Unable to define greeterContract in the Greeter tutorial. Breaking change in Solidity 0.4.9!

Question

I was following the Greeter tutorial on Go Ethereum wiki and got stuck on the "var greeterContract = web3.eth.contract(greeterCompiled.greeter.info.abiDefinition)" phase returning TypeError: Cannot access member 'info' of undefined. I have solC installed and linked - (eth.getCompilers() returns ["Solidity"]) and source code compiled.

The only difference I spotted against the tutorial and other posts in the forum is that viewing greeterCompiled has "stdin"-block before greeter and mortal attributes. Any ideas what causes the error / stdin-block?

Geth Version: 1.5.8-stable-f58fb322 and solC Version: 0.4.9+commit.364da425.Linux.g++

{
  <stdin>:greeter: {
    code: "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",
    info: {
      abiDefinition: [{...}, {...}, {...}],
      compilerOptions: "--combined-json bin,abi,userdoc,devdoc --add-std --optimize",
      compilerVersion: "0.4.9",
      developerDoc: {
        methods: {}
      },
      language: "Solidity",
      languageVersion: "0.4.9",
      source: "contract mortal { address owner; function mortal() { owner = msg.sender; } function kill() { if (msg.sender == owner) suicide(owner); } } contract greeter is mortal { string greeting; function greeter(string _greeting) public { greeting = _greeting; } function greet() constant returns (string) { return greeting; } }",
      userDoc: {
        methods: {}
      }
    }
  },
  <stdin>:mortal: {
    code: "0x6060604052341561000c57fe5b5b60008054600160a060020a03191633600160a060020a03161790555b5b609c806100386000396000f300606060405263ffffffff60e060020a60003504166341c0e1b581146020575bfe5b3415602757fe5b602d602f565b005b6000543373ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff90811691161415606d5760005473ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff16ff5b5b5600a165627a7a72305820eca3dc2bc8d6fa1918006106610ba8497fc2dbc338fbd528482ddd442ab88be50029",
    info: {
      abiDefinition: [{...}, {...}],
      compilerOptions: "--combined-json bin,abi,userdoc,devdoc --add-std --optimize",
      compilerVersion: "0.4.9",
      developerDoc: {
        methods: {}
      },
      language: "Solidity",
      languageVersion: "0.4.9",
      source: "contract mortal { address owner; function mortal() { owner = msg.sender; } function kill() { if (msg.sender == owner) suicide(owner); } } contract greeter is mortal { string greeting; function greeter(string _greeting) public { greeting = _greeting; } function greet() constant returns (string) { return greeting; } }",
      userDoc: {
        methods: {}
      }
    }
  }
}

Answer 1

Update Apr 23 2017

geth 1.6.0 has a breaking change to remove access to the Solidity compiler from within geth.

The workaround is detailed in How to compile Solidity contracts within geth with the v1.6.0 **BREAKING CHANGE**?

---

Note: Solidity 0.4.9 has a breaking change to a lot of old examples

The new Solidity 0.4.9 3 days ago mentions that you have to be "watching out for file prefixes" - https://github.com/ethereum/solidity/releases/tag/v0.4.9 . <stdin> is the file prefix for "standard input", when no file prefix is specified.

The workaround is to use:

greeterCompiled["<stdin>:greeter"]

instead of:

greeterCompiled.<stdin>:greeter

as the < character will cause problems in the geth command line interpreter.

---

Details

To compile the greeter example using Solidity 0.4.9, you will have to modify your instructions slightly.

Following are the instructions to work-around the standard Greeter example.

Compile your contract:

var greeterSource = 'contract mortal { address owner; function mortal() { owner = msg.sender; } function kill() { if (msg.sender == owner) suicide(owner); } } contract greeter is mortal { string greeting; function greeter(string _greeting) public { greeting = _greeting; } function greet() constant returns (string) { return greeting; } }';

var greeterCompiled = web3.eth.compile.solidity(greeterSource);

If you now look at your greeterCompiled variable, you will see that some members are prefixed with <stdin>, as mentioned in the Question above.

> greeterCompiled
{
  <stdin>:greeter: {
    code: "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",
    info: {
      abiDefinition: [{...}, {...}, {...}],
      compilerOptions: "--combined-json bin,abi,userdoc,devdoc --add-std --optimize",
      compilerVersion: "0.4.9",
      developerDoc: {
        methods: {}
      },
      language: "Solidity",
      languageVersion: "0.4.9",
      source: "contract mortal { address owner; function mortal() { owner = msg.sender; } function kill() { if (msg.sender == owner) suicide(owner); } } contract greeter is mortal { string greeting; function greeter(string _greeting) public { greeting = _greeting; } function greet() constant returns (string) { return greeting; } }",
      userDoc: {
        methods: {}
      }
    }
  },
  <stdin>:mortal: {
    code: "0x6060604052341561000c57fe5b5b60008054600160a060020a03191633600160a060020a03161790555b5b609c806100386000396000f300606060405263ffffffff60e060020a60003504166341c0e1b581146020575bfe5b3415602757fe5b602d602f565b005b6000543373ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff90811691161415606d5760005473ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff16ff5b5b5600a165627a7a72305820eca3dc2bc8d6fa1918006106610ba8497fc2dbc338fbd528482ddd442ab88be50029",
    info: {
      abiDefinition: [{...}, {...}],
      compilerOptions: "--combined-json bin,abi,userdoc,devdoc --add-std --optimize",
      compilerVersion: "0.4.9",
      developerDoc: {
        methods: {}
      },
      language: "Solidity",
      languageVersion: "0.4.9",
      source: "contract mortal { address owner; function mortal() { owner = msg.sender; } function kill() { if (msg.sender == owner) suicide(owner); } } contract greeter is mortal { string greeting; function greeter(string _greeting) public { greeting = _greeting; } function greet() constant returns (string) { return greeting; } }",
      userDoc: {
        methods: {}
      }
    }
  }
}

Using < on your your geth JavaScript command line will not work. So here is a temporary workaround. You can access greeterCompiled.<stdin>:greeter: in geth JavaScript using the following syntax:

greeterCompiled["<stdin>:greeter"]

So to execute the rest of the example:

var greeter = greeterContract.new(_greeting,{from:web3.eth.accounts[0],
  data: greeterCompiled["<stdin>:greeter"].code, gas: 1000000}, function(e, contract) {
  if (!e) {
    if (!contract.address) {
      console.log("Contract transaction send: TransactionHash: " +
        contract.transactionHash + " waiting to be mined...");

    } else {
      console.log("Contract mined! Address: " + contract.address);
      console.log(contract);
    }

  }
})

Answer 2

There are still more breaking changes in the newest Solidity. I used the following to fix my error in 0.4.9 latest commit.

You need to copy the filename from the compiled code. In my example, this is /tmp/geth-compile-solidity311107485. Then use this in the next step. See screenshots.

The command to use is:

greeterCompiled["/tmp/geth-compile-solidity311107485:greeter"].info

instead of greeterCompiled.greeter.info.