Prerequisites & presets

The SDK packages talk to services (an indexer, optionally a wallet daemon, and a faucet for testing). This page is the canonical reference for what you need running. For npm-install and bundler requirements see Installation.

Choose a service profile

Pick the row that matches what you are building.

Profile	What to run	When
Public Esmeralda testnet (read-only)	Nothing — the SDK falls back to `defaultIndexerUrl(Network.Esmeralda)`.	Browsing chain state from a browser dApp or a Node script. No write transactions.
LocalNet (full read/write)	A LocalNet indexer + faucet (setup guide).	Local development of write paths (transfers, stealth, custom templates). The default for the example scripts.
Wallet daemon (production write path)	A `tari_ootle_walletd` process configured for `webauthn` (browser) or `none`/`authToken` (Node).	Production. The secret key never enters JS. See the wallet-daemon signer README for the full auth-mode matrix.

Env-var presets

The SDK and the examples/node/ workspace consume exactly two env vars. Both have sensible defaults via defaultIndexerUrl(Network.LocalNet) and the well-known LocalNet faucet component, so you only set them when overriding.

Env var	Default	Purpose
`OOTLE_INDEXER_URL`	`defaultIndexerUrl(Network.LocalNet)` → `http://localhost:12500`	Indexer URL for any script or app that does not pass `withUrl(...)` to `ProviderBuilder`.
`OOTLE_FAUCET_ADDRESS`	LocalNet well-known faucet component	Override only if your LocalNet faucet uses a non-default component address.

The canonical fallback pattern (from examples/node/src/_common.ts) is:

import { Network, defaultIndexerUrl } from "@tari-project/ootle";

const url = process.env.OOTLE_INDEXER_URL ?? defaultIndexerUrl(Network.LocalNet);

Use the same shape in your own scripts.

LocalNet quickstart

The default OOTLE_INDEXER_URL (http://localhost:12500) matches what the Tari Ootle repo’s LocalNet guide configures. Start LocalNet there, then return here — every example in this docs site assumes that URL.

For one-off scripts you can copy examples/node/.env.example to .env (in your project, not committed) and source .env (or use direnv):

cp path/to/ootle.ts/examples/node/.env.example .env
# edit if your indexer is on a non-default port
source .env
NODE_OPTIONS=--experimental-wasm-modules tsx my-script.ts

The SDK does not load .env automatically — there is no dotenv dependency. The .env.example is a template only.

Public Esmeralda testnet

Nothing to run. The SDK falls back to the well-known public indexer when you pick Network.Esmeralda:

import { Network } from "@tari-project/ootle";
import { ProviderBuilder } from "@tari-project/ootle-indexer";

const provider = await ProviderBuilder.new().withNetwork(Network.Esmeralda).connect();

You can read substates, browse transactions, and inspect templates against testnet from a fresh checkout — see Quick start — Node §1 for the smallest read script. Write transactions require a funded testnet account; for hands-on write paths use LocalNet.

Wallet daemon

The wallet daemon (tari_ootle_walletd) is the production signing path — the secret key stays in the daemon process. Two auth modes:

Browser: the daemon’s default method: "webauthn" triggers a passkey flow on WalletDaemonSigner.connect({ url }). See Quick start — browser §2.
Node: WebAuthn is browser-only. Pass authToken explicitly to WalletDaemonSigner.connect({ url, authToken }), or configure the daemon for method: "none" if you control its config. See Quick start — Node §2 “Using WalletDaemonSigner from Node” and the wallet-daemon signer README.