Wallet is the first door to the world of defi. Only by learning how to use wallet can we carry out real chain operation.
Just as everyone's money in the bank needs to be stored in the account, there is something similar to the "account" in the encrypted assets on the chain, which we call "address on the chain".Wallet is a tool for you to manipulate the address on the chain and move the assets on the chain. So sometimes, we also call the address on the chain "wallet address".
If you have ever bought or sold digital assets in the exchange, you need to understand that your assets in the exchange are actually on the "wallet address" of the exchange. What you trade is only numbers, not "touch the chain".
But to use the defi app, you must learn to use your wallet.
We recommend using metamask mentioned in the first issue of airdrop express as the first choice of computer browser wallet. At present, all defi applications support metamask login.
At the same time, we recommend that you use the Chrome browser developed by Google, which is perfectly compatible with metamask.
Download method: visit the official website with Chrome browser: https://metamask.io
The download function is clearly visible on the homepage of the official website. Click to enter and select "Chrome" to download to the browser:
After downloading, click "start using" to start our journey of defi:
Create wallet to generate your first wallet address:
Create a password to log in to the wallet on the current computer.
Why emphasize "current computer"? Don't worry, it will be revealed later.
After this step, we will see a relatively unfamiliar concept: mnemonic words.
In order to understand this new concept, let's take the example of bank account as an analogy:
If you have experience in using online banking on your computer, you should remember that you need to enter a password to log in to online banking, and you need to enter it again before actual payment.
In order to remember, most people will set the two passwords to be the same.
The so-called mnemonics and the private key managed by mnemonics (you can't touch it now, just understand it as the same thing as mnemonics for the time being), which is equivalent to this login + payment password.
With it, you can log in to your online address and move your digital assets freely.
That's why matamask recommends that you back it up on paper and never store and send it over the network, otherwise the assets may not be gone one day.
What about the login password on the previous "current computer"?
It's just the screen lock of your computer.
Metamask does not store either of these passwords. If you change a computer and download metamask again, you can reset the login password on the "current computer", just like resetting a screen lock.
Then, according to your mnemonic, log in to the address on the chain.
However, if the wallet is in the login status, the mnemonic words (and the private key managed by the mnemonic words) are loaded by default, and there is no need to enter them again during payment.
So these two passwords should be kept well. If you log in your wallet on the computer and turn around and leave, the people next to you can transfer money even if they don't know your mnemonic words~
After you get the mnemonic, you will officially have the first address on the chain (where the little hand points to in the figure below). The address format is the combination of letters and numbers beginning with 0x:
Metamask is not an independent software, but a "plug-in" embedded in the browser. It doesn't bother users at ordinary times. When you need to use it, you can find it in the upper right corner of Chrome browser:
Next, you can fly freely in the world of defi.
