From e11d88e0783e1973f231f37b07d0b18ec9fe9834 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: FIRSTNAME LASTNAME <USERNAME@COMPANY.COM>
Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2017 21:10:50 -0800
Subject: [PATCH] Initial notes on 'Installing a PRUNED Bitcoin Node on a VPS'
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-# Learning Bitcoin from the Command-Line
+# Learning Bitcoin from the Command-Line #
+
+> NOTE: This is a draft in progress, so that I can get some feedback from early reviewers. It is not yet ready for learning.
+
+The best way to learn to learn deeply about bitcoin is to avoid GUIs (even bitcoin-qt), and instead learn it from the command line. This tutorial assumes that you have some minimal background of how to use a command line. If not, there are many tutorials available, and I have one for Mac users at https://github.com/ChristopherA/intro-mac-command-line
+
+## Installing a PRUNED Bitcoin Node on a VPS ##
+
+A pruned bitcoin node is a full node (in particular, a pruned node is NOT an SPV node), but it is smaller as doesn’t have all the history.
+
+In addition, the bitcoin.conf settings suggested here will minimalize the initial and ongoing bandwidth requirements, allow a $5 a month VPS to be great for learning and testing with bitcoin.
+
+This info works with both Linode and Digital Ocean, so should work with more VPSs and local virtual machines.
+
+> NOTE: Don’t use a VPS for a bitcoin wallet with significant real funds— see http://blog.thestateofme.com/2012/03/03/lessons-to-be-learned-from-the-linode-bitcoin-incident/ — it is just very nice to be able experiment with real bitcoin transactions on a live full node without tying up a self-hosted server on a home network. I’ve also found it useful to be able to use an iPhone or iPad to communicate via SSH to my VPS to do some simple bitcoin tasks.
+>
+
+If you don’t have a Linode or DG account, signup using these codes will give you roughly a month of free time.
+
+* Linode Referral Code: https://www.linode.com/?r=3c7fa15a78407c9a3d4aefb027539db2557b3765
+* Digital Ocean: http://www.digitalocean.com/?refcode=a6060686b88a
+
+I slightly prefer Linode, because there is a scripting capability called a "StackScript" for creating VPS'es that I plan to use to automate some of these installation functions.
+
+> IMPORTANT: First, you’ll should to copy the httpS URL for most recent bitcoin linux distribution from https://bitcoin.org/en/download as well the most recently httpS URL for the signatures for that release, and you will need the URL for the bitcoin signing keys for versionpast v0.11.+ . I have included what they were as of writing this tutorial, but you should not rely on them — always verify your bitcoin distribution!
+
+On the the VPS, create the minimal (~$5/m) VPS with Debian 8. Startup the VPS and use the IP address that your VPS dashboard shows you.
+
+```
+ssh root@162.243.130.224
+
+uname -a # Should be "Linux debian", and give distribution release "4.8.6-x86_64-linode78"
+lsb_release -a #Should report 8.6 or better (this script tested on debian 8.6)
+
+
+hostnamectl set-hostname bitcoincore-pruned.local # You may not need to do this on Digital Ocean
+
+nano /etc/hosts #add "127.0.0.1 bitcoincore-pruned.local" to hosts file.
+
+dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
+
+date # confirm that this shows your correct time zone
+
+# we should update debian to latest security fixes
+
+apt-get update; apt-get upgrade; apt-get dist-upgrade
+
+# keep debian updates
+echo "unattended-upgrades unattended-upgrades/enable_auto_updates boolean true" | debconf-set-selections
+apt-get -y install unattended-upgrades
+
+# we need to update iptables to use bitcoin ports
+
+iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 22 -m conntrack --ctstate NEW,ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
+iptables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 8333 -j ACCEPT
+iptables -A INPUT -m conntrack --ctstate ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
+iptables -A INPUT -i lo -j ACCEPT
+iptables -P INPUT DROP
+iptables -P FORWARD DROP
+
+ip6tables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 22 -m conntrack --ctstate NEW,ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
+ip6tables -A INPUT -p tcp --dport 8333 -j ACCEPT
+ip6tables -A INPUT -m conntrack --ctstate ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
+ip6tables -A INPUT -i lo -j ACCEPT
+ip6tables -P INPUT DROP
+ip6tables -P FORWARD DROP
+
+echo "iptables-persistent iptables-persistent/autosave_v4 boolean true" | debconf-set-selections
+echo "iptables-persistent iptables-persistent/autosave_v6 boolean true" | debconf-set-selections
+apt-get -y install iptables-persistent
+
+adduser user1
+
+adduser user1 sudo
+
+reboot
+
+ssh user1@162.243.130.224
+
+sudo apt-get install rng-tools # Installs random number tools — otherwise gpg will not have enough randomness on a VPS
+
+sudo /usr/sbin/rngd -r /dev/urandom # Initialize randomness pool
+gpg --gen-key # create a key for this VPS (I don't the name of this machine as the email address — all other questions I press return
+ #TODO: I'm not absolutely sure that we need to do this — it is only required for fully qualified --verify if an --lsign is done of the import.
