How to install grin on Ubuntu Server from scratch

Tech Support
1

Say you have a fresh new install of Ubuntu Server, the regular edition not core, what are all the commands you run to prepare for and install a precompiled binary from the main Mimblewimble Releases section on github?

This is a dupe thread of a previous on I made but I’m still stuck on this digging through old notes and guides that I thought should still work.

So new brainstorming thread. At a bare minimum to say that there is still a pulse in this community we have got to be able to at least figure this out.

I’ll be back with what I have from the old notes.

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@Yeastplume @tromp notifying you just in case you’ve done this any time recently.

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wget grin node bin, then create separate user (grin in my case) to create systemd service
sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/grin-main.service:

[Unit]
Description=Grin Mainnet node
After=network.target

[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/home/grin
User=grin
Group=users
#PrivateDevices=yes
#Type=simple
ExecReload="/bin/kill -HUP $MAINPID"
KillMode=mixed
KillSignal=SIGTERM
TimeoutStopSec=60
ExecStart=/home/grin/grin server run
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=30

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
Alias=grin-main.service

then start and enable service to launch it on system boot:
sudo service grin-main start/enable

3 Likes
4

How to run grin as a service information can also be found in the docs/wiki:

1 Like
5

For a fresh linux server it is pretty simple - you do not need any extra packages for pre-compiled grin-node and wallet. Just download sources from grin.mw github Repo:

wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/releases/latest/download/grin-$VERSION-linux-amd64.tar.gz
wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin-wallet/releases/latest/download/grin-wallet-$VERSION-linux-amd64.tar.gz

Then extract bin:

sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-$VERSION-linux-amd64.tar.gz --strip-components=1
sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-wallet-$VERSION-linux-amd64.tar.gz --strip-components=1

Note if you have downloaded it in the root folder you do not need the strip-components arguments.

Then just run the node and wait 3-4 hours for sync:

grin

Meanwhile you can init your wallet:

grin-wallet init

Then open the ports for wallet listener grin-node, startum and API:

ufw allow 3413
ufw allow 3414
ufw allow 3415
ufw allow 3416

If you want to mine go into folder ./grin/main. Open server config-File:

nano grin-server.toml

There you can enalbe stratum server. Note for mining you have also to enable the grin-wallet listener:

grin-wallet listen

For better xp on linux server start grin and the wallet listener with screen. Then the process does not terminate when you close ssh-session.

Have fun mate.

4 Likes
6

While we’re showering you with options, here is another. A simple ansible playbook. Just pop in your host/group and the SHA-512 hash of your desired password for the grin user and it’ll land grin and grin-wallet in the home folder. I monitor my solo mining so I run a mix of tmux and screen to keep my nodes quick to pull up and monitor.

1 Like
7

This was my regular process before and it’s not working for me now with the current release.

wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/releases/latest/download/grin-v5.3.3_rebuild-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-v5.3.3_rebuild-linux-x86_64.tar.gz --strip-components=1
grin

^ Does not work

wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/releases/download/v5.2.0-beta.3/grin-v5.2.0-beta.3-linux-amd64.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-v5.2.0-beta.3-linux-amd64.tar.gz --strip-components=1
grin

^ Works

So I vaguely assume that the “tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf” process is somehow supposed to register “grin” as a program that can be run from any context on the system, such as when I run it as my user account from my home directory. And if that’s true then this registration seems to be broken in the latest version.

@Yeastplume I’ll try to open a github issue for this unless you stop me here.

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If I first run:

wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/releases/download/v5.2.0-beta.3/grin-v5.2.0-beta.3-linux-amd64.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-v5.2.0-beta.3-linux-amd64.tar.gz --strip-components=1
grin

wget https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/releases/latest/download/grin-v5.3.3_rebuild-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local/bin -xzf grin-v5.3.3_rebuild-linux-x86_64.tar.gz --strip-components=1
grin

The grin window that launches still shows 5.2.0-beta.3 as the running version. So it doesn’t seem like tar extracting the new one over the top of a working old one does the trick either.

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Had the same issues with the latest version and picked like you the previous one.

1 Like
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New archive doesn’t contain an upper level “grin” directory, so remove --strip-components option from your command.

2 Likes
11

This is it! Thank you.

12

I’m looking at my pre-existing grin servers with grin already running as a service, and it looks like I’m using a .service file there that just contains this:

[Unit]
Description=Grin Node Service
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/grin
Restart=always
User=user
Group=user

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

And then:

sudo systemctl enable grinnode.service
sudo systemctl start grinnode.service

Then to check running status:

curl -s --user grin:$(cat ~/.grin/main/.api_secret) -d '{"id":"1","method":"get_status","params":{}}' -o - http://127.0.0.1:3413/v2/owner

But this service file and process is not working for me now with current version grin installed. I may have messed something up in the attempts to install grin at the wrong folder level.

I see that there is a more complicated .service file example being recommended, but if I can get away with continuing to use the simple one I’d prefer to keep it.

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Probabaly you just have to check that the path still matches. Now you file says

Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/grin

If you do not have the grin folder, perhaps it should be.

Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/

Just check where you put the grin binary/executable and reference its top directory.

1 Like
14

Trying that now but I have /usr/local/bin/grin with grin being there directly as an executable, not a folder.

I don’t see the executable name elsewhere in the service config file, so I feel like it does need to be included in the execution path there.

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I am not sure how these service files work, maybe since you use the simple approach it requires a directory with a single executable? You can make it like before, create a grin folder move the grin executable there using mkdir and mv.