The Ethereum name service is an amazing project that allows you to purchase and set up a human-readable .eth address for people to send various cryptocurrencies to. ENS will handle all the transactions, all you need is one address and today I’m going to walk you through how and explain why you should.

First off let’s talk about why you might want to take advantage of this:
- It’s inexpensive
- You will turn a long 40+ character address into a human-readable name that is easy to remember and without having to copy and paste
- It prevents lost transactions from mistyped addresses (if you type “scottcbusi.eth” it will say this is incorrect unless someone else has bought it)
- It enables you to store other records like your email or URL
- It enables you to setup a decentralized website via .onion or IPFS
- They will continue adding more features and improvements

Note that some fixes for various issues are:
- Metamask not working and needing to use a different browser
- Ensuring you have a compatible Ethereum wallet like Metamask
- Navigating to app.ens.domains and not just ens.domains
- One very specific issue I had was that my resolver needed to be reset and thus it was preventing me from adding new coins which I found out by inspecting my browser and seeing the error in the console. I just followed the instructions and redid step 1-3 and it solved the problem

It may look somewhat confusing, but you just need to follow the three steps they have laid out for you at the top when you click on the dropdown for “Learn how to manage your name” and you’ll be good to go.

1. Set the resolver which is a smart contract for translating names into addresses. In the Resolver area click on ‘Set’. Then click the ‘use public resolver’ link, and ‘save’ to launch the transaction.

2. Set your address in records under the resolver address by clicking the ‘+’ in the ‘records’ field then adding your Ethereum address. This makes it so that when people type in your .ETH name, they will get your Ethereum address.

3. Set the reverse record which is the opposite of what you just did. This will make it so that alternatively if someone searches your address, they can also find your .ETH name. Click the arrow for the reverse record that should say it isn’t set just below your address to expand the field, then click the button ‘save’. This will translate your address into your new name.

After that, you can easily add more records for other coins, content hashes, or text records. I’ve added my LTC and BTC addresses as well as my email and URL.

My address is scottcbusiness.eth. While there are currently other solutions out there like FIO and Unstoppable domains, I have found ENS to be the easiest, most widely adopted, and the most compatible with the most wallets.

I also had an interview with Brantly Millegan from ENS to talk a little bit about the project and where it’s headed here: https://youtu.be/-Oz_QKouV5c

Let me know if this helped and if you plan to get a .ETH address or use ENS. Also, feel free to comment what your .ETH address to share that you’ve also got one for yourself and got it set up!