return values for rpc calls #7043

1. 
   kalgecin commented at 5:40 pm on November 17, 2015: none

   Currently calling rpc commands does not return any values. They need to return at minimum true or false. true if the command was successful, false otherwise. For example, I have a script that imports private keys. I’d like to know whether the key i just tried importing imported or not, flag it if it hasn’t move on if it was.
2. 
   sipa commented at 5:59 pm on November 17, 2015: member

   This seems very reasonable to me, but I’m not sure it’s worth changing the API over. Traditionally, RPCs that have a stateful effect return Null (or an error if they fail), and only RPCs that request data return actual values.
3. 
   kalgecin commented at 6:41 pm on November 17, 2015: none

   ok, but there is no error returned if say the private key is wrong, it still returns null. there needs to be a way to know if the command you just sent was completed successfuly
4. 
   sipa commented at 6:45 pm on November 17, 2015: member

   No, an error should definitely be returned in that case: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/v0.11.2/src/wallet/rpcdump.cpp#L115

   If that isn’t working, there is definitely a bug.

5. 
   sipa commented at 6:56 pm on November 17, 2015: member

   Note that errors are returned as JSON-RPC errors, not as return values.
6. 
   kalgecin commented at 7:35 pm on November 17, 2015: none

   i receive null in either case
7. 
   sipa commented at 7:37 pm on November 17, 2015: member

   The return value will be Null in both cases. But one should have a JSON-RPC error code and the other shouldn’t.
8. 
   kalgecin commented at 7:42 pm on November 17, 2015: none

   when using the client, yes, but when calling using external programs, it does not. try with the example using curl
9. 
   luke-jr commented at 7:46 pm on November 17, 2015: member

   Works for me

   0$ curl -u 'bitcoinrpc' http://localhost:8332 -d '{"method":"importprivkey","params":["invalid"],"id":0}'
   1Enter host password for user 'bitcoinrpc':
   2{"result":null,"error":{"code":-5,"message":"Invalid private key encoding"},"id":0}
   

10. 
    sipa commented at 7:46 pm on November 17, 2015: member

    You need to look at the returned header to see the error status. Curl is not a full JSON-RPC client.
11. 
    jonasschnelli commented at 9:42 am on November 18, 2015: contributor

    Works for me here:

     0jonasschnelli$ curl -v --user bitcoin --data-binary '{"method":"importprivkey","params":["invalid"],"id":0}' -H 'content-type: text/plain;' http://127.0.0.1:18332/
     1
     2*   Trying 127.0.0.1...
     3* Connected to 127.0.0.1 (127.0.0.1) port 18332 (#0)
     4* Server auth using Basic with user 'bitcoin'
     5> POST / HTTP/1.1
     6> Host: 127.0.0.1:18332
     7> Authorization: Basic Yml0Y29pbjp0ZXN0
     8> User-Agent: curl/7.43.0
     9> Accept: */*
    10> content-type: text/plain;
    11> Content-Length: 54
    12> 
    13* upload completely sent off: 54 out of 54 bytes
    14< HTTP/1.1 500 Internal Server Error
    15< Content-Type: application/json
    16< Date: Wed, 18 Nov 2015 09:42:12 GMT
    17< Content-Length: 84
    18< 
    19{"result":null,"error":{"code":-5,"message":"Invalid private key encoding"},"id":0}
    

12. 
    laanwj commented at 2:20 pm on November 19, 2015: member

    Works fine for me.
13. laanwj closed this on Nov 19, 2015

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14. 
    MarcoFalke commented at 3:59 pm on November 19, 2015: member

    Traditionally, RPCs that have a stateful effect return Null (or an error if they fail), and only RPCs that request data return actual values.

    So settxfee etc. should not return true?

15. MarcoFalke locked this on Sep 8, 2021

Contributors
kalgecin sipa luke-jr jonasschnelli laanwj MarcoFalke