Mine testnet Stacks tokens

Introducción

Make sure you've followed the Run a node procedure. Once completed it's only a few more steps to run a proof-of-burn miner on the testnet.

If you want to learn more about the technical details of mining, please review the mining guide.

Running bitcoind locally

To participate as a miner on Testnet, you must have access to a testnet bitcoin node. One way to accomplish this is to run bitcoind locally. Ensure your computer meets the minimum hardware requirements before continuing.

First, download the bitcoind software for your platform from https://bitcoin.org/en/download.

Next, start bitcoind with the following configuration:

server=1
rpcuser=your-bitcoind-username
rpcpassword=your-bitcoind-password
testnet=1
txindex=0
listen=1
rpcserialversion=0
maxorphantx=1
banscore=1

[test]
bind=0.0.0.0:18333
rpcbind=0.0.0.0:18332
rpcport=18332

Finally, start bitcoind as follows:

bitcoind -conf=path/to/bitcoin.conf

It may take a few hours for the node to synchronize with the Bitcoin testnet.

Running a miner

First, a keychain needs to be generated. With this keychain, we'll get some testnet BTC from a faucet, and then use that BTC to start mining.

To get a keychain, the simplest way is to use the stacks-cli. To get a keychain, the simplest way is to use the stacks-cli.

npx @stacks/cli make_keychain -t 2>/dev/null | json_pp > keychain.txt

After this runs, you should see some JSON in the new keychain.txt file that looks like this:

{
  "mnemonic": "exhaust spin topic distance hole december impulse gate century absent breeze ostrich armed clerk oak peace want scrap auction sniff cradle siren blur blur",
  "keyInfo": {
    "privateKey": "2033269b55026ff2eddaf06d2e56938f7fd8e9d697af8fe0f857bb5962894d5801",
    "address": "STTX57EGWW058FZ6WG3WS2YRBQ8HDFGBKEFBNXTF",
    "btcAddress": "mkRYR7KkPB1wjxNjVz3HByqAvVz8c4B6ND",
    "index": 0
  }
}

Don't lose this information - we'll need to use the privateKey field later on.

The above BTC address will then need to be imported into the BTC testnet network.

bitcoin-cli -rpcport=18332 -rpcuser=your-user -rpcpassword=your-password importaddress <btcAddress from JSON above>

Once imported, we need to get some testnet BTC to that address. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet. You'll be sent 0.01 testnet BTC to that address.

Now, we need to configure our node to use this Bitcoin keychain. Clone the stacks-blockchain repository to your local machine if you haven't already. In the stacks-blockchain folder, modify the file at testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml.

Update the following properties:

[node]
...
seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
local_peer_seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
...

[burnchain]
...
# To mine on Testnet, you need to run bitcoind locally
# Details can be found in above section, 'Running bitcoind locally'
peer_host = "127.0.0.1"
username = "<USERNAME>"
password = "<PASSWORD>"
...

Now, grab your privateKey from earlier, when you ran the make_keychain command. Replace the seed field with your private key. Save and close this configuration file.

To run your miner, run this in the command line:

stacks-node start --config=./testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml

Your node should start. It will take some time to sync, and then your miner will be running.

Creating an optimized binary

The steps above are great for trying to run a node temporarily. If you want to host a node on a server somewhere, you might want to generate an optimized binary. To do so, use the same configuration as above, but run:

cd testnet/stacks-node
cargo build --release --bin stacks-node

The above code will compile an optimized binary. To use it, run:

cd ../..
./target/release/stacks-node start --config=./testnet/conf/testnet-follower-conf.toml

To read more about the technical details of mining on the Stacks 2.0 network, have a look at the minig guide:

Enable debug logging

In case you are running into issues or would like to see verbose logging, you can run your node with debug logging enabled. In the command line, run:

STACKS_LOG_DEBUG=1 stacks-node testnet

Running a miner in Windows

Pre requisitos

Make sure are running a testnet node before starting this tutorial.

Generate keychain and get testnet tokens in Windows

To setup the miner, first, we need to generate a keychain. With this keychain, we'll get some testnet BTC from a faucet, and then use that BTC to start mining.

To get a keychain, the simplest way is to use the stacks-cli. We'll use the stx make-keychain command, and pass -t to indicate that we want a testnet keychain.

