Ethereum, tokens & smart contracts.

Notes on getting started Part 6. Tokens & Inheritance

Previous notes in case you are just joining us:
Part 1. Setting up.
Part 2. Web3.js/node. 
Part 3. Solidity.
Part 4. Smart Contracts.
Part 5. Smarter Contracts.

Smart contracts along with Ethereum's VM make an environment suitable for all kinds of applications, while we seem to just be starting, digital tokens are a complex,interesting and perhaps even inevitable or obvious one, tokens have sprouted a multimillion dollar industry and represent a new form of funding via ICOS (Initial Coin Offerings), so now that we know enough solidity to make contracts, let’s dive into tokens.

In essence a token is a crypto currency that rides on top of Ethereums VM, let’s start by making a minimal one, deploying in the testnet and interacting with it.

Ethereum’s guide presents us with this one (I just changed the name to minimalToken):

// FILE : minimalToken.sol
pragma solidity ^0.4.0;
contract minimalToken {
/* This creates an array with all balances */
    mapping (address => uint256) public balanceOf;
/* Initializes contract with initial supply tokens to the creator of the contract */
    function…