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Deploying an Agent

In this section, we'll walk you through deploying a Shade Agent. The Shade Agent Framework abstracts the complexities of creating a agent by removing TEE specific code and handling the deployment of the agent contract under hood.

The template we're using is a simple Shade Agent built with Hono and written in TypeScript that acts as a verifiable ETH price oracle. It fetches the price of Eth from two different APIs, takes the average, and then pushes the price to an Ethereum contract.

We'll cover two deployment scenarios:

  1. Local Development: Running the agent locally for rapid testing and development.
  2. TEE Deployment: Running the agent in a real Trusted Execution Environment (TEE).

On the next page, you'll see how to edit this agent for your specific use case.

Prerequisites​

  • First, clone the template.

    git clone https://github.com/NearDeFi/shade-agent-template
    cd shade-agent-template

  • Install NEAR and Shade Agent tooling:

    # Install the NEAR CLI
    curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -LsSf https://github.com/near/near-cli-rs/releases/latest/download/near-cli-rs-installer.sh | sh

    # Install the Shade Agent CLI
    npm i -g @neardefi/shade-agent-cli

  • Create a NEAR testnet account and record the account name and seed phrase:

    near account create-account sponsor-by-faucet-service example-name.testnet autogenerate-new-keypair print-to-terminal network-config testnet create

    replacing example-name.testnet with a unique account Id.

  • Set up Docker if you have not already:

    • Install Docker for Mac or Linux and create an account.

    • Log in to Docker, using docker login for Mac or sudo docker login for Linux.

  • Set up a free Phala Cloud account at https://cloud.phala.network/register, then get an API key from https://cloud.phala.network/dashboard/tokens.

What is a Phala Cloud

Phala Cloud is a service that offers secure and private hosting in a TEE using Dstack. Phala Cloud makes it easy to run a TEE, that's why we use it in our template!

Set up​

  • Rename the .env.development.local.example file name to .env.development.local and configure your environment variables.

  • Start up Docker:

    sudo systemctl start docker

  • Install dependencies

    npm i
warning

This technology has not yet undergone a formal audit. Please conduct your own due diligence and exercise caution before integrating or relying on it in production environments.

Local Development​

  • Make sure the NEXT_PUBLIC_contractId prefix is set to ac.proxy. followed by your NEAR accountId.

  • In one terminal, run the Shade Agent CLI:

    shade-agent-cli

    The CLI on Linux may prompt you to enter your sudo password.

  • In another terminal, start your app:

    npm run dev

    Your app will start on https://localhost:3000

TEE Deployment​

  • Change the NEXT_PUBLIC_contractId prefix to ac.sandbox. followed by your NEAR accountId.

  • Run the Shade Agent CLI

    shade-agent-cli

    The CLI on Linux may prompt you to enter your sudo password.

    The last URL the CLI outputs is the URL of your app. If your application is not working, head over to your App on the Phala Dashboard and review the logs.

Interacting with the Agent​

You can interact with your agent via the APIs directly or via a lightweight frontend contained in this repo.

Direct​

For Phala deployments, swap localhost:3000 for your deployment URL.

  • Get the Agent account Id and its balance:

    https://localhost:3000/api/agent-account

  • Get the derived Ethereum Sepolia price pusher account Id and its balance (you will need to fund this account):

    https://localhost:3000/api/eth-account

  • Send a transaction through the agent to update the price of Eth:

    https://localhost:3000/api/transaction

Frontend​

To start the frontend, run:

cd frontend
npm i
npm run dev

To use the frontend with your Phala deployment change the API_URL to Phala URL in your config.js file.

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