Generate a keychain:

npm install --global @stacks/cli
stx make_keychain -t > cli_keychain.json
type cli_keychain.json

After this runs, you'll probably see some installation logs, and at the end you should see some JSON that looks like this:

{
  "mnemonic": "exhaust spin topic distance hole december impulse gate century absent breeze ostrich armed clerk oak peace want scrap auction sniff cradle siren blur blur",
  "keyInfo": {
    "privateKey": "2033269b55026ff2eddaf06d2e56938f7fd8e9d697af8fe0f857bb5962894d5801",
    "address": "STTX57EGWW058FZ6WG3WS2YRBQ8HDFGBKEFBNXTF",
    "btcAddress": "mkRYR7KkPB1wjxNjVz3HByqAvVz8c4B6ND",
    "index": 0
  }
}

Check out the Stacks CLI reference for more details :::

Request BTC from faucet:

We need to get some testnet BTC to that address. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet.

Update configuration file

Now, we need to configure our node to use this Bitcoin keychain. Clone the stacks-blockchain repository to your local machine if you haven't already. In the stacks-blockchain folder, modify the file at testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml.

Update the following properties:

[node]
...
seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
local_peer_seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
...

[burnchain]
...
# To mine on Testnet, you need to run bitcoind locally
# Details can be found in above section, 'Running bitcoind locally'
peer_host = "127.0.0.1"
username = "<USERNAME>"
password = "<PASSWORD>"
...

Now, grab your privateKey from earlier, when you ran the stx make_keychain command. Replace the seed field with your private key. Save and close this configuration file.

Run the miner

To start your miner, run this in the command line:

stacks-node start --config=testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml

While starting the node for the first time, windows defender might pop up with a message to allow access. If so, allow access to run the node. :::

Your node should start. It will take some time to sync, and then your miner will be running.

Enable debug logging in Windows

In case you are running into issues or would like to see verbose logging, you can run your node with debug logging enabled. In the command line, run:

set RUST_BACKTRACE=full;
set STACKS_LOG_DEBUG=1;
stacks-node start --config=testnet-miner-conf.toml

Optional: Running with Docker

Alternatively, you can run the testnet node with Docker.

Ensure you have Docker installed on your machine. :::

Generate keychain and get testnet tokens

Generate a keychain:

docker run -i node:14-alpine npx @stacks/cli make_keychain -t 2>/dev/null

We need to get some testnet BTC to that address. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet.

Update config file

Now, we need to configure our node to use this Bitcoin keychain. Clone the stacks-blockchain repository to your local machine if you haven't already. In the stacks-blockchain folder, modify the file at testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml.

Update the following properties:

[node]
...
seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
local_peer_seed = "replace-with-your-private-key"
...

[burnchain]
...
# To mine on Testnet, you need to run bitcoind locally
# Details can be found in above section, 'Running bitcoind locally'
peer_host = "127.0.0.1"
username = "<USERNAME>"
password = "<PASSWORD>"
...

Now, grab your privateKey from earlier, when you ran the stx make_keychain command. Replace the seed field with your private key. Save and close this configuration file.

Start the miner

docker run -d \
  --name stacks_miner \
  --rm \
  --network host \
  -e RUST_BACKTRACE="full" \
  -e STACKS_LOG_DEBUG="1" \
  -v "$(pwd))/testnet/stacks-node/conf/testnet-miner-conf.toml:/src/stacks-node/testnet-miner-conf.toml" \
  -p 20443:20443 \
  -p 20444:20444 \
  blockstack/stacks-blockchain:latest \
/bin/stacks-node start --config /src/stacks-node/testnet-miner-conf.toml

You can review the node logs with this command:

docker logs -f stacks_miner

Optional: Running in Kubernetes with Helm

In addition, you're also able to run a testnet node in a Kubernetes cluster using the stacks-blockchain Helm chart.

Ensure you have the following prerequisites installed on your machine:

• Docker
• minikube (Only needed if standing up a local Kubernetes cluster)
• kubectl
• helm

Generate keychain and get some testnet tokens

Generate a keychain:

docker run -i node:14-alpine npx @stacks/cli make_keychain -t 2>/dev/null

We need to get some testnet BTC to that address. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet. Grab the btcAddress field, and paste it into this Bitcoin testnet faucet.

Install the chart and run the miner

To install the chart with the release name my-release and run the node as a miner:

minikube start # Only run this if standing up a local Kubernetes cluster
helm repo add blockstack https://charts.blockstack.xyz
helm install my-release blockstack/stacks-blockchain \
  --set config.node.miner=true \
  --set config.node.seed="replace-with-your-privateKey-from-generate-keychain-step"

You can review the node logs with this command:

kubectl logs -l app.kubernetes.io/name=stacks-blockchain

For more information on the Helm chart and configuration options, please refer to the chart's homepage.