Object has no member 'call' when reading smart contract in geth console

Question

I'm following the Storage contract example from the Geth site (https://geth.ethereum.org/docs/interacting-with-geth/javascript-console-contracts)

I am unable to call a 'retrieve' function on the contract and get the return value. instance.retrieve() appears to return a transaction receipt and instance.retrieve().call() produces and error that there is no 'call' method.

Contract

// SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
pragma solidity ^0.8.0;

contract Storage{

    uint256 value = 5;

    function set(uint256 number) public{
        value = number;
    }

    function retrieve() public view returns (uint256){
        return value;
    }
}

Deploy and Call

geth attach node1/geth.ipc
Welcome to the Geth JavaScript console!

instance: Geth/v1.13.5-stable-916d6a44/linux-amd64/go1.21.4
...

> var abi = [{"inputs":[],"name":"retrieve","outputs":[{"internalType":"uint256","name":"","type":"uint256"}],"stateMutabifunction"},{"inputs":[{"internalType":"uint256","name":"number","type":"uint256"}],"name":"set","outputs":[],"stateMutabilpe":"function"}];

> var bytecode = '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'
> var contract = eth.contract(abi);
> var gas = eth.estimateGas({ data: bytecode });
> var tx = { from: eth.accounts[0], data: bytecode, gas: gas };
> var deployed_contract = contract.new(tx);
>  var instance = contract.at(deployed_contract.address);

> instance.set.sendTransaction(42, {from: eth.accounts[0], gas: 100000});
"0x977067e158d57e5788417abf262fdd4244808f4b711f11ed5ad84fad786fd898"
> eth.defaultAccount = web3.eth.accounts[0];
"0x2367d43e993ffbada5f45e13b6df5e24598530a9"

The Error

> instance.retrieve().call() >> 2
TypeError: Object has no member 'call'
        at <eval>:1:25(4)
> instance.retrieve() >> 2
0
> instance.retrieve().call();
TypeError: Object has no member 'call'
        at <eval>:1:25(4)

> instance.retrieve()
"0x98ede7bca5ae23c3bd219a06a8b9faa508aeab6bbc83c43819e6f3c80f23a0bb"
> eth.getTransactionReceipt("0x98ede7bca5ae23c3bd219a06a8b9faa508aeab6bbc83c43819e6f3c80f23a0bb");
{
  blockHash: "0x69ec3c72df383000cd03d190af5542a04ec17acf37239ffe7015beade952ffbf",
  blockNumber: 1651,
  contractAddress: null,
  cumulativeGasUsed: 23479,
  effectiveGasPrice: 1000000000,
  from: "0x2367d43e993ffbada5f45e13b6df5e24598530a9",
  gasUsed: 23479,
  logs: [],
  logsBloom: "0x00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000",
  status: "0x1",
  to: "0xd6f6bd102568074f70ebe44bd60edb9119a9089f",
  transactionHash: "0x98ede7bca5ae23c3bd219a06a8b9faa508aeab6bbc83c43819e6f3c80f23a0bb",
  transactionIndex: 0,
  type: "0x0"
}

I've tried a few thing, but still not sure how to get this to work, or find details in the documentation.

Answer 1

geth uses a very old version of web3 v0.20. Check the documentation in the github repo https://github.com/web3/web3.js/blob/0.20.7/DOCUMENTATION.md#contract-methods

In your case the equivalent should be

instance.retrieve.call(params..)

Or

instance.retrieve.sendTransaction(params.., {from: "0xxxx"})

Answer 2

fxed it. was copy-n-pasting from the example. it was the ()

instance.retrieve().call();

should be

instance.retrieve.call();