Setup Test Net validator node from scratch on Ubuntu 20.04 on AWS

IMPORTANT

By choosing to participate in the Casper Test Net, you acknowledge that you have reviewed and will abide by the Test Net Code of Conduct and Incentive Requirements. Failure to do so may reduce or fully disqualify any Test Net incentive participation.

Before you set up your node, make sure it conforms to the minimum Recommended Hardware Specifications

Create security group

Create casperlabs-validator security group that exposes the following ports to public:

7777 - rpc port
8888 - status port
9999 - event stream port
35000 - gossip port

Launch instance

Launch an appropriately powered instance using Ubuntu Server 20.04 LTS AMI and at least a 2TB EBS volume, and attach the casperlabs-validator security group to it

Create elastic IP

Create elastic IP and assign it to the instance

Setup Test Net validator node from scratch on Ubuntu 20.04

IMPORTANT

By choosing to participate in the Casper Test Net, you acknowledge that you have reviewed and will abide by the Test Net Code of Conduct and Incentive Requirements. Failure to do so may reduce or fully disqualify any Test Net incentive participation.

Before you set up your node, make sure it conforms to the minimum Recommended Hardware Specifications

Note

Do not execute all the commands below as root. sudo is included where it is required.

Expect that setting up a node and bonding it to the network will take about 30 minutes

Open Firewall Ports

In your firewall set-up, make sure you expose the following ports to public and that they're routed to your node:

7777 - rpc port
8888 - status port
9999 - event stream port
35000 - gossip port

Set version and network you're going to set up

Set a variable defining the version of the node package you're setting up. For 1.0.0, use 1_0_0

CASPER_VERSION=1_0_0

Set a variable defining the network name you're trying to set up. For example, for Main Net, use casper, while for Test Net use casper-test

CASPER_NETWORK=casper-test

Install software

Update package repositories

sudo apt-get update

Install pre-requisites

sudo apt install dnsutils -y

The node uses dig to get external IP for autoconfig during the installation process

Install helpers

sudo apt install jq -y

We will use jq to process JSON responses from API later in the process

Remove Previous Versions

If you were running previous versions of the casper-node on this machine, first stop and remove the old versions:

sudo systemctl stop casper-node-launcher.service
sudo apt remove -y casper-client
sudo apt remove -y casper-node-launcher
sudo rm /etc/casper/casper-node-launcher-state.toml
sudo rm -rf /etc/casper/1_0_*
sudo rm -rf /var/lib/casper/*

Install Casper node

Add Casper repository

Execute the following in order to add the Casper repository to apt in Ubuntu.

echo "deb https://repo.casperlabs.io/releases" bionic main | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/casper.list
curl -O https://repo.casperlabs.io/casper-repo-pubkey.asc
sudo apt-key add casper-repo-pubkey.asc
sudo apt update

Install the Casper node software

sudo apt install casper-node-launcher -y
sudo apt install casper-client -y

Build smart contracts that are required to bond to the network

Install pre-requisites for building smart contracts

cd ~
sudo apt purge --auto-remove cmake
wget -O - https://apt.kitware.com/keys/kitware-archive-latest.asc 2>/dev/null | gpg --dearmor - | sudo tee /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/kitware.gpg >/dev/null
sudo apt-add-repository 'deb https://apt.kitware.com/ubuntu/ focal main'   
sudo apt update
sudo apt install cmake -y

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

sudo apt install libssl-dev -y
sudo apt install pkg-config -y
sudo apt install build-essential -y

BRANCH="1.0.20" \
    && git clone --branch ${BRANCH} https://github.com/WebAssembly/wabt.git "wabt-${BRANCH}" \
    && cd "wabt-${BRANCH}" \
    && git submodule update --init \
    && cd - \
    && cmake -S "wabt-${BRANCH}" -B "wabt-${BRANCH}/build" \
    && cmake --build "wabt-${BRANCH}/build" --parallel 8 \
    && sudo cmake --install "wabt-${BRANCH}/build" --prefix /usr --strip -v \
    && rm -rf "wabt-${BRANCH}"

Build smart contracts

Pull sources

Go to your home directory and clone the node repository. Later we will use this path to the smart contracts in our bonding request.

cd ~

git clone git://github.com/CasperLabs/casper-node.git
cd casper-node/

Checkout the release branch

Note
Verify that the version of your contracts matches the version of the casper-node software you have installed.

git checkout release-1.2

Build the contracts

make setup-rs
make build-client-contracts -j

Generate keys and fund your account

Generate node keys

Navigate to the default key directory:

cd /etc/casper/validator_keys

And execute the following command to generate the keys:

sudo -u casper casper-client keygen .

It will create three files in the /etc/casper/validator_keys directory:

secret_key.pem - your private key; never share it with anyone
public_key.pem - your public key
public_key_hex - hex representation of your public key; copy it to your machine to create an account

Save your keys to a safe place.

Create account

Install the Signer app, and import your secret_key.pem file following the steps described under the New User (Has Secret Keys) section of the Signer Guide.

Fund account

Go to Testnet CSPR.Live, and connect with the account you want to fund. Click Tools from the top navigation menu, then click Faucet. Wait for the faucet page to load, and click the Request tokens button. Wait until the request transaction succeeds.

Configure and Run the Node

Set up configuration

sudo -u casper /etc/casper/pull_casper_node_version.sh $CASPER_NETWORK.conf $CASPER_VERSION
sudo -u casper /etc/casper/config_from_example.sh $CASPER_VERSION

Get known validator IP

Let's get a known validator IP first. We'll use it multiple times later in the process.

KNOWN_ADDRESSES=$(sudo -u casper cat /etc/casper/$CASPER_VERSION/config.toml | grep known_addresses)
KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IPS=$(grep -oE '[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}\.[0-9]{1,3}' <<< "$KNOWN_ADDRESSES")
IFS=' ' read -r KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IP _REST <<< "$KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IPS"

echo $KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IP

After running the commands above the $KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IP variable will contain IP address of a known validator.

Set trusted hash

Note

Setting the trusted_hash is only required if you join the network after Genesis has taken place. If you are joining prior to Genesis, you may skip this step and continue at "Start the node".

Get the trusted hash from the network:

# Get trusted_hash into config.toml
TRUSTED_HASH=$(casper-client get-block --node-address http://$KNOWN_VALIDATOR_IP:7777 -b 20 | jq -r .result.block.hash | tr -d '\n')
if [ "$TRUSTED_HASH" != "null" ]; then sudo -u casper sed -i "/trusted_hash =/c\trusted_hash = '$TRUSTED_HASH'" /etc/casper/$CASPER_VERSION/config.toml; fi

Stage the upgrades

"Staging an upgrade" is a process in which you tell your node to download the upgrade files and prepare them, so that they can automatically be applied at the pre-defined activation point. Stage all of the following upgrades from the oldest to the newest (from the top to the bottom).

Upgrade to casper-node v1.1.0

For this upgrade, to casper-node v1.1.0, the activation point is Era 166. In order to not have points deducted for your Testnet reward score, you have to make sure you have properly staged the upgrade well ahead of the activation point, so that your node will be upgraded on time.