Using @dfinity/agent in node.js

Developers
21

@anthonymq: How do you check for your “CLI” principal? IIRC you have to pass --no-wallet so that the call goes to the canister directly and not via your “wallet” canister.

22

dfx identity --network ic get-principal

23

yep that’s what I did :frowning:

24

Alright so I was about to post details and everything but cannot therefore I just gonna say that I face the exact same issue.

When I compare a caller principal in a query called from a NodeJS script, in which I used my private key, with the self fromActor principal, I get an error respectively both principals are not the same.

1 Like
26 
const initIdentity = () => {
  const buffer = readFileSync('/Users/daviddalbusco/.config/dfx/identity/default/identity.pem');
  const key = buffer.toString('utf-8');

  const privateKey = crypto.createHash('sha256').update(key).digest('base64');

  return Secp256k1KeyIdentity.fromSecretKey(Buffer.from(privateKey, 'base64'));
};
27

dfx identity --network ic get-principal leads to w2bwq-cyvg6...

in nodejs

const identity = initIdentity();

console.log(identity.getPrincipal().toText());

I get another value → cd5mb-c6i5a....

2 Likes
28

Are you sure your pem file is corresponding to a Secp256k1 key? and not Ed25519?

1 Like
29

I would say probably or yes because if I use the Ed25519KeyIdentity provider of agent-js instead of the Secp256k1KeyIdentity with the exact same code I get Error: bad secret key size

5 Likes
30

Yep same error for me.

31

Same here too
20chars

32

I’ve added reproductible identities across dfx and agent-js as an issue for SDK to resolve. It ought to work, and either a defect or lack of documentation is barring that functionality

3 Likes
33

Do you have a link to the issue?

34

We’ve shifted to Jira for our board to work with other teams at the foundation more easily, but I could also create an issue in agent-js to track it publicly

2 Likes
35

Hello dears, is there any update about reply #29 ?

36

Not that I know, I did not try again neither.

37

Yeah, that’s on me. I haven’t had the time to figure out what’s going on there

38

I’m also running into this issue as well

39

We’ve been investigating on and off for a while and haven’t been able to find a simple way to reproduce identities from dfx in agent-js. I think it’s going to require re-implementing the full logic of the Rust library that dfx uses as a new npm package.

It’s something we want to do, but it’s below a few other more critical features we want to get through first

40

It might be happening on tweetnacl, better using try catch and loop the keypair function

41

Update - @ericswanson helped me unblock this:

seed.txt

early cinnamon crucial teach mobile just toast real rebel around card priority spike aerobic result account marble hero action intact inside elbow wrestle oval

$ keysmith principal yields
bh66w-ffyze-maien-ejjje-wzhqi-crrjo-rcgs7-twjrh-kf2km-hbtia-eae

seed.js

const Identity = require("@dfinity/identity");
const hdkey = require("hdkey");
const fs = require("fs");

const { Secp256k1KeyIdentity } = Identity;

const bip39 = require("bip39");

const phrase = fs.readFileSync("seed.txt").toString().trim();

export const identityFromSeed = async (phrase) => {
  const seed = await bip39.mnemonicToSeed(phrase);
  const root = hdkey.fromMasterSeed(seed);
  const addrnode = root.derive("m/44'/223'/0'/0/0");

  return Secp256k1KeyIdentity.fromSecretKey(addrnode.privateKey);
};

identityFromSeed(phrase).then((identity) => {
  console.log(identity.getPrincipal().toString());
});

$ node seed.js yields
bh66w-ffyze-maien-ejjje-wzhqi-crrjo-rcgs7-twjrh-kf2km-hbtia-eae

We still have to hunt down the implementation used by rust-openssl/pkey.rs at master · sfackler/rust-openssl · GitHub, but this should open up the possibility to use a single identity across JS and dfx, from a shared seed phrase!

Of course, this comes with some security caveats -

  • Do not ever commit a seed phrase to your souce code.
  • THIS PATTERN SHOULD NEVER BE USED IN A FRONTEND APPLICATION
  • Use a different identity for each project to mitigate risk
  • Dfinity does not officially endorse doing this
7 Likes