Most Ethereum libraries and tools are written in JavaScript, and so is Hardhat. If you're not familiar with Node.js, it's a JavaScript runtime built on Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine. It's the most popular solution to run JavaScript outside of a web browser and Hardhat is built on top of it.
You can skip this section if you already have a working Node.js >=12.0
installation. If not, here's how to install it on Ubuntu, MacOS and Windows.
Copy and paste these commands in a terminal:
sudo apt update
sudo apt install curl git
curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_12.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install nodejs
Make sure you have git
installed. Otherwise, follow these instructions.
There are multiple ways of installing Node.js on MacOS. We will be using Node Version Manager (nvm). Copy and paste these commands in a terminal:
curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/creationix/nvm/v0.35.2/install.sh | bash
nvm install 12
nvm use 12
nvm alias default 12
npm install npm --global # Upgrade npm to the latest version
Installing Node.js on Windows requires a few manual steps. We'll install git, Node.js 12.x and npm. Download and run these:
node-v12.XX.XX-x64.msi
from hereIf your version of Node.js is older than 12.0
follow the instructions below to upgrade.
sudo apt remove nodejs
in a terminal to remove Node.js.sudo apt update && sudo apt install nodejs
in a terminal to install Node.js again.You can change your Node.js version using nvm. To upgrade to Node.js 12.x
run these in a terminal:
nvm install 12
nvm use 12
nvm alias default 12
npm install npm --global # Upgrade npm to the latest version
You need to follow the same installation instructions as before but choose a different version. You can check the list of all available versions here.