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Deploy Mainnet Staking Pool

Deploying a node on mainnet is similar to deploying one on testnet and requires the following steps:

  1. Create mainnet wallet.
  2. Build mainnet validator node daemon.
  3. Initialize the node.
  4. Deploy mainnet staking pool.
  5. Run the validator node.

1. Create mainnet wallet​

If you don’t have a NEAR account, first go to NEAR Wallet and create one.

2. Build mainnet validator node daemon​

To build the validator first clone the nearcore repository:

git clone https://github.com/near/nearcore.git

Once that’s done, figure out the most recent stable release. Stable releases are ones without -rc.<number> suffix (‘rc’ stands for ‘release candidate’). This can be done automatically as follows:

NEAR_RELEASE_VERSION=$(curl -s https://github.com/near/nearcore/releases/latest |
                       tr '/" ' '\n' | grep "[0-9]\.[0-9]*\.[0-9]" | head -n 1)

Now, go to the cloned repository’s root directory and checkout the code corresponding to the latest stable release:

cd nearcore
git checkout "refs/heads/${NEAR_RELEASE_VERSION:?}"

Finally, build the executable using make. Note that building with cargo build --release command is not sufficient to create fully optimized executable:

make neard

3. Initialize the node​

Once the daemon executable is built it’s time to initialize the node.

./target/release/neard init --chain-id=mainnet \
                            --account-id="<POOL_ID>.poolv1.near"

<POOL_ID> is the name you want to use for your staking pool. Note that at this point the <POOL_ID>.poolv1.near account doesn’t yet exist. We’re going to create it in the next step.

This command will create a ~/.near/validator_key.json file which will contain validator’s private key. It’s a good idea to back this file up in a secure location. For now, read the validator’s public key from this file:

grep public_key ~/.near/validator_key.json

4. Deploy mainnet Staking Pool​

You can deploy the staking pool with near-cli, using the near call command:

near call poolv1.near create_staking_pool '{
    "staking_pool_id": "<POOL_ID>",
    "owner_id": "<OWNER_ID>",
    "stake_public_key": "<VALIDATOR_KEY>",
    "reward_fee_fraction": {"numerator": <X>, "denominator": <Y>}
}' --account_id <OWNER_ID> --amount 30 --gas 300000000000000

It will invoke the staking-pool-factory method from NEAR Core Contracts, passing the following parameters:

  • poolv1.near is the staking pool factory,
  • <POOL_ID> is the name of your validator (and the staking pool associated with it),
  • <OWNER_ID> is the wallet that controls the pool (see owner-only methods for more information),
  • <VALIDATOR_KEY> is the validator node public key read in the previous step from the ~/.near/validator_key.json file,
  • {"numerator": <X>, "denominator": <Y>} sets the validator fees (for exampleX=10 and Y=100 means 10%),
  • --amount 30 attaches 30 $NEAR to the transaction to pay the contract storage,
  • --gas 300000000000000 specifies the amount of gas for the transaction (optional).

Note that if your <POOL_ID> is ‘buildlinks’, the staking pool factory will deploy a contract called ‘buildlinks.poolv1.near’, and your node will appear in the Explorer as ‘buildlinks.poolv1.near’. This corresponds to the account identifier used in the previous step.

5. Run the validator node​

Once the daemon is built, node is initialized and staking pool created, the validator can be started. To make sure the node has been set up correctly, check that the configuration file located at ~/.near/config.json is the same as this mainnet config.json:

sha1sum <~/.near/config.json
curl -s https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/build.nearprotocol.com/nearcore-deploy/mainnet/validator/config.json | sha1sum

If everything is in order, start your node with the following command:

./target/release/neard run

You can start your node without the JSON RPC endpoint by running the above command with an additional --disable-rpc flag. This reduces resource use and attack vector by closing a listening port.

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