Convenience libraries

Various convenience libraries exist for dapp developers. Some of them simplify the creation of specific user interface elements, some entirely manage the user account onboarding, and others give you a variety of methods for interacting with smart contracts, for a variety of API preferences (for example, promises, callbacks, and strong types).

The MetaMask Ethereum provider API is very simple, and wraps Ethereum JSON-RPC formatted messages, which is why some developers use a convenience library for interacting with the provider, such as Ethers, web3.js, Truffle, and Embark. You can refer to those tools' documentation to interact with the provider.

The provider API is all you need to create a full-featured web3 application, but if you need higher-level abstractions than those provided by the API, we recommend using a convenience library.