<p>There is no way to currently specify the description via cardano-cli. Some things are generated with a default description and others are not. You can modify the description as it has no bearing on serialization.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-11-18T13:21:10.090Z
2022-11-18T13:21:10.090Z
Jim
<p>In cardano-cli, when I create a transaction file (.body and also .signed) the contents of the file appear to be in JSON format with 3 fields, as follows</p>
<pre><code>{
    &quot;type&quot;: &quot;Tx AlonzoEra&quot;,
    &quot;description&quot;: &quot;&quot;,
    &quot;cborHex&quot;: &quot;84a4008282582066188ffe......
</code></pre>
<p>I have searched the full cardano-cli help and done multiple Internet searches, but I cannot see how I can or should use that &quot;description&quot; field. I'm envisioning simple plain text such as &quot;for new account jwb&quot;. Of course that can be put into metadata, which may be best anyway. Perhaps the description field is meant to be manually or programmatically changed, if desired, before or after submission, like a post-it note memo?</p>

<transaction>
How to specify a description using cardano-cli
# How to specify a description using cardano-cli

(Asked by: username_0 on 2022-11-18)

In cardano-cli, when I create a transaction file (.body and also .signed) the contents of the file appear to be in JSON format with 3 fields, as follows
{
    "type": "Tx AlonzoEra",
    "description": "",
    "cborHex": "84a4008282582066188ffe......

I have searched the full cardano-cli help and done multiple Internet searches, but I cannot see how I can or should use that "description" field. I'm envisioning simple plain text such as "for new account jwb". Of course that can be put into metadata, which may be best anyway. Perhaps the description field is meant to be manually or programmatically changed, if desired, before or after submission, like a post-it note memo?

**Tags:** transaction

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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2022-11-18. Score: 3

There is no way to currently specify the description via cardano-cli. Some things are generated with a default description and others are not. You can modify the description as it has no bearing on serialization.


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