"Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'encode')" error when calling a method

Question

I'm trying to call a simple hello_world method from my Solana Anchor program, but I keep getting this error:

TypeError: Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'encode')
    at .../node_modules/@coral-xyz/anchor/dist/cjs/program/namespace/index.js:35:100

Here’s my JavaScript code:

import { Program, AnchorProvider, setProvider } from '@coral-xyz/anchor';
import { PublicKey, Connection, Keypair } from '@solana/web3.js';
import bs58 from 'bs58';
import idl from './operator.json';

const connection = new Connection("http://127.0.0.1:8899"); // Localnet
const scionx = Keypair.fromSecretKey(bs58.decode("my_secret_key"));

const provider = new AnchorProvider(connection, scionx, { commitment: "confirmed" });
setProvider(provider);

const programID = new PublicKey("CMjNnp9yvMUqKJF2jB6E5HHpktwhm1ax9rHzh5risdNK");
const program = new Program(idl, programID, provider);

const tx = await program.methods.helloWorld().accounts({
  user: scionx.publicKey
}).rpc();

console.log("Transaction signature:", tx);

Here’s the relevant part of my Rust contract:

use anchor_lang::prelude::*;

#[program]
pub mod operator {
    pub fn hello_world(_ctx: Context<HelloWorld>) -> Result<()> {
        msg!("Hello, World!");
        Ok(())
    }
}

#[derive(Accounts)]
pub struct HelloWorld<'info> {
    pub user: Signer<'info>,
}

The program deploys fine, but I get the error when trying to call hello_world. Any ideas what might be wrong? Thanks!

Answer 1

Try using the bs58 module that anchor re-exports

import { bs58 } from "@coral-xyz/anchor/dist/cjs/utils/bytes";

You can also get information about your Solana environment on the anchor client using

const provider = anchor.AnchorProvider.env()

This will read the details of your workspace and use them to initialize the anchor provider.

If you need a different signer for the txs, you can append them using the signers() method to your tx