Mainnet/Testnet: Running Nodes using AWS 1-click Deployment

This tutorial will use our AWS 1-click Deployment image to start and create the latest Cronos POS Chain 1-Click Node for both Mainnet and Testnet

CAUTION We do not recommend directly running validator on Mainnet by 1-Click deployment. Please use it with caution! Because the 1-click deployment is not running with TMKMS and your tendermint validator key is in plain text /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json. You may consider running validator with tmkms on AWS nitro-enclave.

Step 1. AWS Account Creation

You will first need to create an AWS account. This will require providing your credit card information to AWS and you may be subject to getting charged when you create a virtual machine. More details on account creation, check this link.

Please read AWS free trial page to see if you are eligible for the free-tier.

Step 2. Common Setup

Step 2-0. Go to EC2 page and change the region

Sign in to your AWS account and go to EC2 Dashboard and change to your favourite region. Click "Launch Instance"

Step 2-1. Search for Cronos POS Chain 1-Click Node on AWS Marketplace

Search for "Cronos POS Chain 1-Click Node" in Choose an Amazon Machine Image (AMI) section. Select "Cronos POS Chain 1-Click Node" from the search results.

Step 2-2. Choose an instance type

By default, it will choose the recommended instance type (m5a.large) for you. But you can choose another instance type based on Mainnet/Testnet requirements.

Step 2-3. Configure instance details

Configuration	Value
Network	Select an existing one or default vpc if you don't have any
Subnet	Choose a subnet or default subnet if you don't have any
Auto-assign Public IP	Enable
Other fields	Follow default setting

Step 2-4. Add Storage

• Follow the default setting with 125 Throughput (MB/s)

Step 2-5. Add Tags

• Create Tag if needed

Step 2-6. Configure Security Group

By default, the image creates a new security group for you allowing ssh, p2p, rpc, and rest ports. You can remove the default opened rules or add more rules for example: grpc(9090), node_exporter(9100), prometheus (26660), etc.

Default Port	Description
22	ssh
26656	p2p
26657	rpc
1317	rest
You should consider updating your security group rules to allow access from known IP addresses only.

Step 2-7. Review Instance Launch

Click "Launch" once you finish the review

You can either create a new key pair or import a key pair. Follow this instruction.

Step 2-8. Connect to your instance

Once the deployment is completed, you can connect to your instance via SSH.

$ ssh ubuntu@PUBLIC_IP -i YOUR_KEY.pem

AfterwardAfterwards, go to the chain directory, and you will find all the essential binaries for setting up your node:

$ cd /chain/
$ ll
total 32
drwxr-xr-x  7 crypto crypto 4096 Mar 20 14:51 ./
drwxr-xr-x 20 root   root   4096 Mar 25 09:46 ../
drwxr-xr-x  4 crypto crypto 4096 Mar 20 14:47 .chain-maind/
drwxr-xr-x  2 crypto crypto 4096 Mar 20 14:44 bin/
drwxr-xr-x  2   3434   3434 4096 Mar  5 09:41 node_exporter-1.1.2.linux-amd64/
-rwxr-xr-x  1 crypto crypto  535 Mar 20 14:43 reconfig.sh*
drwxr-xr-x  2 root   root   4096 Mar 20 14:43 release_binary/
drwxr-xr-x  2 crypto crypto 4096 Mar 20 14:47 sockets/

Step 3. Running a full node

Step 3-1. Use the reconfiguration script

Now we use the reconfiguration script reconfig.sh to choose the existing networks to join.

$ sudo -u crypto /chain/reconfig.sh
Please select either mainnet(M) or testnet(T) to join (M/T): M
You can select the following networks to join
	0. crypto-org-chain-mainnet-1
Please choose the network to join by index (0/1/...): 0
The selected network is crypto-org-chain-mainnet-1
The genesis does not exit or the sha256sum does not match the target one. Download the target genesis from github.
💾 Downloading crypto-org-chain-mainnet-1 genesis

(Optional) You may also enable STATE-SYNC. Your node will download data related to the head or near the head of the chain and verify the data. This leads to drastically shorter times for joining a network for validator. For validator, It will be amazingly fast to sync the near head of the chain and join the network.

CAUTION Blocks before state-sync trust height will NOT be queryable. If you want to run a full node or a validator with complete blockchain data; It is not suggested to use state-sync.

...
Do you want to enable state-sync? (Y/N): Y
State-sync require the latest version of binary to state-sync from the latest block.
The binary does not exist or the version does not match the target version. Download the target version binary from github release.
💾 Downloading crypto-org-chain-mainnet-1 binary
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100   644  100   644    0     0   6192      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--  6192
100 13.7M  100 13.7M    0     0  43.6M      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:-- 43.6M

Clean up the old blockchain data (if any)

...
Reset chain-maind and remove data if any
❗️ Enter (Y/N) to confirm to delete any old data: Y
Stopping chain-maind service
3:18PM INF Removed all blockchain history dir=/chain/.chain-maind/data
3:18PM INF Generated private validator file keyFile=/chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json stateFile=/chain/.chain-maind/data/priv_validator_state.json
❗️ /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json already exists! Do you want to override old key? (Y/N): Y
A new priv_validator_key.json with pubkey: open /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json: no such file or directory

💡 Please make sure you have a backup of /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json in case of unexpected accidents!