+
+# get current values for these URLs from https://bitcoin.org/en/download — make sure that they are HTTPS not HTTP urls.
+
+wget https://bitcoin.org/bin/bitcoin-core-0.13.2/bitcoin-0.13.2-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz
+wget https://bitcoin.org/bin/bitcoin-core-0.13.2/SHA256SUMS.asc
+wget https://bitcoin.org/laanwj-releases.asc
+ ## TODO: validate the release key, for instance, it is the same as in the keyserver i.e. gpg --recv-keys 0x01EA5486DE18A882D4C2684590C8019E36C2E964
+gpg --import laanwj-releases.asc
+ gpg --list-keys
+ gpg --lsign 36C2E964 # laanwj's bitcoin release key just imported ##
+gpg --verify SHA256SUMS.asc
+# You should see a 'good signature', for example:
+# gpg: Signature made Tue 03 Jan 2017 12:20:59 AM PST using RSA key ID 36C2E964
+# gpg: Good signature from "Wladimir J. van der Laan (Bitcoin Core binary release signing key) <laanwj@gmail.com>"
+
+cat SHA256SUMS.asc
+sha256sum bitcoin-0.13.2-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz
+# SHA256 hashes should match
+
+tar xzf bitcoin-0.13.2-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz
+sudo install -m 0755 -o root -g root -t /usr/local/bin bitcoin-0.13.2/bin/*
+rm bitcoin-0.13.2-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz
+rm -rf bitcoin-0.13.2/
+
+mkdir ~/.bitcoin
+echo -e "server=1\npar=1\nblocksonly=1\nprune=550\nmaxuploadtarget=137\nmaxconnections=16\nrpcuser=bitcoinrpc\nrpcpassword=$(xxd -l 16 -p /dev/urandom)" > ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf
+chmod 600 ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf
+more ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf
+
+bitcoind -daemon #start bitcoin
+
+```
+Note: it may take up to several minutes for Bitcoin Core to start, during which it will display the following message whenever you use bitcoin-cli:
+ `error: {"code":-28,"message":"Verifying blocks..."}`
+
+Also useful is this command, the same number (your local getblockcount = the remote blockchain.info's getblockcount) then your pruned node is ready (about a day).
+
+```
+echo `bitcoin-cli getblockcount 2>&1`/`wget -O - http://blockchain.info/q/getblockcount 2>/dev/null`
+```
+
+### Useful aliases to add to .bash_profile
+
+```
+alias btcdir="cd ~/.bitcoin/" #linux default bitcoind path
+ # alias btcdir="cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Bitcoin/" #mac default bitcoind path
+alias bc="bitcoin-cli"
+alias bd="bitcoind"
+alias btcinfo='bitcoin-cli getinfo | egrep "\"version\"|balance|blocks|connections|errors"'
+alias btcblock="echo `bitcoin-cli getblockcount 2>&1`/`wget -O - http://blockchain.info/q/getblockcount 2>/dev/null`"
+```
+
+### Useful commands
+
+```
+bc help
+bc getblockchaininfo
+bc getnetworkinfo
+bc getnettotals
+bc getwalletinfo
+bc stop
+```
+
+
+### Some tutorials once you've got bitcoin installed and up-to-date
+
+- Bitcoin.org's developer examples https://bitcoin.org/en/developer-examples#transactions
+- Jonas Nick's "How to Run a Bitcoin Node" https://github.com/jonasnick/bitcoin-node
+- David DeRosa's "A Developer Oriented Series about Bitcoin" http://davidederosa.com/basic-blockchain-programming/
+
+Videos
+
+- Bitcoin JSON-RPC Tutorial 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygNit44dQHA
+- Bitcoin JSON-RPC Tutorial 2 - VPS Setup https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygNit44dQHA
+- Bitcoin JSON-RPC Tutorial 3 - bitcoin.conf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W54aRszkEOI&t=65s
+- Bitcoin JSON-RPC Tutorial 4 - Command Line Interface https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmdYD7vutTI
+- Bitcoin JSON-RPC Tutorial 5 - Your First Calls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARL_PvDEBtU
+
+
+