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Validator (~15 min)

Validator Cheat Sheet ​

🖨 🍝 instructions to get you up and running with a Validator on Pocket Network ✅

There is lots of scripting and some details are abstracted away

See the Validator Walkthrough if you want to understand what's happening under the hood.

Table of Contents ​

Prerequisites​

  1. CLI: Make sure to install the pocketd CLI.
  2. Full Node: Make sure you have followed the Full Node Cheat Sheet to install and run a Full Node first.
pocket user

If you followed Full Node Cheat Sheet, you can switch to user running the full node (which has pocketd installed) like so:

su - pocket # or a different user if you used a different name

Account Setup​

Create the Validator Account​

Create a new key pair for the validator like so:

pocketd keys add validator

Prepare your environment​

Run the following commands to set up your environment:

cat << 'EOT' > ~/.pocketrc
export BETA_NODE="https://shannon-testnet-grove-rpc.beta.poktroll.com"
export BETA_NODE_FLAGS="--node=https://shannon-testnet-grove-rpc.beta.poktroll.com"
export TX_PARAM_FLAGS="--fees 200000upokt --chain-id=<CHAIN_ID>" # pocket-alpha, pocket-beta, pocket
export ADDR=$(pocketd keys show validator -a)
export VALIDATOR_ADDR=$(pocketd keys show validator -a --bech val)
EOT

echo "source ~/.pocketrc" >> ~/.bashrc

Fund the Validator account​

Run the following command to get the Validator:

echo "Validator address: $ADDR"

If you are on a Beta Testnet, use the Shannon Beta TestNet faucet to fund the validator account.

If you are on Mainnet you'll need to transfer funds to the account:

pocketd tx bank send <SOURCE ADDRESS> $ADDR <AMOUNT_TO_STAKE>upokt $TX_PARAM_FLAGS

Afterwards, you can query the balance using the following command:

pocketd query bank balances $ADDR
tip

If you know someone at Grove who maintains Beta TestNet, you can ask them to run this command:

pkd_beta_tx tx bank send faucet_beta $ADDR 6900000000042upokt [$BETA_NODE_FLAGS]

Configure the Validator​

Get the Validator's PubKey​

Run the following command to get the pubkey of your validator:

pocketd comet show-validator

This will output something like:

{ "@type": "/cosmos.crypto.ed25519.PubKey", "key": "YourPublicKeyHere" }

Create the Validator JSON File​

Create a JSON file named validator.json with the content below while make these changes:

  • Replace the "pubkey" value with the output from pocketd comet show-validator.
  • Update the "amount" field with the amount you wish to stake (e.g., "1000000upokt").
  • Set the "moniker" to your validator's name (validator is the default we provided).
  • You can optionally fill in "identity", "website", "security", and "details".
cat << 'EOF' > validator.json
{
  "pubkey": {
    "@type": "/cosmos.crypto.ed25519.PubKey",
    "key": "YdlQyhjtrq9pk7afmz6oQ275L4FElzjzEJvB1fj3e1w="
  },
  "amount": "1000000upokt",
  "moniker": "validator",
  "identity": "",
  "website": "",
  "security": "",
  "details": "",
  "commission-rate": "0.100000000000000000",
  "commission-max-rate": "0.200000000000000000",
  "commission-max-change-rate": "0.010000000000000000",
  "min-self-delegation": "1"
}
EOF

Create the Validator​

Run the following command to create the validator:

pocketd tx staking create-validator ./validator.json --from=validator $TX_PARAM_FLAGS [$BETA_NODE_FLAGS]

Verify the Validator Status​

Verify the status of your validator by running:

pocketd query staking validator $VALIDATOR_ADDR [$BETA_NODE_FLAGS]