Set Up and Run a Node in a Local Private Network

Now that the application is ready and the keyring populated, it's time to see how to locally run an Injective node. This guide will walk you through setting up a standalone network locally, if you wish to join as a validator on Mainnet or Testnet, please follow the relevant guides here.

Initialize the Chain

Before actually running the node, we need to initialize the chain, and most importantly its genesis file. This is done with the init subcommand:

Copy # The argument <moniker> is the custom username of your node, it should be human-readable. injectived init <moniker> --chain-id injective-1

The command above creates all the configuration files needed for your node to run, as well as a default genesis file, which defines the initial state of the network. All these configuration files are in ~/.injectived by default, but you can overwrite the location of this folder by passing the --home flag.

The ~/.injectived folder has the following structure:

Copy . # ~/.injectived |- data # Contains the databases used by the node. |- config/ |- app.toml # Application-related configuration file. |- config.toml # Tendermint-related configuration file. |- genesis.json # The genesis file. |- node_key.json # Private key to use for node authentication in the p2p protocol. |- priv_validator_key.json # Private key to use as a validator in the consensus protocol.

Before starting the chain, you need to populate the state with at least one account. To do so, first create a new account in the keyring named my_validator under the test keyring backend (feel free to choose another name and another backend).

Now that you have created a local account, go ahead and grant it some inj tokens in your chain's genesis file. Doing so will also make sure your chain is aware of this account's existence:

Copy injectived add-genesis-account $MY_VALIDATOR_ADDRESS 100000000000inj

Recall that $MY_VALIDATOR_ADDRESS is a variable that holds the address of the my_validator key in the keyring. Token in the Injective Chain have the {amount}{denom} format: amount is an 18-digit-precision decimal number, and denom is the unique token identifier with its denomination key (e.g. inj). Here, we are granting inj tokens, as inj is the token identifier used for staking in injectived.

Now that your account has some tokens, you need to add a validator to your chain. Validators are special full-nodes that participate in the consensus process in order to add new blocks to the chain. Any account can declare its intention to become a validator operator, but only those with sufficient delegation get to enter the active set. For this guide, you will add your local node (created via the init command above) as a validator of your chain. Validators can be declared before a chain is first started via a special transaction included in the genesis file called a gentx:

Copy # Create a gentx. injectived gentx my_validator 100000000inj --chain-id=injective-1 --keyring-backend=file # Add the gentx to the genesis file. injectived collect-gentxs

A gentx does three things:

1. Registers the validator account you created as a validator operator account (i.e. the account that controls the validator).
2. Self-delegates the provided amount of staking tokens.
3. Link the operator account with a Tendermint node pubkey that will be used for signing blocks. If no --pubkey flag is provided, it defaults to the local node pubkey created via the injectived init command above.

For more information on gentx, use the following command:

Copy injectived gentx --help

Configuring the Node Using app.toml and config.toml

Two configuration files are automatically generated inside ~/.injectived/config:

• config.toml: used to configure Tendermint, learn more on Tendermint's documentation (opens new window),
• app.toml: generated by the Cosmos SDK (which the Injective Chain is built on), and used for configurations such as state pruning strategies, telemetry, gRPC and REST servers configuration, state sync and more.

Both files are heavily commented, please refer to them directly to tweak your node.

One example config to tweak is the minimum-gas-prices field inside app.toml, which defines the minimum gas prices the validator node is willing to accept for processing a transaction. If it's empty, make sure to edit the field with some value, for example 10inj, or else the node will halt on startup. For the purpose of this tutorial, let's set the minimum gas price to 0:

Copy # The minimum gas prices a validator is willing to accept for processing a # transaction. A transaction's fees must meet the minimum of any denomination # specified in this config (e.g. 0.25token1;0.0001token2). minimum-gas-prices = "0inj"

Run a Localnet

Now that everything is set up, you can finally start your node:

Copy injectived start

You should see blocks come in.

The previous command allow you to run a single node. This is enough for the next section on interacting with this node, but you may wish to run multiple nodes at the same time, and see how consensus happens between them.