Blockchain Explorer
A blockchain explorer is an online webpage similar to Mozilla and Google Chrome, which allows users to browse and explore information about blockchain technology. All bitcoin and ether users depend on blockchain explorer to manage their records and transactions. It allows users to explore the entire blockchain platform that clients are using. Blockchain explorers are exclusive in nature. Each blockchain explorer is associated with a specific blockchain i.e.; a Bitcoin explorer cannot be used to extract information about litecoin transactions or blocks.
The functionality of Blockchain Explorer
The behavior of each blockchain explorer with its respective blockchain interface is explained below:
- Block Logs– Explorer permits its user to scrutinize blocks, which are freshly mined in its associated blockchain. Each explorer produces the current feed of all the blocks that have been added most recently.
- Transaction Logs– Explorer authorizes its users to traverse any transaction of any block, which has already been mined and is still a part of the blockchain.
- Transaction history for any given address– This feature helps the users to explore all the records associated with a given public address, which may include a number of transactions, its balance, etc.
- Address information and modification– The blockchain explorer allows its users to see the receiving address in a transaction. It also allows them to make necessary changes in their existing public address.
- Best transaction for a given day– Some explorers keep a record of the largest transaction made in a day to distinguish it from the other. An example is blockchain.info.
- State of Mempool– Explorer enables its users to check the current status of the mempool, which encompasses the number of unregistered transactions and information related to it.
- Double spending occurrences– The record of all the double-spend transactions in the last ten minutes are recorded in some explorers.
- Genesis Block – Explorer displays the genesis block of that blockchain. For example, one can see Bitcoin’s genesis block here, which was mined in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto.
- Foundling Blocks- User can check the blocks, which were lost or orphaned and not attached to the blockchain.
- Relay chain- Explorer enables the user to know that the block was found by a particular mining pool.
Traversing a Public Blockchain Address
The most commonly found explorers are the bitcoin explorers. To explain the process of traversing a public address, we will use https://explorer.bitcoin.com/btc . It is one of the top results when searched for explorers.
For example, let’s take the given public bitcoin address-1F1tAaz5x1HUXrCNLbtMDqcw6o5GNn4xqX
Step 1- Go to https://explorer.bitcoin.com/btc, and search for 1F1tAaz5x1HUXrCNLbtMDqcw6o5GNn4xqX in the search tab.
Step 2- Check the details, such as total balance and BTC received or sent on this public address, as shown in the image.
Step 3- Exploring the transactions for this address, you will find transaction:
The ID of each transaction along with the input and output sections, amount in terms of BTC, fees charged, confirmations for this transaction, and size of the transactions.
You can also find equivalent BTH details of the same address through this explorer. The example of it is shown below:
Explorers are irreplaceable asset and one of the best methods to analyze a blockchain. The presence of such open-source explorers like https://explorer.bitcoin.com/btc, provides transparency and immutability to the cryptocurrencies and other blockchain-based business solutions. Permitting users to access the blockchain ledger promotes a decentralized system to function peacefully.