The consensus public key information could be found in /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json

Backup your old /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json if you ever created.

❗️ /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json already exists! Do you want to override old key? (Y/N): Y
A new priv_validator_key.json with pubkey: open /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json: no such file or directory

💡 Please make sure you have a backup of /chain/.chain-maind/config/priv_validator_key.json in case of unexpected accidents!

The script will also ask you to fill in the moniker value which is a human-readable display name for tendermint p2p. p2p gossip will allow you to connect with more nodes (data sources).

Replace moniker in /chain/.chain-maind/config/config.toml
Moniker is display name for tendermint p2p

moniker: YOUR_MONIKER_NAME
Do you want to add the public IP of this node for p2p gossip? (Y/N): Y
✅ Added public IP to external_address in chain-maind config.toml for p2p gossip

node_id and node_key are the unique identity of your node. Save them for later use.

...
Generate and replace node_key in /chain/.chain-maind/config/node_key.json

You may want to save node_id and node_key for later use

node_id: 62cf74XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

node_key: LyQiGlL4HsdHsPXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

chain-maind is now running in the background as a systemd service.

You can check its log by the command journalctl, for example:

$ journalctl -u chain-maind.service -f
-- Logs begin at Wed 2020-12-30 13:51:25 UTC. --
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF finalizing commit of block hash=3CB6E9CFAEB6681797E02547A096C9654A4558701660DCA78182CA1B43AA05F3 height=8460 module=consensus num_txs=3 root=39878A5AC834C6D89ADBC55097A6495FCE8C9E6FF8DE8DAAC5DD7373407A5C6D
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF minted coins from module account amount=7925328957basecro from=mint module=x/bank
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF executed block height=8460 module=state num_invalid_txs=0 num_valid_txs=3
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF updates to validators module=state updates=A7E76081779FF5EE79A765DE4D716B4903D6902B:4266505417
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF commit synced commit=436F6D6D697449447B5B36352032313020313636203639203130203633203137322032372031363120313438203133322031313320313031203135203131302031353720323134203134372034302034203234362032343220323237203231362032362031363220333120313431203231342032303020313239203234345D3A323130437D
Mar 25 15:34:02 ip-172-31-69-43 chain-maind[2657]: 3:34PM INF committed state app_hash=41D2A6450A3FAC1BA1948471650F6E9DD6932804F6F2E3D81AA21F8DD6C881F4 height=8460 module=state num_txs=3
...

The consensus public key can be found by and please take note of it for the next steps:

$ sudo /chain/bin/chain-maind tendermint show-validator --home /chain/.chain-maind/
## [crocnclcons... address] ##
## [tcrocnclcons... address] ##

The latest block height can be found by:

Mainnet

$ curl -s https://rpc.mainnet.crypto.org:443/block | jq -r .result.block.header.height
8525

Testnet

$ curl -s https://testnet-croeseid-4.crypto.org:26657/block | jq -r .result.block.header.height
8525

Once the tendermint syncs to the latest block, the setup is done! You may move on to the next step if you want to join the network as a validator.

Step 4. Join as a validator

We suggest that you should do this process locally with chain-maind to avoid exposing your keys on a cloud server. If you haven't installed chain-maind yet, please follow Step 1. Get the Cronos POS Chain binary for testnet or Step 1. Get the Cronos POS Chain Mainnet binary for mainnet.

NOTE

• Check whether your chain-maind is mainnet or testnet binary

Mainnet

$ chain-maind version
3.3.9

• Mainnet binary for Mac and Windows are also available.

Or

Testnet

$ chain-maind version
3.1.0-croeseid

• Testnet binary for Mac (Intel x86 / M1)and Windows are also available.

Mainnet

Create a new key and address

Please follow Step 3-1. Create a new key and address

Creating a validator node

You should obtain a consensus public key from Step 3-1. Use the reconfiguration script

Please follow Step 3-5. Joining the network as a validator to create a validator.

Check if the validator has been set

Back your server, and follow Step 3-6. Check your validator status

🎊 Congratulations! You've successfully joined the network as a validator! 🎊

Testnet

Create a new key and address

Please follow Step 3-1. Create a new key and address

Creating a validator node

You should obtain a consensus public key from Step 3-1. Use the reconfiguration script

Please follow Step 3-2 Joining the network as a validator to create a validator.

Check if the validator has been set

Back your server, and follow Step 3-6. Check your validator status

🎊 Congratulations! You've successfully joined the network as a validator! 🎊