Gets the next nonce required for this Signer to send a transaction.
Optional
blockTag: BlockTagThe blocktag to base the transaction count on, keep in mind
many nodes do not honour this value and silently ignore it [default: "latest"
]
Prepares a TransactionRequest for sending to the network by populating any missing properties:
to
and from
addressesfrom
is specified , check that it matches this Signernonce
via signer.getNonce("pending")
gasLimit
via signer.estimateGas(tx)
chainId
via signer.provider.getNetwork()
type
and relevant fee data for that type (gasPrice
for legacy transactions, maxFeePerGas
for EIP-1559, etc)The call to prepare
Estimates the required gas required to execute //tx// on the Blockchain. This
will be the expected amount a transaction will require as its gasLimit
to successfully run all the necessary computations and store the needed state
that the transaction intends.
Keep in mind that this is best efforts, since the state of the Blockchain is in flux, which could affect transaction gas requirements.
UNPREDICTABLE_GAS_LIMIT A transaction that is believed by the node to likely
fail will throw an error during gas estimation. This could indicate that it
will actually fail or that the circumstances are simply too complex for the
node to take into account. In these cases, a manually determined gasLimit
will need to be made.
Evaluates the //tx// by running it against the current Blockchain state. This cannot change state and has no cost in ether, as it is effectively simulating execution.
This can be used to have the Blockchain perform computations based on its state (e.g. running a Contract's getters) or to simulate the effect of a transaction before actually performing an operation.
Sends %%tx%% to the Network. The signer.populateTransaction(tx)
is called first to ensure all necessary properties for the
transaction to be valid have been popualted first.
Signs an [[link-eip-191]] prefixed personal message.
If the %%message%% is a string, it is signed as UTF-8 encoded bytes. It is not
interpretted as a [[BytesLike]]; so the string "0x1234"
is signed as six
characters, not two bytes.
To sign that example as two bytes, the Uint8Array should be used
(i.e. new Uint8Array([ 0x12, 0x34 ])
).
A Signer represents an account on the Ethereum Blockchain, and is most often backed by a private key represented by a mnemonic or residing on a Hardware Wallet.
The API remains abstract though, so that it can deal with more advanced exotic Signing entities, such as Smart Contract Wallets or Virtual Wallets (where the private key may not be known).