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Durable & Offline Transaction Signing using Nonces

This guide is meant to be a one-stop shop for Solana's Durable Nonces: a highly under-utilized and under-appreciated way to power your Solana dapps and make your user's experience more reliable and deterministic.

The code for this guide can be found in this repository, and it's advisable to follow along and run the examples locally to get a better grasp of Durable Nonces

Durable Nonce Applications​

Before we dive deep into Durable Nonces, its important to understand that durable nonces provide an opportunity to create and sign a transaction that can be submitted at any point in the future, and much more. This opens up a wide range of use cases that are otherwise not possible or too difficult to implement:

  1. Scheduled Transactions: One of the most apparent applications of Durable Nonces is the ability to schedule transactions. Users can pre-sign a transaction and then submit it at a later date, allowing for planned transfers, contract interactions, or even executing pre-determined investment strategies.

  2. Multisig Wallets: Durable Nonces are very useful for multi-signature wallets where one party signs a transaction, and others may confirm at a later time. This feature enables the proposal, review, and later execution of a transaction within a trustless system.

  3. Programs Requiring Future Interaction: If a program on Solana requires interaction at a future point (such as a vesting contract or a timed release of funds), a transaction can be pre-signed using a Durable Nonce. This ensures the contract interaction happens at the correct time without necessitating the presence of the transaction creator.

  4. Cross-chain Interactions: When you need to interact with another blockchain, and it requires waiting for confirmations, you could sign the transaction with a Durable Nonce and then execute it once the required confirmations are received.

  5. Decentralized Derivatives Platforms: In a decentralized derivatives platform, complex transactions might need to be executed based on specific triggers. With Durable Nonces, these transactions can be pre-signed and executed when the trigger condition is met.

Introduction to Durable Nonces​

Double Spend​

Imagine you're buying an NFT on MagicEden or Tensor. You have to sign a transaction that allows the marketplace's program to extract some SOL from your wallets.

What is stopping them from reusing your signature to extract SOL again? Without a way to check if the transaction was already submitted once, they can keep submitting the signed transaction until there's no SOL left in their wallet.

This is known as the problem of Double-Spend and is one of the core issues that blockchains like Solana solve.

A naive solution could be to crosscheck all transactions made in the past and see if we find the signature there. This is not practically possible, as the size of the Solana ledger is >80 TB.

Recent Blockhashes​

Solution: Crosscheck signatures within only a set period of recent time, and discard the transaction if it gets "too" old.

Recent Blockhashes are used to achieve this. A blockhash contains a 32-byte SHA-256 hash. It is used to indicate when a client last observed the ledger. Using recent blockhashes, transactions are checked in the last 150 blocks. If they are found, they are rejected. They are also rejected if they get older than 150 blocks. The only case they are accepted is if they are unique and the blockhash is more recent than 150 blocks (~80-90 seconds).

As you can imagine, a side-effect of using recent blockhashes is the forced mortality of a transaction even before its submission.

Another issue with blockhashes is the forced non-uniqueness of signed transactions in very small timeframes. In some cases, if the transactions are executed very quickly in succession, some get the same recent blockhashes with high probability, thus making them duplicate and avoid their execution.

To summarize:

  1. What if I don't want to send the transaction right away?
  2. What if I want to sign the transaction offline as I don't want to keep my keys on a device that is connected to the net?
  3. What if I want to co-sign the transaction from multiple devices owned by multiple people, and the co-signing takes more than 90 seconds, like in a case of a multi-sig operated by a DAO?
  4. What if I want to sign and send a burst of transactions and don't want them to fail due to duplication?

The solution lies with Durable Nonces⚡️

Durable Nonces​

Durable Transaction Nonces, which are 32-byte in length (usually represented as base58 encoded strings), are used in place of recent blockhashes to make every transaction unique (to avoid double-spending) while removing the mortality on the unexecuted transaction.

How do they make transactions unique to avoid double spending?

