Katana Development Starter Kit¶

This tutorial will help you set up and use the Katana Development Starter Kit for building applications on Katana and its testnet, Tatara.

Note: Tatara will deprecate on or around the release of Public Mainnet. A new testnet will release along with it

What is Katana?¶

Katana is a chain focused on providing optimized infrastructure for DeFi applications with integrated “money legos” - composable financial building blocks that developers can use to create new financial applications. It is focused on creating an experience where applications building on it can tap into deeper liquidity and offer higher yields than is available on any other chain.

Prerequisites¶

Before you begin, make sure you have a Conduit API key that’s been whitelisted. Follow instructions here.

Then, make sure you have the following tools installed:

Bun - A fast JavaScript runtime and package manager
Foundry - A toolkit for Ethereum application development
Git - Version control

Installing Bun¶

curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash

More info here.

Installing Foundry¶

curl -L https://foundry.paradigm.xyz | bash
foundryup

More info here

Setting Up Your Project¶

Clone the repository and navigate to it:

git clone https://github.com/katana-network/specialk
cd specialk

Create an environment file by copying the example:
```
cp .env.example .env
```
Edit .env to add your RPC endpoints:
```
TATARA_RPC_URL=https://your-tatara-rpc-url
```
Get your testnet API Key here
Install dependencies:
```
bun install
```

Running a Local Tatara Fork¶

To develop locally without spending testnet tokens, you can run a local fork of the Tatara testnet.

Step 1: Start Anvil Fork (Terminal 1)¶

bun run start:anvil:tatara

Anvil Start

Step 2: Verify the Fork (Terminal 2)¶

bun run verify:anvil:tatara

Anvil Start

Connecting to the Fork¶

You can now connect MetaMask or another wallet to your local fork:

Network Name: Tatara Local Fork
RPC URL: http://localhost:8545
Chain ID: 471
Currency Symbol: ETH

Opening the Example App¶

Build the example app with:

bun run build:all

Going forward you can just run bun run build to rebuild the app-only, but the first build:all run will build the ABIs, the MCP server, and more.

This will:

Compile your TypeScript code
Create a dist folder with your built application
Copy static assets like HTML, CSS, and images

Then, make sure your local fork is running (Terminal 1) and serve the compiled web app with any server, e.g.:

cd dist
npx http-server

Demo app running

Exploring the Interfaces¶

One of the key features of this starter kit is the comprehensive set of interfaces for Katana’s “money legos.” Browse the interfaces directory to see what’s available. The README of that folder contains a full list of contracts and their descriptions.

Alternatively, for a more readable UI, you can use the Katana Contract Directory UI.

Next Steps¶

Now that you have a working development environment, you can:

Explore the example App code to understand how it interacts with Katana
Review the interfaces to understand available contracts
Start building your own application using the “money legos”

For more tutorials, examples, and inspiration, please see the awesome-katana repo.

Troubleshooting¶

If you encounter issues:

Make sure your RPC URL in .env is correct
Check that port 8545 isn’t already in use by another application
Ensure Foundry is properly installed and anvil is in your PATH
If the script isn’t executable, run chmod +x scripts/start_anvil.sh
If all else fails, let us know in the starter kit issues!

Happy building on Katana! 🚀