title_body: How can a developer access the Cardano network?
upvoted_answer: If you use Nix or NixOs, it is rather straightforward: Build the code for a cardano node using nix (link to current documentation)
  Duplicating the official documentation:
  git clone https://github.com/input-output-hk/cardano-node
  cd cardano-node
  nix-build -A scripts.mainnet.node -o mainnet-node-local
  ./mainnet-node-local
  
  This will run a cardano node on the mainnet.
  Then you can also build and use the CLI tool to interact with the cardano network.
  
  In the provided solution above, if you don't want to compile GHC which can take a long time, IOHK provides many binaries that are pre-compiled for you: lots of time gained ! So don't hesitate to use their nix binary cache
  In NixOS, I currently set it this way:
  # configuration.nix
  { config, pkgs, ... }:
  {
    # ... all the rest of the configuration of the server
  
    # iohk binary caches
    nix = 
    {
      binaryCaches          = [ &quot;https://hydra.iohk.io&quot; &quot;https://iohk.cachix.org&quot; ];
      binaryCachePublicKeys = [ &quot;hydra.iohk.io:f/Ea+s+dFdN+3Y/G+FDgSq+a5NEWhJGzdjvKNGv0/EQ=&quot; &quot;iohk.cachix.org-1:DpRUyj7h7V830dp/i6Nti+NEO2/nhblbov/8MW7Rqoo=&quot; ];
    };
  }