Disclaimer: to anyone with essentially any degree of real coding and/or development experience it will be clear that I myself have next to none. This document is a revision of another guide that I followed to initially set up my node, with some extra notes that may be useful to others like me, who are not ultra familiar with Linux, CLI (command-line interface) operations, and cryptography.

Setting Up a Quilibrium Ceremony Client Node

To set up a Quilibrium Ceremony Client node and start acquiring $QUIL, follow these simplified steps. This guide includes session management with tmux and comprehensive process management instructions, now ordered to minimize the need for restarts.

For those who may not be familiar, tmux is a way to essentially have multiple windows, or control multiple processes, within a CLI (command-line interface).

1. Provision a VPS (virtual private server)

For the Dawn phase, a server must have a minimum of 16GB of RAM, preferably 32 GB, 250GB of storage, preferably via SSD, and 50MBps symmetric bandwidth. For Intel/AMD, the baseline processor is a Skylake processor @ 3.4GHz with 12 dedicated cores. For ARM, the M1 line of Apple is a good reference. With Dusk, these minimum requirements will reduce significantly. As of 5/5/24 version 1.5.0 or "Dusk" has been delayed several times over the last few weeks, but appears that it will be updated very soon.

• Choose a VPS provider and set up a server running Ubuntu 22.04.
  • I am currently running a Perfect Quality Hosting server. Scroll down and select the Adamantium-NL option. I recommend paying with crypto - this is the way.

*Each service is a little different, but when setting up your VPS you'll be assigned an IP address and set a password to access your server. Some services have more options than others, but keep it as simple as possible.

• Once your VPS has been provisioned, connect via SSH from your computer's terminal by replacing VPS_IP_ADDRESS with that of your VPS in the following command:

  ssh root@VPS_IP_ADDRESS

2. Install Prerequisite Software

Execute the following commands to install necessary software:

sudo apt -q update
sudo apt-get install jq tmux -y  # Includes tmux installation
sudo apt install git -y
git --version  # Ensure git version is 2.34.1 or later

3. Install Golang

Download and install Golang with these commands:

wget https://go.dev/dl/go1.20.14.linux-amd64.tar.gz
sudo tar -xvf go1.20.14.linux-amd64.tar.gz -C /usr/local
echo 'export GOROOT=/usr/local/go' >> ~/.bashrc
echo 'export GOPATH=$HOME/go' >> ~/.bashrc
echo 'export PATH=$GOPATH/bin:$GOROOT/bin:$PATH' >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc
go version  # Verify installation with go version go1.20.14 linux/amd64

4. Clone the Ceremony Client Repo

Clone the repository and navigate to the node directory:

git clone https://github.com/QuilibriumNetwork/ceremonyclient.git
cd ceremonyclient/node

5. Configure the firewall to allow necessary traffic:

sudo ufw allow 22 && sudo ufw allow 8336 && sudo ufw allow 8337 && sudo ufw allow 8338 && sudo ufw allow 8317 && sudo ufw allow 8316 && sudo ufw enable
sudo ufw status  # Confirm firewall settings

6. Increase buffer size for better network performance:

echo -e "\n# Increase buffer sizes for better network performance\nnet.core.rmem_max=600000000\nnet.core.wmem_max=600000000" | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf > /dev/null && sudo sysctl -p

Apply changes:

sudo sysctl -p

7. Start Node in a tmux session

Initiate a tmux session:

tmux new -s quilnode

Start the node within the tmux session:

cd ~/ceremonyclient/node
GOEXPERIMENT=arenas go run ./...

You are now running a quilibrium node!

*** some notes on tmux ***

• Detach from the tmux session with Ctrl+b then d
• Reattach to tmux session with tmux a
• Open a new window within the session with Ctrl + b then c
• Cycle through open windows with Ctrl + b then p
• Split window horizontally with Ctrl + b then "
• Split window vertically with Ctrl + b then %

Node Management

Restarting the node

• Auto Restart:

  • Navigate to the node window in tmux

  • Pause the node process with Ctrl+z

  • Make the auto script executable:

    chmod +x poor_mans_cd.sh

  • Start the auto script

    ./poor_mans_cd.sh

  • poor_mans_cd.sh should auto restart if your process goes down as well as auto update new github releases. Although in my exerience it sometimes doesn't work as planned and stalls out. If this happens, go for the manual restart.

• Manual Restart:

  • Navigate to the node window in tmux

  • Pause the node process with Ctrl+z

  • Find the PID of the node process. Look for the number for any proces ending in /b001/exe/node

    ps -aux | grep go # PID number for the process ending in /b001/exe/node

  • Use the PID to kill the process:

    kill PID

  • Recheck the node processes and confirm deletion. If not deleted force kill with:

    kill -9 PID

  • Now restart the node with:

    GOEXPERIMENT=arenas go run ./...

Configure gRPC to enable node query:

• Edit .config/config.yml:

  nano ~/ceremonyclient/node/.config/config.yml

• Scroll to the bottom with the arrow keys to the line, listenGrpcMultiaddr: "", and replace with:

  listenGrpcMultiaddr: /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/8337

• Save the file with Ctrl+O, and exit with Ctrl+X.

• Restart the node

Get Node Peer ID and Balance

• Get your Node Peer ID:

  cd ~/ceremonyclient/node
  GOEXPERIMENT=arenas go run ./... -peer-id

• Get your $QUIL balance (gRPC must be configured):

  cd ~/ceremonyclient/node
  GOEXPERIMENT=arenas go run ./... -balance

Save your keys to your local computer

• You will want to save config.yml and keys.yml in a safe place. To copy them from your VPS to your local computer run the following commands from your local terminal, making sure to replace VPS_IP_ADDRESS with that of the VPS you're trying to copy from, and FULL_DIRECTORY_PATH_WHERE_YOU_WANT_TO_SAVE_THE_FILE with your prefered directory to which you'd like to save:
• saving config.yml

  scp -rp root@VPS_IP_ADDRESS:/root/ceremonyclient/node/.config/config.yml /FULL_DIRECTORY_PATH_WHERE_YOU_WANT_TO_SAVE_THE_FILE

• saving keys.yml

  scp -rp root@VPS_IP_ADDRESS:/root/ceremonyclient/node/.config/keys.yml /FULL_DIRECTORY_PATH_WHERE_YOU_WANT_TO_SAVE_THE_FILE