API to create an in-process Hardhat network from a standalone program

[abacabadabacaba]

Using ganache, it is easy to create an ephemeral network from JavaScript:

const web3 = new Web3(require("ganache").provider(options));
// Now web3 is connected to an in-process network and can be used to interact with it.

How to do the same using hardhat-network? Hardhat will do it for you when running scripts in a Hardhat project, but I want to use it in a standalone program, not part of a project and run directly using nodejs.

[kanej]

There is not an easy way to create an ephemeral network based on a passed in config. You can import hardhat in a standalone script that will run a node:

const hre = require("hardhat");

However this reads the config from a Hardhat config file in the current working directory - not what you are after. It is also limited to one Hardhat network per node process.

See the docs for more details on use a Hardhat node from a script.

This is a limitation we explicitly looking to overcome in Hardhat v3, which we are actively working on.