Once your signer is upgraded to version 2.5.0.0.5.2-rc1 (here) you’ll need to run a primary testnet node alongside it.
You have two options here. The first is to run the Bash script below and it will handle everything for you, including creating the configuration file, downloading and extracting a chain state archive, and getting the node up and running.
If you prefer to handle these yourself, step-by-step instructions are included below the Bash script.
Automated Bash Script
Be sure to edit your auth_token (previously block_proposal_token) field here to match the auth_password field in your signer config.
Create a file called node-config.toml. Below is a sample of the configuration file you’ll need to use.
Sample Configuration File
[node]working_dir ="/stacks-blockchain/data"rpc_bind ="0.0.0.0:20443"p2p_bind ="0.0.0.0:20444"bootstrap_node ="029266faff4c8e0ca4f934f34996a96af481df94a89b0c9bd515f3536a95682ddc@seed.testnet.hiro.so:30444"prometheus_bind ="0.0.0.0:9153"[burnchain]chain ="bitcoin"mode ="krypton"peer_host ="bitcoin.regtest.hiro.so"username ="hirosystems"password ="hirosystems"rpc_port =18443peer_port =18444pox_prepare_length =100pox_reward_length =900[[events_observer]]endpoint ="0.0.0.0.0:30000"retry_count =255include_data_events =falseevents_keys = ["stackerdb","block_proposal","burn_blocks"]# Set your auth token, which the signer uses# This should match the auth_password field of your signer config[connection_options]auth_token ="12345"[[ustx_balance]]address ="ST2QKZ4FKHAH1NQKYKYAYZPY440FEPK7GZ1R5HBP2"amount =10000000000000000[[ustx_balance]]address ="ST319CF5WV77KYR1H3GT0GZ7B8Q4AQPY42ETP1VPF"amount =10000000000000000[[ustx_balance]]address ="ST221Z6TDTC5E0BYR2V624Q2ST6R0Q71T78WTAX6H"amount =10000000000000000[[ustx_balance]]address ="ST2TFVBMRPS5SSNP98DQKQ5JNB2B6NZM91C4K3P7B"amount =10000000000000000[fee_estimation]fee_estimator ="fuzzed_weighted_median_fee_rate"[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="1.0"start_height =0[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.0"start_height =0[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.05"start_height =1[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.1"start_height =2[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.2"start_height =3[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.3"start_height =4[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.4"start_height =5[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="2.5"start_height =6[[burnchain.epochs]]epoch_name ="3.0"start_height =2000701
The important aspects that you’ll need to change are:
auth_token: an authentication token that your signer uses to authenticate certain requests to your node. This must match the value you used as auth_password in the signer’s configuration.
events_observer.endpoint: This is the host (IP address and port) where your signer is configured to listen for events. An example string would be ”127.0.0.1:30000” or ”my-signer.local:30000”
Start with an archive
If you are running your Stacks node on the primary testnet, it will be much faster to start with an archive of the chain state rather than syncing from genesis.
tar -xzvf /stacks-blockchain/data/latest.tar.gz -C /stacks-blockchain/data
Run a Stacks Node with Docker
You can run the Stacks node as a Docker container using the blockstack/stacks-core image. When running the Docker container, you’ll need to ensure a few things:
The port configured for p2p_bind must be exposed to the internet for egress
The port configured for rpc_bind must be accessible by your signer
working_dir needs to be on a volume with 3-5GB of available storage
You’ll need to include your node-config.toml file
An example for running the node’s Docker image with docker run is below. Be sure to run this from the same directory as your node-config.toml file or change the STX_NODE_CONFIG option.