Lisk Core

Lisk is a next-generation crypto-currency and decentralized application platform, written entirely in JavaScript. The official documentation about the whole ecosystem can be found in https://lisk.io/documentation.

Lisk Core is the program that implements the Lisk Protocol. In other words, Lisk Core is what every machine needs to set-up to run a node that allows for participation in the network.

This document details how to install Lisk Core from source, but there are two other ways to participate in the network: binaries and Docker images. If you have satisfied the requirements from the Pre-Installation section, you can jump directly to the next section Installation Steps.

Index

• Installation
  • Dependencies
• Managing Lisk
• Configuring Lisk
  • Structure
  • Command Line Options
  • Examples
• Tests
  • Preparing Node
  • Running Tests
    • Running Mocha Tests
    • Running Jest Tests
• Utility Scripts
• Performance Monitoring
• License

Installation

Dependencies

The following dependencies need to be installed in order to run applications created with the Lisk SDK:

Dependencies	Version
NodeJS	10.15.3
PostgreSQL	10.x
Redis (optional)	4+

You can find further details on installing these dependencies in our pre-installation setup guide. Clone the Lisk Core repository using Git and initialize the modules.

git clone https://github.com/LiskHQ/lisk-core.git
cd lisk-core
git checkout master
npm ci
npm run build

Managing Lisk

To test Lisk is built and configured correctly, issue the following command at the root level of the project:

npm start

This will start the lisk instance with devnet configuration. Once the process is verified as running correctly, use CTRL+C to quit the running application. Optionally, start the process with pm2. This will fork the process into the background and automatically recover the process if it fails.

npx pm2 start --name lisk src/index.js

After the process is started, its runtime status and log location can be retrieved by issuing the following command:

npx pm2 show lisk

To stop Lisk after it has been started with pm2, issue the following command:

npx pm2 stop lisk

NOTE: The port, address and config-path can be overridden by providing the relevant command switch:

npx pm2 start --name lisk src/index.js -- -p [port] -a [address] -c [config-path] -n [network]

You can pass any of devnet, alphanet, betanet, testnet or mainnet for the network option. More information about options can be found at Command Line Options.

Configuring Lisk

Structure

1. The Lisk configuration is managed under different folder structures.
2. Root folder for all configuration is ./config/.
3. The default configuration file that used as a base is config/default/config.json
4. You can find network specific configurations under config/<network>/config.json
5. Don't override any value in files mentioned above if you need custom configuration.
6. Create your own json file and pass it as command line options -c or LISK_CONFIG_FILE
7. Configurations will be loaded in the following order, lowest in the list has the highest priority:
   • Default configuration file
   • Network specific configuration file
   • Custom configuration file (if specified by the user)
   • Command line configurations, specified as command flags or env variables
8. Any config option of array type gets completely overridden. If you specify one peer at peers.list in your custom config file, it will replace every default peer for the network.
9. For development use devnet as the network option.

Command Line Options

There are plenty of options available that you can use to override configuration on runtime while starting the lisk.

npm start -- [options]

Each of that option can be appended to the command-line. There are also a few ENV variables that can be utilized for this purpose.

Option	ENV Variable	Config Option	Description
--network -n	LISK_NETWORK		Which configurations set to use, associated to lisk networks. Any of this option can be used devnet, alphanet, betanet, testnet and mainnet. Default value is devnet.
--config -c	LISK_CONFIG_FILE		Path to the custom configuration file, which will override values of config/default/config.json. Should be relative path from root of project.
--port -p	LISK_WS_PORT	wsPort	TCP port for P2P layer
--http-port -h	LISK_HTTP_PORT	httpPort	TCP port for HTTP API
--address -a	LISK_ADDRESS	address	Listening host name or ip
--log -l	LISK_FILE_LOG_LEVEL	fileLogLevel	Log level for file output
	LISK_CONSOLE_LOG_LEVEL	consoleLogLevel	Log level for console output
	LISK_CACHE_ENABLED	cacheEnabled	Enable or disable cache. Must be set to true/false
--database -d	LISK_DB_NAME	db.database	PostgreSQL database name to connect to
	LISK_DB_HOST	db.host	PostgreSQL database host name
	LISK_DB_PORT	db.port	PostgreSQL database port
	LISK_DB_USER	db.user	PostgreSQL database username to connect to
	LISK_DB_PASSWORD	db.password	PostgreSQL database password to connect to
--redis -r	LISK_REDIS_HOST	redis.host	Redis host name
	LISK_REDIS_PORT	redis.port	Redis port
	LISK_REDIS_DB_NAME	redis.db	Redis database name to connect to
	LISK_REDIS_DB_PASSWORD	redis.password	Redis database password to connect to
--peers -x	LISK_PEERS	peers.list	Comma separated list of peers to connect to in the format 192.168.99.100:5000,172.169.99.77:5000
	LISK_API_PUBLIC	api.access.public	Enable or disable public access of http API. Must be set to true/false
	LISK_API_WHITELIST	api.access.whiteList	Comma separated list of IPs to enable API access. Format 192.168.99.100,172.169.99.77
	LISK_FORGING_DELEGATES	forging.delegates	Comma separated list of delegates to load in the format publicKey|encryptedPassphrase,publicKey2|encryptedPassphrase2
	LISK_FORGING_WHITELIST	forging.access.whiteList	Comma separated list of IPs to enable access to forging endpoints. Format 192.168.99.100,172.169.99.77
--snapshot -s			Number of rounds to include in the snapshot, must be a positive integer equal to or greater than 0. When 0 is passed, this corresponds to the inclusion of all rounds. Any other number equals to its corresponding round. Bear in mind this mode disables all the network features of the node to ensure reliability.

