openzeppelin-contracts/docs/modules/ROOT/pages/utilities.adoc

= Utilities

The OpenZeppelin Contracts provide a ton of useful utilities that you can use in your project. Here are some of the more popular ones.

[[cryptography]]
== Cryptography

=== Checking Signatures On-Chain

xref:api:cryptography.adoc#ECDSA[`ECDSA`] provides functions for recovering and managing Ethereum account ECDSA signatures. These are often generated via https://web3js.readthedocs.io/en/v1.2.4/web3-eth.html#sign[`web3.eth.sign`], and are a 65 byte array (of type `bytes` in Solidity) arranged the following way: `[[v (1)], [r (32)], [s (32)]]`.

The data signer can be recovered with xref:api:cryptography.adoc#ECDSA-recover-bytes32-bytes-[`ECDSA.recover`], and its address compared to verify the signature. Most wallets will hash the data to sign and add the prefix '\x19Ethereum Signed Message:\n', so when attempting to recover the signer of an Ethereum signed message hash, you'll want to use xref:api:cryptography.adoc#ECDSA-toEthSignedMessageHash-bytes32-[`toEthSignedMessageHash`].

[source,solidity]
----
using ECDSA for bytes32;

function _verify(bytes32 data, bytes memory signature, address account) internal pure returns (bool) {
    return data
        .toEthSignedMessageHash()
        .recover(signature) == account;
}
----

WARNING: Getting signature verification right is not trivial: make sure you fully read and understand xref:api:cryptography.adoc#ECDSA[`ECDSA`]'s documentation.

=== Verifying Merkle Proofs

xref:api:cryptography.adoc#MerkleProof[`MerkleProof`] provides xref:api:cryptography.adoc#MerkleProof-verify-bytes32---bytes32-bytes32-[`verify`], which can prove that some value is part of a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkle_tree[Merkle tree].

[[introspection]]
== Introspection

In Solidity, it's frequently helpful to know whether or not a contract supports an interface you'd like to use. ERC165 is a standard that helps do runtime interface detection. Contracts provide helpers both for implementing ERC165 in your contracts and querying other contracts:

* xref:api:introspection.adoc#IERC165[`IERC165`] — this is the ERC165 interface that defines xref:api:introspection.adoc#IERC165-supportsInterface-bytes4-[`supportsInterface`]. When implementing ERC165, you'll conform to this interface.
* xref:api:introspection.adoc#ERC165[`ERC165`] — inherit this contract if you'd like to support interface detection using a lookup table in contract storage. You can register interfaces using xref:api:introspection.adoc#ERC165-_registerInterface-bytes4-[`_registerInterface(bytes4)`]: check out example usage as part of the ERC721 implementation.
* xref:api:introspection.adoc#ERC165Checker[`ERC165Checker`] — ERC165Checker simplifies the process of checking whether or not a contract supports an interface you care about.
* include with `using ERC165Checker for address;`
* xref:api:introspection.adoc#ERC165Checker-_supportsInterface-address-bytes4-[`myAddress._supportsInterface(bytes4)`]
* xref:api:introspection.adoc#ERC165Checker-_supportsAllInterfaces-address-bytes4---[`myAddress._supportsAllInterfaces(bytes4[\])`]

[source,solidity]
----
contract MyContract {
    using ERC165Checker for address;

    bytes4 private InterfaceId_ERC721 = 0x80ac58cd;

    /**
     * @dev transfer an ERC721 token from this contract to someone else
     */
    function transferERC721(
        address token,
        address to,
        uint256 tokenId
    )
        public
    {
        require(token.supportsInterface(InterfaceId_ERC721), "IS_NOT_721_TOKEN");
        IERC721(token).transferFrom(address(this), to, tokenId);
    }
}
----

[[math]]
== Math

The most popular math related library OpenZeppelin Contracts provides is xref:api:math.adoc#SafeMath[`SafeMath`], which provides mathematical functions that protect your contract from overflows and underflows.

Include the contract with `using SafeMath for uint256;` and then call the functions:

* `myNumber.add(otherNumber)`
* `myNumber.sub(otherNumber)`
* `myNumber.div(otherNumber)`
* `myNumber.mul(otherNumber)`
* `myNumber.mod(otherNumber)`

Easy!

