Clef: Fatal: Could not start IPC api: Invalid pipe address '%appdata%\Signer\clef.ipc'

[gpersoon]

System information

geth version
Geth
Version: 1.9.5-stable
Git Commit: a1c09b93871dd3770adffb177086abda1b2ff3af
Git Commit Date: 20190920
Architecture: amd64
Protocol Versions: [63]
Network Id: 1
Go Version: go1.13
Operating System: windows
GOPATH=C:\Users\...\go
GOROOT=C:\Go\

clef -v
Clef version 0.0.0

Expected behaviour

Clef works with default (pipe) configuration on windows.

Actual behaviour

When clef is started without parameters, the following error is shown:

...
Fatal: Could not start IPC api: Invalid pipe address 'C:\Users\...\AppData\Roaming\Signer\clef.ipc'.

Steps to reproduce the behaviour

On windows, start clef.exe

Workaround

When clef is started with a windows type pipe config (similar like geth is using), it works fine:

clef --ipcpath \\.\pipe\clef.ipc

....
INFO [09-24|16:51:20.368] IPC endpoint opened                      url=\\\\.\\pipe\\clef.ipc

[ligi]

@gpersoon can you verify this solves your issue?

[gpersoon]

@ligi : be happy to.
@holiman: can I get a compiled clef.exe somewhere? (i tried compiling it myself but got a bit stuck)

[ligi]

@gpersoon great! wonder where you got stuck in compiling though

[gpersoon]

@ligi the last thing i go stuck in is: cmd\clef\main.go:46:2: use of internal package github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum/internal/ethapi not allowed

[ligi]

@gpersoon did you follow this instructions to build? https://github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum/wiki/Installation-instructions-for-Windows#compiling-geth-with-tools-from-chocolatey

[gpersoon]

@ligi : I can confirm the invalid pipe address issue is solved.

I was able to compile clef in the following way:

cd %GOPATH%
mkdir src\github.com\ethereum
git clone https://github.com/holiman/go-ethereum  src\github.com\ethereum\go-ethereum
cd src\github.com\ethereum\go-ethereum
git checkout fix_windows_clefpath
go build -v ./cmd/clef

The windows install instructions are not exact. Here is an alternative:

cd %GOPATH%
mkdir src\github.com\ethereum
git clone https://github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum src\github.com\ethereum\go-ethereum
cd src\github.com\ethereum\go-ethereum
go install -v ./cmd/clef
rem The resulting executable is located at %GOPATH%\bin, which is already part of Path

[ligi]

@gpersoon great! thanks for confirming the fix worked