Anthony Campolo demonstrates deploying a smart contract on Avalanche using QuickNode and integrating it with a React frontend hosted on Netlify.
Episode Summary
In this QuickStream episode, Anthony Campolo, a developer advocate at QuickNode, provides a comprehensive tutorial on working with the Avalanche blockchain. He begins by explaining the multi-chain future and Avalanche’s unique features, including its faster, cheaper, and more environmentally conscious approach compared to Ethereum. The tutorial covers setting up a MetaMask wallet for Avalanche’s Fuji testnet, creating a project using Vite and React, and deploying a simple “Hello World” smart contract. Anthony walks through the process of connecting to QuickNode’s Avalanche endpoint, compiling and deploying the smart contract using Hardhat, and creating a React frontend to interact with the deployed contract. The episode concludes with deploying the application to Netlify, demonstrating a full end-to-end workflow for building and hosting a decentralized application on Avalanche.
Chapters
00:00 - Introduction and Overview
Anthony Campolo introduces himself and the new weekly QuickStream series by QuickNode. He provides context about QuickNode and its role in the Web3 blockchain world, emphasizing the company’s belief in a multi-chain future. Anthony briefly explains Avalanche’s background, including its origins in academic research from Cornell and its advantages over Ethereum in terms of speed, cost, and environmental impact. He outlines the structure of Avalanche’s three interconnected chains and introduces the C chain, which will be the focus of the tutorial. This chapter sets the stage for the hands-on demonstration that follows, giving viewers a clear understanding of what to expect from the tutorial.
02:56 - Setting Up the Environment
This chapter focuses on the initial setup required to work with Avalanche. Anthony begins by showing how to configure MetaMask, a popular cryptocurrency wallet, to work with both the Avalanche mainnet and the Fuji testnet. He demonstrates how to add these networks to MetaMask, including the necessary network details such as RPC URLs, chain IDs, and currency symbols. Anthony then guides viewers through the process of obtaining test tokens from the Fuji testnet faucet, which are needed for deploying and interacting with smart contracts on the testnet. The chapter concludes with an overview of the project setup, including creating a React boilerplate using Vite and installing necessary dependencies such as Hardhat, Ethers.js, and Solidity. This comprehensive setup process ensures that viewers have all the tools and resources needed to follow along with the tutorial.
09:52 - Creating and Deploying the Smart Contract
In this chapter, Anthony dives into the creation and deployment of a simple “Hello World” smart contract on the Avalanche network. He begins by writing the Solidity code for the contract, explaining its structure and functionality. To ensure the contract works as expected, Anthony demonstrates how to use the Remix IDE as a quick sanity check before proceeding with the actual deployment. The chapter then moves on to creating a deployment script using Hardhat, explaining each part of the script and its purpose. Anthony walks through the process of compiling the contract and deploying it to the Fuji testnet using QuickNode’s endpoint. He emphasizes the importance of keeping private keys and endpoints secure by using environment variables. The chapter concludes with a successful deployment of the contract and shows how to verify its existence on the Avalanche block explorer, SnowTrace.
16:53 - Building the React Frontend
This chapter focuses on integrating the deployed smart contract with a React frontend application. Anthony begins by setting up the basic structure of the React app, including importing necessary dependencies and contract artifacts. He explains the process of connecting to the MetaMask wallet and interacting with the deployed contract using the ethers.js library. Anthony demonstrates how to read the current state of the contract and display it in the React app. He then adds functionality to update the contract’s state, showing how to handle transactions and wait for them to be confirmed on the blockchain. Throughout this chapter, Anthony provides clear explanations of React concepts and how they integrate with blockchain interactions, making it accessible for viewers with varying levels of experience in both React and blockchain development.
22:37 - Deploying to Netlify and Conclusion
In the final chapter, Anthony demonstrates how to deploy the React application to Netlify, making it accessible on the internet. He walks through the process of setting up a Netlify configuration file, initializing a Git repository, and pushing the code to GitHub. Anthony then shows how to connect the GitHub repository to Netlify and set up the build process, including how to securely add environment variables for the contract address. After a successful deployment, he demonstrates the live application, showing that it can interact with the smart contract deployed on the Avalanche testnet. The chapter concludes with Anthony summarizing the entire process, from deploying a smart contract on the Avalanche Fuji testnet to creating a React frontend and hosting it on Netlify. He provides links to the GitHub repository and QuickNode resources, encouraging viewers to explore further. The episode ends with Anthony teasing the next QuickStream session and thanking the audience for their attention.