If nonces are used in place of recent blockhashes, the first instruction of the transaction needs to be a nonceAdvance instruction, which changes or advances the nonce. This ensures that every transaction which is signed using the nonce as the recent blockhash, irrespective of being successfully submitted or not, will be unique.

Let's look at a couple of accounts that are important for using durable nonces with Solana transactions.

Nonce Account​

The Nonce Account is the account that stores the value of the nonce. This account is owned by the SystemProgram and is rent-exempt; thus needs to maintain the minimum balance for rent exemption (around 0.0015 SOL).

Nonce Authority​

Nonce authority is the account that controls the Nonce Account. It has the authority to generate a new nonce, advance the nonce or withdraw SOL from the Nonce Account. By default, the account that creates the Nonce Account is delegated as the Nonce Authority, but it's possible to transfer the authority onto a different keypair account.

Durable Nonces with Solana CLI​

Now that we know what Durable Nonces are, it's time to use them to send durable transactions.

If you do not have the Solana CLI installed, please go through this tutorial and set up the CLI and a keypair with some airdropped SOL on devnet

Create Nonce Authority​

Let's start with creating a new keypair which we will use as our Nonce authority. We can use the keypair currently configured in our Solana CLI, but it's better to make a fresh one (make sure you're on devnet).

solana-keygen new -o nonce-authority.json

Set the current Solana CLI keypair to nonce-authority.json and airdrop some SOL in it.

solana config set -k ~/<path>/nonce-authority.json
solana airdrop 2

Okay, we're set. Let's create our nonce account.

Create Nonce Account​

Create a new keypair nonce-account and use the create-nonce-account instruction to delegate this keypair as the Nonce Account. We will also transfer 0.0015 SOL to the Nonce Account from the Nonce Authority, which is usually just above the minimum quantity needed for rent exemption.

solana-keygen new -o nonce-account.json
solana create-nonce-account nonce-account.json 0.0015

Output

Signature: skkfzUQrZF2rcmrhAQV6SuLa7Hj3jPFu7cfXAHvkVep3Lk3fNSVypwULhqMRinsa6Zj5xjj8zKZBQ1agMxwuABZ

Upon searching the signature on the explorer, we can see that the Nonce Account was created and the InitializeNonce instruction was used to initialize a nonce within the account.

Fetch Nonce​

We can query the value of the stored Nonce as follows.

solana nonce nonce-account.json

Output

AkrQn5QWLACSP5EMT2R1ZHyKaGWVFrDHJ6NL89HKtwjQ

This is the base58 encoded hash that will be used in place of recent blockhashes while signing a transaction.

Displace Nonce Account​

We can inspect the details of a Nonce Account in a prettier formatted version

solana nonce-account nonce-account.json

Output

Balance: 0.0015 SOL
Minimum Balance Required: 0.00144768 SOL
Nonce blockhash: AkrQn5QWLACSP5EMT2R1ZHyKaGWVFrDHJ6NL89HKtwjQ
Fee: 5000 lamports per signature
Authority: 5CZKcm6PakaRWGK8NogzXvj8CjA71uSofKLohoNi4Wom

Advancing Nonce​

As discussed before, advancing the Nonce or changing the value of the nonce is an important step for making subsequent transactions unique. The Nonce Authority needs to sign the transaction with the nonceAdvance instruction.

solana new-nonce nonce-account.json

Output

Signature: 4nMHnedguiEtHshuMEm3NsuTQaeV8AdcDL6QSndTZLK7jcLUag6HCiLtUq6kv21yNSVQLoFj44aJ5sZrTXoYYeyS

If we check the nonce again, the value of the nonce has changed or advanced.

solana nonce nonce-account.json

Output

DA8ynAQTGctqQXNS2RNTGpag6s5p5RcrBm2DdHhvpRJ8

Withdraw from Nonce Account​

We transferred 0.0015 SOL when creating the Nonce Account. The Nonce Authority can transfer these funds back to itself or some other account.

solana withdraw-from-nonce-account nonce-account.json nonce-authority.json 0.0000001

