Matrix recently launched public testing of it’s blockchain by allowing users to test using test net tokens. With the release of the new MAC node setup guidelines, I thought I’d take the chance to test out the network a bit and deploy a node.

Staking the Necessary $MAN

So the first thing you need to do before you attempt to deploy a node is ensure that you have the necessary 10,000 or 100,000 tokens for a miner and verification node respectively, and ensure that you have the keystore file for that wallet.

If you have enough tokens the first step is to stake the testnet tokens through Matrix’s online wallet. This is an easy enough process, all you have to do is enter the amount of testnet $man you want to stake, enter the deposit node address(this is basically the wallet address where the rewards will go) and then press submit.

Priming Our Computer

After completing this step, its time to deploy the masternode. I had already downloaded the package from the matrix website so all I had to do was open up a terminal window and ensure that I was in the gman (mac) folder.

Once we’re in the gman folder, we have to enter/copy this command into the terminal window.

./gman --datadir ./chaindata/ init ./MANGenesis.json

It looks something like this once you’ve copied and pressed enter.

This was the priming process, once this is done there should be a “keystore” folder located in the “chaindata” folder. Remember that keystore file I mentioned you needed to have, copy it to this folder.

Configuring the signAccount

Now we have to configure the signAccount, we can see from the image above that there is a signAccount.txt file located in the gman (MAC) folder.

When we open that file there should be a string of code, with values left empty for the Address and Password. All we have to do now is enter our wallet address and password within the parenthesis as below.

Once we’ve entered our address and password we have to change the extension from .txt to .json and save the file.

Generating a Password

Next step is generating a password, this is super simple and all you need to do is enter/copy the following command into terminal:

./gman --datadir ./chaindata aes --aesin ./signAccount.json --aesout entrust.json

Entering password is straight forward, but you just have to make sure that you type carefully as you wont be able to see the characters. You also have to make sure your password is at least eight digits and contains both upper and lower case characters, numbers and a special character.

Once you’ve typed your password and pressed enter, the terminal window should look similar to this.

Deploying the Masternode

So that’s our master node all set up but now we’ve gotta run it.

All we do is copy this string into a word processing software, and make sure that we replace the bold string with our wallet address.

/gman --datadir ./chaindata --networkid 1 --debug --verbosity 5 –manAddress MAN.2skXxxxXxxxXxXXXxxXXxx8B3NgxX --entrust ./entrust.json --gcmode archive --outputinfo 1 --syncmode full

When this command is entered, you will be prompted to enter the password you setup earlier.

After successfully entering your password your node should be up and running, the terminal window will look like the screen below, but make sure you keep that running as closing it will shut off your node.

Interacting With the Masternode

If you’d like to check the status of your node, all you do is open up a new terminal window, make sure you’re in the gman (MAC) folder and enter the following command.

./gman attach ./chaindata/gman.ipc

This should open up the Gman JavaScript console where you will be able to interact with your node. To view a list of all available commands just enter “man”

To interact with the node, for example if we wanted to view the block number we enter:

man.blockNumber

This displays the information as follows:

Closing Thoughts

Overall setting up the node is a very straight forward and simple procedure, infact it should take you under 20 or 30 minutes to get it up and running, and this is ofcourse being dilligent and ensuring you don’t run into any errors while setting up the node. The deployment guides provided ensure that you will have all the information and instructions necessary so it does take the pressure off completely.

Eventhough a familiarity with terminal/command prompt windows could come in handy, I think that even someone new to using terminal could set up a node easily.