How can I create the typechain directory in my hardhat project?

Question

I have set up a hardhat project with typescript a while ago and want to write some tests. Now I only have a typechain-types directory and it doesn't give me the types I am used to. Where is the plain typechain directory? For instance this following code:

import { expect } from "chai";
import { ethers } from "hardhat";

import type {
    Example
 } from "../typechain-types";

async function doSomeExample() {
    let example : Example
    const signers = await ethers.getSigners()
    const ExampleFactory = await ethers.getContractFactory('Example', signers[0])
    example = await ExampleFactory.deploy()
}

gives me the Type-error: Type 'Contract' is missing the following properties from type 'Example': ... in the pen-ultimate line.

I have - amongst others - installed the following packages in package.json (it is a bit of a mess, admittedly):

"devDependencies": {
    "@nomiclabs/hardhat-ethers": "^2.0.5",
    "@nomiclabs/hardhat-etherscan": "^3.0.3",
    "@nomiclabs/hardhat-waffle": "^2.0.3",
    "@typechain/ethers-v5": "^10.1.0",
    "@typechain/hardhat": "^6.0.0",
    "@types/chai": "^4.3.1",
    "@types/mocha": "^9.1.1",
    "@types/node": "^17.0.31",
    "@typescript-eslint/eslint-plugin": "^5.22.0",
    "@typescript-eslint/parser": "^5.22.0",
    "ts-node": "^10.7.0",
    "typechain": "^8.1.0",
    "typescript": "^4.6.4",
    ...
},
"dependencies": {
    "@typechain/truffle-v5": "^8.0.1",
    "@typechain/web3-v1": "^6.0.1",
    "hardhat-typechain": "^0.3.5",
    "ts-generator": "^0.1.1",
    ...
}
   

My tsconfig.json looks as follows:

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "target": "es2018",
    "module": "commonjs",
    "strict": true,
    "esModuleInterop": true,
    "outDir": "dist",
    "declaration": true
  },
  "include": ["./scripts", "./test", "./typechain"],
  "files": ["./hardhat.config.ts"]
}

and the hardhat.cofig.ts starts with:

import { HardhatUserConfig, task } from "hardhat/config";
import "@nomiclabs/hardhat-etherscan";
import "@nomiclabs/hardhat-waffle";
import "@typechain/hardhat";

...

Also cleaning the types and all that with npx hardhat clean and re-compiling npx hardhat compile won't generate the types at the correct directory with the expected behaviour. What am I doing wrong?

Answer 1

You can define the typechain output target in the hardhat configuration file.

To receive the desired "plain" typechain directory add the following to your config file:

const config: HardhatUserConfig = {
solidity: {
    ...
  },
  typechain: {
    outDir: "typechain",
    target: "ethers-v5",
  },
  networks: {
    ...
  },
}

Answer 2

try to re-initial your hardhat project and use the default typescript template.

please vote me up if it's useful :)

Answer 3

You can do npx hardhat typechain and it will regenerate the folder for you.