Output

Signature: 5zuBmrUpqnubdePHVgzSNThbocruJZLJK5Dut7DM6WyoqW4Qbrc26uCw3nq6jRocR9XLMwZZ79U54HDnGhDJVNfF

We can check the status of the Nonce Account after the withdrawal; the balance should have changed.

solana nonce-account nonce-account.json

Output

Balance: 0.0014999 SOL
Minimum Balance Required: 0.00144768 SOL
Nonce blockhash: DA8ynAQTGctqQXNS2RNTGpag6s5p5RcrBm2DdHhvpRJ8
Fee: 5000 lamports per signature
Authority: 5CZKcm6PakaRWGK8NogzXvj8CjA71uSofKLohoNi4Wom

Live Example: DAO Offline Co-Signing​

We will use an example where a DAO committee needs to transfer some SOL to a new wallet. Two co-signers are needed before sending the SOL, where co-sender pays for the transaction and sender sends the SOL. To add to this, the co-sender is very careful when it comes to connecting his device to the internet and thus wants to sign the transaction offline.

Let's create three new keypairs, which will act as the two members of the DAO and the receiver. Although, for this example, we are creating the keypairs in the same system, we will assume that these accounts are on different systems to replicate an IRL scenario.

solana-keygen new -o sender.json
# pubkey: H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51

solana-keygen new -o co-sender.json
# pubkey: HDx43xY4piU3xMxNyRQkj89cqiF15hz5FVW9ergTtZ7S

solana-keygen new -o receiver.json
# pubkey: D3RAQxwQBhMLum2WK7eCn2MpRWgeLtDW7fqXTcqtx9uC

Let's add some SOL to the member wallets.

solana airdrop -k sender.json 0.5
solana airdrop -k co-sender.json 0.5

Using Recent Blockhashes​

Before we try to sign and send a durable transaction, let's see how transactions are normally submitted using recent blockhashes.

Its important to note that although we'll attempt to achieve the above using recent blockhashes, the expected outcome is failure, which will help us appreciate why durable nonces are necessary here.

The first step is to build a transfer transaction from sender to receiver and sign it with co-sender's wallet.

To sign an offline transaction, we need to use:

  1. --sign-only: which prevents clients from sending the transaction.
  2. --blockhash: which lets us specify a recent blockhash so that the client does not try to fetch for it in an offline setting.
  • We can get a recent blockhash from solscan. Just copy the first blockhash from the list.
  • We will also need the pubkey of sender: H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51
  • You can even turn off your internet when you sign this transaction using the co-sender's wallet :).
solana transfer receiver.json 0.1 \
  --sign-only \
  --blockhash F13BkBgNTyyuruUQFSgUkXPMJCfPvKhhrr217eiqGfVE \
  --fee-payer co-sender.json \
  --from H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51 \
  --keypair co-sender.json

Output

Blockhash: F13BkBgNTyyuruUQFSgUkXPMJCfPvKhhrr217eiqGfVE
Signers (Pubkey=Signature):
 HDx43xY4piU3xMxNyRQkj89cqiF15hz5FVW9ergTtZ7S=2gUmcb4Xwm3Dy9xH3a3bePsWVKCRMtUghqDS9pnGZDmX6hqtWMfpubEbgcai5twncoAJzyr9FRn3yuXVeSvYD4Ni
Absent Signers (Pubkey):
 H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51

The transaction is signed by co-sender's wallet, who will pay the tx fee. Also, we are notified about the pending signature from the sender's wallet (H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51).