Note

• All ENV variables restricted with operating system constraint of ENV variable maximum length.
• Comma-separated lists will replace the original config values. e.g. If you specify LISK_PEERS, original peers.list, which is specific to the network, will be replaced completely.

For a more detailed understanding of configuration read this online documentation

Examples

Change Redis Port

Update the redis.port configuration attribute in config/devnet/config.json or any other network you want to configure.

Tests

Preparing Node

1. Recreate the database to run the tests against a new blockchain:

dropdb lisk_dev
createdb lisk_dev

2. Launch Lisk (runs on port 4000):

NODE_ENV=test npm start

Utility Scripts

There are a couple of command line scripts that facilitate users of lisk to perform handy operations. All scripts are located under ./framework/src/modules/chain/scripts/ directory and can be executed directly by node framework/src/modules/chain/scripts/<file_name>.

Generate Config

This script will help you to generate a unified version of the configuration file for any network. Here is the usage of the script:

Usage: generate_config [options]

Options:

-h, --help               output usage information
-V, --version            output the version number
-c, --config [config]    custom config file
-n, --network [network]  specify the network or use LISK_NETWORK

Argument network is required and can by devnet, testnet, mainnet or any other network folder available under ./config directory.

Update Config

This script keeps track of all changes introduced in Lisk over time in different versions. If you have one config file in any of specific version and you want to make it compatible with other versions of the Lisk, this scripts will do it for you.

Usage: update_config [options] <input_file> <from_version> [to_version]

Options:

-h, --help               output usage information
-V, --version            output the version number
-n, --network [network]  specify the network or use LISK_NETWORK
-o, --output [output]    output file path

As you can see from the usage guide, input_file and from_version are required. If you skip to_version argument changes in config.json will be applied up to the latest version of Lisk Core. If you do not specify --output path the final config.json will be printed to stdout. If you do not specify --network argument you will have to load it from LISK_NETWORK env variable.

Console (Unmaintained)

This script is useful in development. It will initialize the components of Lisk and load these into Node.js REPL.

node framework/src/modules/chain/scripts/console.js

initApplication: Application initialization inside test environment started...
initApplication: Target database - lisk_dev
initApplication: Rewired modules available
initApplication: Fake onBlockchainReady event called
initApplication: Loading delegates...
initApplication: Delegates loaded from config file - 101
initApplication: Done
lisk-core [lisk_dev] >

Once you get the prompt, you can use modules, helpers, logic, storage and config objects and play with these in REPL.

Performance Monitoring

We used newrelic to monitor the activities inside the application. It enables to have detail insight into the system and keeps track of the performance of each activity. e.g. An HTTP API call or a background job from a queue.

To enable the performance monitoring on your node make sure you have an environment variable NEW_RELIC_LICENSE_KEY available and set and then start the node normally. The monitoring data will be visible to your newRelic account with the name of the network you started. e.g. lisk-mainnet, lisk-testnet.

Contributors

https://github.com/LiskHQ/lisk-core/graphs/contributors

License

Copyright © 2016-2018 Lisk Foundation

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

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This program also incorporates work previously released with lisk 0.9.11 (and earlier) versions under the MIT License. To comply with the requirements of that license, the following permission notice, applicable to those parts of the code only, is included below:

Copyright © 2016-2018 Lisk Foundation Copyright © 2015 Crypti

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.