Kitabu Chain

Prerequisites

Validator Hardware requirements

• Stable internet connection ($YOUR_IP:30303 should be publicly reachable)
• 2 CPU ($ nproc)
• 2 GB available RAM
• 40 GB Available space

This step assumes you have root access on a Ubuntu (Tested on v22) based host OS

$ apt update
$ apt install chrony curl git unzip
$ curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com | bash

# Docker now ships with docker-compose v2, you can make it available in path by adding the following line to your .bashrc
# export PATH="/usr/libexec/docker/cli-plugins:$PATH"

$ curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/1.29.2/docker-compose-$(uname -s)-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose
$ chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose

# If you have a firewall active, add 30303 (both TCP and UDP) to the allow list

Installing the OpenEthereum bin (optional, if you want to create a new keystore)

# This setp is only useful if you want to generate a new keystore with OpenEthereum.
# If you bring your own key or use geth, e.t.c. this step can be skipped
# x64 Linux only
$ wget https://github.com/openethereum/openethereum/releases/download/v3.3.5/openethereum-linux-v3.3.5.zip
$ unzip openethereum*
# assumes /usr/local/bin is in $PATH
$ sudo mv openethereum /usr/local/bin
$ openethereum --version

Validator node setup

1. Clone this repo

$ git clone https://gitlab.com/grassrootseconomics/kitabu-chain.git
$ cd kitabu chain
$ cd openethereum
# all commands after this step will be run in kitabu-chain/openethereum dir

All steps

2. Obtain your private key (optional)

If you have an existing keystore file, rename it to key else create a new one:

$ openethereum account new --base-path=$(pwd)
$ mv keys/ethereum/UTC* ./key
$ rm -rf keys

Save the password you entered in the step above in a password file. After you complete creating the key, note the public address output (format 0x...) somewhere.

3. Setup environmental variables and other configs

$ cp .env.example .env

Edit the .env file:

• EXT_IP: Your server's external IP (curl ifconfig.me)
• ACCOUNT: Your private key's public address

Edit docker-compose.yml or kitabu.toml to tweak the Openethereum config as per your own preferences.

4. Start the validator node

$ docker-compose up
#  or...
$ docker-compose up -d

Reverse proxy setup (optional)

The devops folder contains a Caddy config to use as a reverse proxy to further control access to your validator node's API.

with your domain hosting provider:

create two A records, pointing to your server's public IP address:

• rpc.YOURPUBLICDOMAIN
• ws.YOURPUBLICDOMAIN

inside the devops folder:

$ cp Caddyfile.copyAndEdit Caddyfile

Edit the Caddyfile file:

• .YOURPUBLICDOMAIN: the public domain that points to your server.

Bring Caddy up with:

$ docker-compose up -d
#  or...
$ docker-compose up -d

Ethstats client (optional)

The ethstats-client folder contains a the statisics client that publishes to the Kitabu dashboard (https://stats.kitabu.sarafu.network/).

inside the ethstats-client folder:

$ cp .env.copyAndEdit .env

Edit the .env file:

• YOURARBITRARYINSTANCENAME: your chosen instance name (what you want to call your validator on the dashboard)

Bring the ethstats client up with:

$ docker-compose up -d
#  or...
$ docker-compose up -d

Non Validator full node setup

Change the toml file to:

[parity]
chain = "./kitabu.json"
base_path = "./data"

[footprint]
tracing = "on"
pruning = "archive"

Ensure kitabu.json exists at the path declared above and then run:

openethereum --config=kitabu.toml --bootnodes=enode://4bf5f4d219fbe71e35f34e42b8df898f81a743563d87e52b2c6ea8080c607f7d5a02e8cf4f553a689a0f9ca73d6102721e51cd173351c85f8dae281e356bf5f0@51.15.48.58:30303,enode://3d58cc2d1394c7c75c8118b2c3105dc730ee4c2f3580e8a3042c9db6eafb47c4e47cd8702d2ee4e8d8de180859fedc4041f5078589223e5f74d1206fb1a2edf8@163.172.141.184:30303,enode://b5b5c80c93a96ff61762ed25072aabc02c8db4a19e973d59eefb6f1ad5dd1c5c1a485c97c3d96ec03135025ac717140d4375332cd5253c4ac1ccbe2f3ee571f6@142.93.38.53:30303