In a real-world scenario, co-sender can share their Pubkey=Signature pair with the sender who will need this sign and submit the transaction. This share may take more than a minute to happen. Once the sender receives this pair, they can initiate the transfer.

solana transfer receiver.json 0.1 \
  --allow-unfunded-recipient \
  --blockhash F13BkBgNTyyuruUQFSgUkXPMJCfPvKhhrr217eiqGfVE \
  --from sender.json \
  --keypair sender.json \
  --signer HDx43xY4piU3xMxNyRQkj89cqiF15hz5FVW9ergTtZ7S=2gUmcb4Xwm3Dy9xH3a3bePsWVKCRMtUghqDS9pnGZDmX6hqtWMfpubEbgcai5twncoAJzyr9FRn3yuXVeSvYD4Ni

Output

Error: Hash has expired F13BkBgNTyyuruUQFSgUkXPMJCfPvKhhrr217eiqGfVE

The transfer is not successful because the hash has expired. How do we overcome this issue of expired blockhashes? Using Durable Nonces!

Using Durable Nonces​

We will use the nonce-account.json and nonce-authority.json keypairs that we created earlier. We already have a nonce initialized in the nonce-account. Let's advance it to get a new one first, just to be sure that the nonce isn't already used.

solana new-nonce nonce-account.json
solana nonce-account nonce-account.json

Output

Signature: 3z1sSU7fmdRoBZynVLiJEqa97Ja481nb3r1mLu8buAgwMnaKdF4ZaiBkzrLjPRzn1HV2rh4AHQTJHAQ3DsDiYVpF

Balance: 0.0014999 SOL
Minimum Balance Required: 0.00144768 SOL
Nonce blockhash: HNUi6La2QpGJdfcAR6yFFmdgYoCvFZREkve2haMBxXVz
Fee: 5000 lamports per signature
Authority: 5CZKcm6PakaRWGK8NogzXvj8CjA71uSofKLohoNi4Wom

Perfect, now let's start with offline co-signing the transaction with co-signer's wallet, but this time, we'll use the Nonce blockhash printed above, which is basically the nonce stored in the nonce-account as the blockhash for the transfer transaction.

solana transfer receiver.json 0.1 \
  --sign-only \
  --nonce nonce-account.json \
  --blockhash HNUi6La2QpGJdfcAR6yFFmdgYoCvFZREkve2haMBxXVz \
  --fee-payer co-sender.json \
  --from H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51 \
  --keypair co-sender.json

Output

Blockhash: HNUi6La2QpGJdfcAR6yFFmdgYoCvFZREkve2haMBxXVz
Signers (Pubkey=Signature):
 HDx43xY4piU3xMxNyRQkj89cqiF15hz5FVW9ergTtZ7S=5tfuPxsXchbVFU745658nsQr5Gqhb5nRnZKLnnovJ2PZBHbqUbe7oB5kDbnq7tjeJ2V8Mywa4gujUjT4BWKRcAdi
Absent Signers (Pubkey):
 H8BHbivzT4DtJxL4J4X53CgnqzTUAEJfptSaEHsCvg51

This is very similar to the one we signed using the recent blockhash. Now we'll sign and send the transaction with the sender's wallet.

solana transfer receiver.json 0.1 \
  --nonce nonce-account.json \
  --nonce-authority nonce-authority.json \
  --blockhash HNUi6La2QpGJdfcAR6yFFmdgYoCvFZREkve2haMBxXVz \
  --from sender.json \
  --keypair sender.json \
  --signer HDx43xY4piU3xMxNyRQkj89cqiF15hz5FVW9ergTtZ7S=5tfuPxsXchbVFU745658nsQr5Gqhb5nRnZKLnnovJ2PZBHbqUbe7oB5kDbnq7tjeJ2V8Mywa4gujUjT4BWKRcAdi

Output

Signature: anQ8VtQgeSMoKTnQCubTenq1J7WKxAa1dbFMDLsbDWgV6GGL135G1Ydv4QTNd6GptP3TxDQ2ZWi3Y5qnEtjM7yg

The transaction is successfully submitted!

If we check it on the explorer, we can see that an AdvanceNonce instruction was prepended to the transaction, as we discussed before. This is done to avoid using the same nonce again.

Voila, we've gone through a very real-life use case of Durable Nonces. Now let's see how to use them in transactions using JavaScript and the @solana/web3.js package.

