First, a note on safety:
You should not make the personal
API available over RPC
If you are on a local, trusted machine, you should use IPC instead of RPC. Otherwise, anyone who can connect to your node via RPC can try to brute-force your passwords and steal your Ether.
All administrative APIs are available by default over IPC, so no need to use any flags with geth
To connect via IPC:
Install my library:
npm install web3_extended
var web3_extended = require('web3_extended');
var options = {
host: '/home/user/.ethereum/geth.ipc',
ipc:true,
personal: true,
admin: false,
debug: false
};
var web3 = web3_extended.create(options);
web3.personal.newAccount("password",function(error,result){
if(!error){
console.log(result);
}
});
Replace the host
variable with the proper path for your system.
Note: All requests via IPC must be asynchronous.
Some Alternatives:
I don't know why you want to create new accounts via web3, but it's likely not the best way to do what you're trying to achieve. It is much safer and more modular to use a hooked web3 provider with a client-side light wallet or to simply use the Mist browser which handles all accounts for you.
Now for the technique (don't do this)
You need to enable the personal
API over RPC. Do this by starting geth with
geth --rpc --rpcapi "db,eth,net,web3,personal"
Then you can use the personal_newAccount
method via RPC. It's not implemented in web3.js, so you need to manually issue the RPC request. For example with curl:
curl -X POST --data '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"personal_newAccount","params":["password"],"id":1}' localhost:8545
creates a new account with password password
and returns the address:
{"id":1,"jsonrpc":"2.0","result":"0x05ca0ddf7e7506672f745b2b567f1d33b7b55f4f"}
There is some basic documentation
Alternatively:
Use the unofficial extended web3.js
- this allows you to use the
personal
, admin
and miner
APIs via a standard web3.js interface.
When you send a transaction, you will receive back a transaction hash.
Use the command getTransactionByHash({transaction hash}) to retrieve the transaction details. Your blockNumber should be non-null if the transaction has been mined and included into a block.
The call is documented in https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/JSON-RPC#eth_gettransactionbyhash with the following example:
// Request
curl -X POST --data '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"eth_getTransactionByHash","params":["0xb903239f8543d04b5dc1ba6579132b143087c68db1b2168786408fcbce568238"],"id":1}'
// Result
{
"id":1,
"jsonrpc":"2.0",
"result": {
"hash":"0xc6ef2fc5426d6ad6fd9e2a26abeab0aa2411b7ab17f30a99d3cb96aed1d1055b",
"nonce":"0x",
"blockHash": "0xbeab0aa2411b7ab17f30a99d3cb9c6ef2fc5426d6ad6fd9e2a26a6aed1d1055b",
"blockNumber": "0x15df", // 5599
"transactionIndex": "0x1", // 1
"from":"0x407d73d8a49eeb85d32cf465507dd71d507100c1",
"to":"0x85h43d8a49eeb85d32cf465507dd71d507100c1",
"value":"0x7f110" // 520464
"gas": "0x7f110" // 520464
"gasPrice":"0x09184e72a000",
"input":"0x603880600c6000396000f300603880600c6000396000f3603880600c6000396000f360",
}
}
Then call eth_blockNumber (https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/JSON-RPC#eth_blocknumber) to get the current block height. Your number of confirmations is the eth_blockNumber result minus the eth_getTransaction blockNumber result.
Best Answer
If you’re querying for historical balances, you have to be running an archive node otherwise all the balances will report as zero.
If you’re not running an archive note, you can query any address as far back as 250 blocks (or some small number) from the head.