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If I want to watch a public address, I need the hex string for that address, because the importpubkey command only takes a hex input. How can I convert a base 58 address to a hex string using the bitcoin core?
Get hex string for a public address
Answers
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You cannot generate public key from a bitcoin address. From bitcoin address, all you can get is the hash160. Following reference, this can be done through base58 decoding, going from Step 9 -> Step 8. So you get same output as from Step 4 along with checksum at the end.
Basically you have two alternatives:
- If you have the private key, generate the public key and use
importpubkey - Use
importaddress
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You might want to use the importaddress RPC method (I'm not even aware of an importpubkey method). The importaddress method accepts the base58 address string you have. I recently asked a slightly-related question and ended up answering it myself here: How to make ImportMulti function like ImportAddress for watch-only addresses placed into Accounts?
When I do that, I get the error "couldn't connect to server". – Tyler Durden – 2017-11-21T02:25:22.890
Then you have a bigger problem! – Pieter Wuille – 2017-11-21T09:44:35.323
Possible duplicate of How can I convert a SHA256 hash into a Bitcoin base58 private key?
– Max Vernon – 2017-11-20T21:50:52.743I realize the above link does the conversion the other way; however it should help you get started. – Max Vernon – 2017-11-20T21:51:24.490
1@MaxVernon Uh, what??? This has nothing to do with private keys. Also, the conversion you cited is going the wrong way. That does not get me started. I want to know how to convert a base 58 pub key to a hex pub key USING THE CORE CLIENT. – Tyler Durden – 2017-11-20T21:56:32.217