Durable Nonces with Solana web3.js​

We'll use a similar example of making a simple transfer to demonstrate how to send transactions using durable nonces.

Create Nonce Authority​

const nonceAuthKP = Keypair.generate();
// airdrop some SOL into this account from https://solfaucet.com/

Create Nonce Accounts​

const nonceKeypair = Keypair.generate();
const tx = new Transaction();

// the fee payer can be any account
tx.feePayer = nonceAuthKP.publicKey;

// to create the nonce account, you can use fetch the recent blockhash
// or use a nonce from a different, pre-existing nonce account
tx.recentBlockhash = (await connection.getLatestBlockhash()).blockhash;

tx.add(
  // create system account with the minimum amount needed for rent exemption.
  // NONCE_ACCOUNT_LENGTH is the space a nonce account takes
  SystemProgram.createAccount({
    fromPubkey: nonceAuthKP.publicKey,
    newAccountPubkey: nonceKeypair.publicKey,
    lamports: 0.0015 * LAMPORTS_PER_SOL,
    space: NONCE_ACCOUNT_LENGTH,
    programId: SystemProgram.programId,
  }),
  // initialise nonce with the created nonceKeypair's pubkey as the noncePubkey
  // also specify the authority of the nonce account
  SystemProgram.nonceInitialize({
    noncePubkey: nonceKeypair.publicKey,
    authorizedPubkey: nonceAuthKP.publicKey,
  }),
);

// sign the transaction with both the nonce keypair and the authority keypair
tx.sign(nonceKeypair, nonceAuthKP);

// send the transaction
const sig = await sendAndConfirmRawTransaction(
  connection,
  tx.serialize({ requireAllSignatures: false }),
);
console.log("Nonce initiated: ", sig);

Fetch Initialised Nonce Account​

const accountInfo = await connection.getAccountInfo(nonceKeypair.publicKey);
const nonceAccount = NonceAccount.fromAccountData(accountInfo.data);

Sign Transaction using Durable Nonce​

// make a system transfer instruction
const ix = SystemProgram.transfer({
  fromPubkey: publicKey,
  toPubkey: publicKey,
  lamports: 100,
});

// make a nonce advance instruction
const advanceIX = SystemProgram.nonceAdvance({
  authorizedPubkey: nonceAuthKP.publicKey,
  noncePubkey: noncePubKey,
});

// add them to a transaction
const tx = new Transaction();
tx.add(advanceIX);
tx.add(ix);

// use the nonceAccount's stored nonce as the recentBlockhash
tx.recentBlockhash = nonceAccount.nonce;
tx.feePayer = publicKey;

// sign the tx with the nonce authority's keypair
tx.sign(nonceAuthKP);

// make the owner of the publicKey sign the transaction
// this should open a wallet popup and let the user sign the tx
const signedTx = await signTransaction(tx);

// once you have the signed tx, you can serialize it and store it
// in a database, or send it to another device. You can submit it
// at a later point, without the tx having a mortality
const serialisedTx = bs58.encode(
  signedTx.serialize({ requireAllSignatures: false }),
);
console.log("Signed Durable Transaction: ", serialisedTx);

Live Example: Poll Simulation App​

The Poll Simulation app simulates a real-life poll mechanism, wherein voters are allowed to vote for a given set of times. Once the time comes for determining the results of the poll: the votes are counted, the count is publicly announced to everyone, and the winner is declared.

This is tough to build on-chain, as changing the state of an account on-chain is a public action, and hence if a user votes for someone, others would know, and hence the count won't be hidden from the public until the voting has been completed.

Durable nonces can be used to partially fix this. Instead of signing and sending the transaction when voting for your candidate, the dapp can let the user sign the transaction using durable nonces, serialize the transaction as shown above in the web3.js example, and save the serialized transactions in a database until the time comes for counting.

For counting the votes, the dapp then needs to sync, send, or submit all the signed transactions one by one. With each submitted transaction, the state change will happen on-chain, and the winner can be decided.

Live App​

References​