Lighthouse
Overview
Official Links
Documentation
1. Initial configuration
Create a service user for the consensus service, create data directory and assign ownership.
sudo adduser --system --no-create-home --group consensus
sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/lighthouse
sudo chown -R consensus:consensus /var/lib/lighthouse
Install dependencies.
sudo apt install curl -y
sudo apt install jq -y
2. Install Binaries
Downloading binaries is often faster and more convenient.
Building from source code can offer better compatibility and is more aligned with the spirit of FOSS (free open source software).
3. Setup and configure systemd
Create a systemd unit file to define your consensus.service
configuration.
sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/consensus.service
Paste the following configuration into the file.
[Unit]
Description=Lighthouse Consensus Layer Client service for Goerli
Wants=network-online.target
After=network-online.target
Documentation=https://www.coincashew.com
[Service]
Type=simple
User=consensus
Group=consensus
Restart=on-failure
RestartSec=3
KillSignal=SIGINT
TimeoutStopSec=900
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/lighthouse bn \
--datadir /var/lib/lighthouse \
--network goerli \
--staking \
--validator-monitor-auto \
--metrics \
--checkpoint-sync-url=https://goerli.beaconstate.info \
--port 9000 \
--execution-endpoint http://127.0.0.1:8551 \
--execution-jwt /secrets/jwtsecret
[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
To exit and save, press Ctrl
+ X
, then Y
, then Enter
.
Run the following to enable auto-start at boot time.
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable consensus
Finally, start your consensus layer client and check it's status.
sudo systemctl start consensus
sudo systemctl status consensus
Press Ctrl
+ C
to exit the status.
Check your logs to confirm that the consensus client is up and syncing.
sudo journalctl -fu consensus | ccze
Press Ctrl
+ C
to exit the logs.
4. Helpful consensus client commands
sudo journalctl -fu consensus | ccze
Example of Synced Lighthouse Consensus Client Logs
Feb 03 01:02:36.000 INFO New block received root: 0xb5ccb2f85d981ca9e1c0d904f967403ddf8c47532c195fe213c94a28ffaf6a2e, slot: 2138
Feb 03 01:02:42.000 INFO Synced slot: 2138, block: 0x1cb281a, epoch: 121, finalized_epoch: 120, finalized_root: 0x1dce0, exec_hash: 0x6827aeb (verified), peers: 50, service: slot_notifier
Now that your consensus client is configured and started, you have a full node.
Proceed to the next step on setting up your validator client, which turns a full node into a staking node.