Dev:Run a Testnet Node
This guide will help to set up a node on the nexus testnet. No permission is required to join the testnet and users have complete control of the dedicated node.
The node configuration will differ as per the individual application requirement or amount of transactions generated.
If you need any help on the node specifications for a particular application do contact developer support here.
Prerequisites
- A computer with a minimum of 1 CPU, 1GB RAM, 20GB hard space, Raspberry Pi 4 with 2 GB RAM.
- VPS with 1GB RAM is sufficient for normal usage.
- Ubuntu server 20.04 LTS or Debian 11 for AMD/IA64 or Ubuntu IOT / Raspberry Pi OS 64 bit for Raspberry Pi. (Use any linux distribution of choice, but this guide is tailored for Debian /Ubuntu).
- USB drive or SD card to install ubuntu
- Etcher – To burn the OS image file to USB/SD card
- Putty if you are using ssh via windows
Do not use Ubuntu 22.04 as it has the new version of openssl which breaks compatibility with core.
Testnet Mining Node Links
The testnet mining nodes are listed below:
- http://testnet1.nexus-interactions.io
- http://testnet2.nexus-interactions.io
- http://testnet3.nexus-interactions.io
Testnet Ports
The testnet uses a different set of ports compared to the mainnet. If using a firewall, make sure to open the following ports. Legacy is disabled and the reason RPC port 8336 is not allowed:
7080 - API port 8325 - Mining port, only enable if mining on testnet 8888 - Outgoing node connections
| Port | Description |
|---|---|
| 7080 | API port |
| 8325 | Mining port, only enable if mining on testnet |
| 8888 | Outgoing node connections |
Prepare The Node
Install Ubuntu server 20.04 LTS or distro of your choice, install open-ssh server during the install and once the installation is complete restart the node. SSH in your node and follow the below commands. You can copy the commands and paste it in the terminal using keys CTRL+SHIFT+v.
Update your node:
sudo apt update
Upgrade your node:
sudo apt upgrade -y
Open SSH port before you enable firewall:
sudo ufw allow ssh
Allow API port 7080:
sudo ufw allow 7080/tcp
Allow outgoing connections port 8888
sudo ufw allow 8888/tcp
Allow mining port 8325, only if mining
sudo ufw allow 8325/tcp
Enable firewall:
sudo ufw enable
Check firewall status:
sudo ufw status
Set your timezone:
sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
If you need to change the hostname – Not compulsory if you already set it during the install:
sudo hostnamectl set-hostname <newhostname>
Reboot node:
sudo reboot
We have our computer ready to install the nexus core!
Compiling Nexus Core Install the dependencies required for compiling nexus core CLI. It will take some time to complete depending on your internet speed:
sudo apt-get install -y build-essential libssl-dev libdb-dev libdb++-dev libminiupnpc-dev git
Download the latest nexus core source code, and should only take a few seconds to complete:
git clone --branch merging https://github.com/Nexusoft/LLL-TAO
Change into the source code directory:
cd LLL-TAO
Lastly, run this command to compile from source. This begins compiling the nexus core. Please be patient, as this can take a long time depending on your CPU. Replace the 1 in ‘j1’ to the number of cores / threads for compiling faster. To build on Raspberry Pi with 1 GB of ram you have to enable Swap memory. Proceed after setting up swap:
make -f makefile.cli clean
For x86/IA64 computers use:
make -f makefile.cli -j1 AMD64=1 NO_WALLET=1
For the raspberry pi use:
make -f makefile.cli -j4 ARM64=1 NO_WALLET=1
The output will show “Finished building nexus” on a successful compile.
Testnet Node Configuration
The nexus wallet configuration is kept in a nexus.conf file in ~/.Nexus which is the nexus core directory. Create Nexus core directory (it’s a hidden directory, if you have the directory you can skip this step.):
mkdir ~/.Nexus
Create the nexus.conf file:
nano ~/.Nexus/nexus.conf
Copy the below configuration in the nexus.conf file and change the values denoted by "< >" to suit your setup:
#Nexus testnet config- PLEASE CHANGE TO SUITABLE VALUES #Set API credentials apiuser=<username> apipassword=<password> #To enable API authentication for testing apiauth=1 #To enable API remote access apiremote=1 #To whitelist IP address for API access llpallowip=<ipaddress>:7080 #To enable multiuser mode: enables more than one user to be logged into the node multiuser=1 #To enable debug mode #debug=1 #To enable the daemon mode daemon=1 #To accept incoming JSON-RPC commands server=1 #Enable mining #mining=1 #Enable Staking #stake=1 #The testnet flag defaults the API port to 7080, RPC to 8336 & mining port to 8325 testnet=1 #To connect to the Nexus public testnet. connect=testnet1.nexus-interactions.io connect=testnet2.nexus-interactions.io connect=testnet3.nexus-interactions.io #To disable mainet DNS nodes nodns=1 #process notifications (incoming transactions) automatically in background processnotifications=1 #To add a stop password to protect from accidental wallet exit system/stop=<password>
Ctrl+s & ctrl+x to save and exit the nano text editor. The wallet configuration is now complete.
APIs to Control the Node
To start, stop and check the node info you have to use APIs from the terminal. Change into the LLL-TAO directory to start nexus core (You have to be in the LLL-TAO folder to run all the following commands):
cd LLL-TAO
To start the daemon:
./nexus
Nexus core will be running in the background as a daemon. It will connect to the mining nodes specified in the configuration and synchronize the blockchain. It will take a few minutes to find peers and synchronize the chain.
To stop the daemon:
./nexus system/stop
./nexus system/stop password=<password>
To get the node info:
./nexus system/get/info
Now the testnet node is ready to be used for your application. Hope this guide was helpful!