Harry Pierson, chief architect of NGD Seattle, and Ricardo Prado, a Neo core developer, recently joined Neo News Today to give an introduction and overview of the Neo Blockchain Toolkit for Visual Studio Code.

The toolkit is the first product released by NGD Seattle for the development community, offering a streamlined Neo private blockchain solution, contract templates, and debugging capabilities designed to feel familiar for traditional developers that are new to blockchain.

In the video, Pierson begins by showing how to import a simple “Hello World” contract template and runs it through the debugger. Debugging with the Neo Blockchain Toolkit is done without a live blockchain, with contract storage being emulated.

Further, the Neo Express private network solution is introduced, with a basic overview of commands such as creating a single or multi-node blockchain, managing wallets and assets, and the checkpointing feature that allows private network states to be preserved and shared between users as required.

The Visual DevTracker interface is also demonstrated, which allows developers to easily analyze transactions on MainNet, TestNet, or any Neo Express private networks. To conclude the overview, a more in-depth look at the debugging experience is provided, using the CNEO contract template which uses more complex methods.

Developers interested in trying out the toolkit can download it directly via the VS Marketplace as an extension. A quickstart has been provided with additional installation prerequisites, a contract template pack, and comprehensive instructions for using the available tools.