How to handle gas limit exceeded errors in Ethereum smart contracts using Hardhat?
I'm working on a project and hit a roadblock... After trying multiple solutions online, I still can't figure this out. I'm developing a smart contract using Solidity 0.8.17 and deploying it using Hardhat 2.12.0... While running tests, I frequently encounter the error `Error: Returned error: transaction underpriced` or sometimes `Error: Error: gas required exceeds gas limit (8000000)`. I've set my gas limit to 8 million in my Hardhat configuration, but it seems like it's still not enough in certain scenarios when interacting with functions that perform multiple operations. Here’s the relevant part of my contract: ```solidity pragma solidity ^0.8.17; contract ComplexLogic { uint256 public counter; function incrementCounter(uint256 times) public { require(times > 0, "Must increment by a positive number"); for (uint256 i = 0; i < times; i++) { counter++; } } } ``` In my test file, I have: ```javascript const { ethers } = require('hardhat'); describe('ComplexLogic', function () { let complexLogic; before(async function () { const ComplexLogic = await ethers.getContractFactory('ComplexLogic'); complexLogic = await ComplexLogic.deploy(); }); it('should increment the counter', async function () { await complexLogic.incrementCounter(100000); // This line causes the error const count = await complexLogic.counter(); console.log(count.toString()); }); }); ``` I've tried increasing the gas limit in my Hardhat config file like this: ```javascript module.exports = { solidity: "0.8.17", networks: { hardhat: { gas: 8000000, }, }, }; ``` Despite this, it seems the transaction is still underpriced or exceeds the set gas limit when I try to increment the counter significantly. What am I missing? Is there a best practice for handling gas limits in scenarios where functions might have varying complexity? Any insights into optimizing gas usage or restructuring my smart contract would be greatly appreciated. My development environment is Linux. I'd really appreciate any guidance on this. This is part of a larger API I'm building. This is happening in both development and production on Ubuntu 22.04.