Simple Types

UUID

IDs are generated as UUID V4 globally unique identifiers

FFTime

Times are serialized to JSON on the API in RFC 3339 / ISO 8601 nanosecond UTC time for example 2022-05-05T21:19:27.454767543Z.

Note that JavaScript can parse this format happily into millisecond time with Date.parse().

Times are persisted as a nanosecond resolution timestamps in the database.

On input, and in queries, times can be parsed from RFC3339, or unix timestamps (second, millisecond or nanosecond resolution).

FFBigInt

Large integers of up to 256bits in size are common in blockchain, and handled in FireFly.

In JSON output payloads in FireFly, including events, they are serialized as strings (with base 10).

On input you can provide JSON string (string with an 0x prefix are parsed at base 16), or a JSON number.

Maximum size of numbers in versions of FireFly up to v1.3.1

In versions of FireFly up to and including v1.3.1, be careful when using large JSON numbers. The largest number that is safe to transfer using a JSON number is 2^53 - 1 and it is possible to receive errors from the transaction manager, or for precision to be silently lost when passing numeric parameters larger than that. It is recommended to pass large numbers as strings to avoid loss of precision.

Maximum size of numbers in versions of FireFly v1.3.2 and higher

In FireFly v1.3.2 support was added for 256-bit precision JSON numbers. Some application frameworks automatically serialize large JSON numbers to a string which FireFly already supports, but there is no upper limit to the size of a number that can be represented in JSON. FireFly now supports much larger JSON numbers, up to 256-bit precision. For example the following input parameter to a contract constructor is now supported:

    ...
    "definition": [{
        "inputs": [
            {
                "internalType":" uint256",
                "name": "x",
                "type": "uint256"
            }
        ],
        "outputs":[],
        "type":"constructor"
    }],
    "params": [ 10000000000000000000000000 ]
    ...

Some application frameworks seralize large numbers in scientific notation e.g. 1e+25. FireFly v1.3.2 added supported for handling scientific numbers in parameters. This removes the need to change an application that uses this number format. For example the following input parameter to a contract constructor is now supported:

    ...
    "definition": [{
        "inputs": [
            {
                "internalType":" uint256",
                "name": "x",
                "type": "uint256"
            }
        ],
        "outputs":[],
        "type":"constructor"
    }],
    "params": [ 1e+25 ]
    ...

JSONAny

Any JSON type. An object, array, string, number, boolean or null.

FireFly stores object data with the same field order as was provided on the input, but with any whitespace removed.

JSONObject

Any JSON Object. Must be an object, rather than an array or a simple type.