[[payment]]
== Payment

Want to split some payments between multiple people? Maybe you have an app that sends 30% of art purchases to the original creator and 70% of the profits to the current owner; you can build that with xref:api:payment.adoc#PaymentSplitter[`PaymentSplitter`]!

In Solidity, there are some security concerns with blindly sending money to accounts, since it allows them to execute arbitrary code. You can read up on these security concerns in the https://consensys.github.io/smart-contract-best-practices/[Ethereum Smart Contract Best Practices] website. One of the ways to fix reentrancy and stalling problems is, instead of immediately sending Ether to accounts that need it, you can use xref:api:payment.adoc#PullPayment[`PullPayment`], which offers an xref:api:payment.adoc#PullPayment-_asyncTransfer-address-uint256-[`_asyncTransfer`] function for sending money to something and requesting that they xref:api:payment.adoc#PullPayment-withdrawPayments-address-payable-[`withdrawPayments()`] it later.

If you want to Escrow some funds, check out xref:api:payment.adoc#Escrow[`Escrow`] and xref:api:payment.adoc#ConditionalEscrow[`ConditionalEscrow`] for governing the release of some escrowed Ether.

[[collections]]
== Collections

If you need support for more powerful collections than Solidity's native arrays and mappings, take a look at xref:api:utils.adoc#EnumerableSet[`EnumerableSet`] and xref:api:utils.adoc#EnumerableMap[`EnumerableMap`]. They are similar to mappings in that they store and remove elements in constant time and don't allow for repeated entries, but they also support _enumeration_, which means you can easily query all stored entries both on and off-chain.

[[misc]]
== Misc

Want to check if an address is a contract? Use xref:api:utils.adoc#Address[`Address`] and xref:api:utils.adoc#Address-isContract-address-[`Address.isContract()`].

Want to keep track of some numbers that increment by 1 every time you want another one? Check out xref:api:utils.adoc#Counters[`Counters`]. This is useful for lots of things, like creating incremental identifiers, as shown on the xref:erc721.adoc[ERC721 guide].

=== Base64

xref:api:utils.adoc#Base64[`Base64`] util allows you to transform `bytes32` data into its Base64 `string` representation. 

This is specially useful to build URL-safe tokenURIs for both xref:api:token/ERC721.adoc#IERC721Metadata-tokenURI-uint256-[`ERC721`] or xref:api:token/ERC1155.adoc#IERC1155MetadataURI-uri-uint256-[`ERC1155`]. This library provides a clever way to serve URL-safe https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Web/HTTP/Basics_of_HTTP/Data_URIs/[Data URI] compliant strings to serve on-chain data structures.

Consider this is an example to send JSON Metadata through a Base64 Data URI using an ERC721:

[source, solidity]
----
// contracts/My721Token.sol
// SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import "@openzeppelin/contracts/token/ERC721/ERC721.sol";
import "@openzeppelin/contracts/utils/Strings.sol";
import "@openzeppelin/contracts/utils/Base64.sol";

contract My721Token is ERC721 {
    using Strings for uint256;

    constructor() ERC721("My721Token", "MTK") {}
    
    ...

    function tokenURI(uint256 tokenId)
        public
        pure
        override
        returns (string memory)
    {
        bytes memory dataURI = abi.encodePacked(
            '{',
                '"name": "My721Token #', tokenId.toString(), '"',
                // Replace with extra ERC721 Metadata properties
            '}'
        );

        return string(
            abi.encodePacked(
                "data:application/json;base64,", 
                Base64.encode(dataURI)
            )
        );
    }
}
----

=== Multicall

The `Multicall` abstract contract comes with a `multicall` function that bundles together multiple calls in a single external call. With it, external accounts may perform atomic operations comprising several function calls. This is not only useful for EOAs to make multiple calls in a single transaction, it's also a way to revert a previous call if a later one fails.

Consider this dummy contract:

[source,solidity]
----
// contracts/Box.sol
// SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
pragma solidity ^0.8.0;

import "@openzeppelin/contracts/utils/Multicall.sol";

contract Box is Multicall {
    function foo() public {
        ...
    }

    function bar() public {
        ...
    }
}
----

This is how to call the `multicall` function using Truffle, allowing `foo` and `bar` to be called in a single transaction:
[source,javascript]
----
// scripts/foobar.js

const Box = artifacts.require('Box');
const instance = await Box.new();

await instance.multicall([
    instance.contract.methods.foo().encodeABI(),
    instance.contract.methods.bar().encodeABI()
]);
----