Executing Bitcoin operations

Bitcoin Core has a Console which allows you to execute commands directly. The backend engine, called bitcoind, will execute the command and interact with the wallet, the blockchain, or the network, as requested. The results are returned as standard JSON text.

Note

JSON stands for Javascript Object Notation. Developers can use the JSON format as a way of encoding data that's easily read by both humans and computers. Following is an example of using JSON to describe a company and address:

{
  "title" : "ACME Manufacturing","address" : "1234 Main Street, Anywhere, CA"}

Curly braces, {}, are used to group key/value pairs. Keys are used to reference a piece of data. Each pair is separated by a colon, ":" . JSON uses quotes, "", to define strings of characters.

Bitcoin Core accepts and responds with JSON.

Opening the console

To open the window, select Debug window under the Help menu, and then select the Console tab. You will be prompted with a window similar to the example...