Deploy a Smart Contract
Hardhat

Hardhat

What is Hardhat?

Hardhat (opens in a new tab) is a development environment for Ethereum that helps developers manage and automate the common tasks involved in building smart contracts and decentralized applications. It can directly interact with Xterio Chain (BNB)'s Ethereum API, allowing for the deployment of smart contracts into the Xterio Chain (BNB).

Additionally, Hardhat is a comprehensive set of tools for creating Ethereum-based software, which includes various components that aid in editing, compiling, debugging, and deploying smart contracts and decentralized applications. All of these components work together to create a complete development environment.

In this example, let's deploy a simple contract in Xterio Testnet.

Prerequisites

Before we start, make sure you have met the following conditions:

  1. Have some tBNB on Xterio Testnet Network. You can follow our guide on Bridging for Xterio Chain (BNB).

  2. Node.js and npm must be installed on your computer. If it's not, follow this guide (opens in a new tab).

Creating a Hardhat Project

  1. Create a directory for your project:

    mkdir hardhat && cd hardhat
  2. Initialize the project, which will create a package.json file

    npm init -y
  3. Install Hardhat:

    npm install --save-dev hardhat
  4. Start a new Hardhat project with TypeScript:

    npx hardhat init
  5. Create an empty hardhat.config.js and install the Ethers plugin to use the Ethers.js library to interact with the network.

    npm install @nomiclabs/hardhat-ethers ethers

Creating Your Smart contract

  1. Create contracts directory:
    mkdir contracts && cd contracts
  2. Create your_contract.sol file in contracts directory
    touch your_contract.sol

Creating Your Configuration File

Modify the Hardhat configuration file and create a secure file to store your private key in.

  1. Create a secrets.json file to store your private key
    touch secrets.json
  2. Add your private key to secrets.json
    {
    "privateKey": "YOUR-PRIVATE-KEY-HERE"
    }
  3. Add the file to your project's .gitignore, and never reveal your private key.
  4. Modify the hardhat.config.js file
    • Import the Ethers.js plugin
    • Import the secrets.json file
    • Inside the module.exports add the Xterio Chain (BNB) configuration
    require('@nomiclabs/hardhat-ethers');
    const { privateKey } = require('./secrets.json');
    
    module.exports = {
    solidity: "0.8.1",
    defaultNetwork: "rinkeby",
    networks: {
        rinkeby: {
            url: "https://eth-rinkeby.alchemyapi.io/v2/123abc123abc123abc123abc123abcde",
            accounts: [privateKey]
        },
        xterioTestnet: {
            url: "https://xterio-testnet.alt.technology/",  // XterioTestnet RPC URL Here
            chainId: 1637450, // XterioTestnet Chain ID Here
        }
    },
    }

Notice:

Avoid uploading your hardhat.config.ts file to GitHub or disclosing your private key to others. It's a frequent error to accidentally push your private key to GitHub, so ensure you include hardhat.config.ts in your .gitignore file to prevent this.

Deploying Your Smart Contract

  1. Compile the contract
    npx hardhat compilejs
  2. Create a new directory for the script and name it scripts and add a new file to it called deploy.js
    mkdir scripts && cd scripts
    touch deploy.js
  3. Create a deployment script, like the one below
    async function main() {
    // 1. Get the contract to deploy
    const Your_Contract = await ethers.getContractFactory('your_contract');
    console.log('Deploying Your_Contract...');
    
    // 2. Instantiating a new smart contract
    const your_contract = await Your_Contract.deploy();
    
    // 3. Waiting for the deployment to resolve
    await your_contract.deployed();
    
    // 4. Use the contract instance to get the contract address
    console.log('Your_Contract deployed to:', your_contract.address);
    }
    
    main()
    .then(() => process.exit(0))
    .catch((error) => {
        console.error(error);
        process.exit(1);
    });
  4. Deploy your_contract.sol using the command below
    npx hardhat run scripts/deploy.js --network xterioTestnet