title_body: Can Daedalus be used to query the blockchain, like a passive node?
upvoted_answer: Daedalus runs its own instance of cardano-node under the hood, so by installing and using cardano-cli, one can connect to this node and interact with the blockchain directly.
  
  Start Daedalus, and wait until it reaches the wallet home screen; the cardano-node.socket file is only made available after the cardano-node has started fully.
  Use cardano-cli: [Documentation]
  
  Ubuntu Example (Bash)
  export CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_PATH=/home/$USER/.local/share/Daedalus/mainnet/cardano-node.socket
  cardano-cli query tip --mainnet
  
  MacOS Example
  export CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_PATH=~/Library/Application\ Support/Daedalus\ Mainnet/cardano-node.socket
  cardano-cli query tip --mainnet
  
  Windows Example (PowerShell)
  On Windows, a socket file isn't used, instead we specify the pipe used, which has a different name every time Daedalus runs.
  cd &quot;C:\Program Files\Daedalus Mainnet&quot;
  $ENV:CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_PATH = (Get-ChildItem \\.\pipe\ | Where-Object {$_.name -like &quot;cardano-node-mainnet*&quot;}).FullName
  .\cardano-cli.exe query tip --mainnet