Understanding Solana Program Derived Addresses (PDAs)

Overview

Program Derived Addresses (PDAs) are special types of account used on Solana that are deterministically derived and look like standard public keys, but have no associated private keys.

Only the program that derived the PDA can sign transactions involving the address/account. This is due to the fact that PDAs do not occur on the Ed25519 curve (elliptic-curve cryptography). Only addresses that appear on the curve can have a matching private key making PDAs a secure way of signing transactions from within a program. This means that no external user can generate a valid signature for the PDA address and sign on behalf of a pda/program.

Role of PDAs

PDAs are primarily used to:

• Manage State: PDAs allow programs to create accounts and store data to a determinstic PDA address which allows read and write access for the program.
• Authorize Transactions: Only the program that owns the PDA can authorize transactions involving it, ensuring secure controlled access. For example this allows programs and PDA accounts to store tokens/own NFTs that would require the current owner of the tokens/NFT to sign a transaction to transfer the items to another account.

How PDAs are Derived

PDAs are derived using a combination of a program ID and a set of seed values. The derivation process involves hashing these values together and ensuring the resulting address is valid.

Derivation Process

1. Select Program ID: The public key of the program for which the PDA is being derived.
2. Choose Seeds: One or more seed values that, together with the program ID, will deterministically generate the PDA algorithmically based on the combined values.
3. Compute PDA: Use the Pubkey::find_program_address function to derive the PDA. This function ensures the derived address is valid and cannot collide with any regular (non-PDA) address.

Example in Rust

Here's an example of deriving a PDA in a Solana program written in Rust:

use solana_program::{
    pubkey::Pubkey,
    system_instruction,
    system_program,
    sysvar::rent::Rent,
    program::invoke_signed,
};

// Function to derive a PDA
fn derive_pda(program_id: &Pubkey, seeds: &[&[u8]]) -> (Pubkey, u8) {
    Pubkey::find_program_address(seeds, program_id)
}

// Example usage
fn example_usage(program_id: &Pubkey) {
    // Define seeds
    let seed1 = b"seed1";
    let seed2 = b"seed2";

    // Derive PDA
    let (pda, bump_seed) = derive_pda(program_id, &[seed1, seed2]);

    // Print PDA
    println!("Derived PDA: {}", pda);
}

Practical Use Case: Account Creation Programs often use PDAs to create and manage program-specific accounts. Here's an example of how a PDA can be used to create an account:

use solana_program::{
    pubkey::Pubkey,
    system_instruction,
    system_program,
    sysvar::rent::Rent,
    program::invoke_signed,
};

fn create_account_with_pda(
    program_id: &Pubkey,
    payer: &Pubkey,
    seeds: &[&[u8]],
    lamports: u64,
    space: u64,
) -> Result<(), ProgramError> {
    let (pda, bump_seed) = Pubkey::find_program_address(seeds, program_id);

    let create_account_ix = system_instruction::create_account(
        payer,
        &pda,
        lamports,
        space,
        program_id,
    );

    // Sign the instruction with the PDA
    let signers_seeds = &[&seeds[..], &[bump_seed]];

    invoke_signed(
        &create_account_ix,
        &[payer_account_info, pda_account_info],
        signers_seeds,
    )?;

    Ok(())
}