mined this uncle block.
Reward: Displays the total amount of Ether rewarded to miners for mining this uncle block.

9. TOP ACCOUNTS

A list of all wallets on Ethereum filtered according to their ETH balance. The data provided here are;

Address: Displays the Ethereum address associated with each account.
Name Tag: Allows users to assign a name tag to each account for easy identification.
Balance: Displays the current balance of Ether held by each account.
Percentage: Displays what percentage each account holds relative to all other accounts on Ethereum.
Txn Count: Displays how many transactions have been sent from each account.

10. Verified Contracts

Gives detailed information of all verified smart contracts on the Ethereum network.

These include;

Address: Displays the Ethereum address associated with each verified contract.
Contract Name: Displays the name of the verified contract.
Compiler: Displays the version of the Solidity compiler used to compile the contract.
Version: Displays the version of the contract.
Balance: Displays the current balance of Ether held by each verified contract.
Txns: Displays how many transactions have been sent to each verified contract.
Settings: Displays any settings associated with each verified contract.
Verified: Indicates whether each contract has been verified by Etherscan.
Audit: Displays any audit reports associated with each verified contract.
License: Displays the open-source license associated with each verified contract.
Similar Contract: Displays any similar contracts that have been verified by Etherscan

The red arrow points to a caution sign beside the Solidity compiler version. This means that some Known Solidity compiler vulnerabilities exist for the particular compiler version of the smart contract.

That's a wrap on the blockchain section ...

The next episode promises to be an interesting one because we'll be talking about NFTs. See you soon.