Topic: [Guide] Futurebit Apollo BTC Custom Linux Install - Node (Read 475 times)

Here is how to create RPC credentials:

It will output a hash that you want to store (e.g. in a text file) for the very last step. You can trash that afterwards.

Then delete shell history:

Finally add this line to the Bitcoin configuration file (in your case at /root/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf)

After these changes, reboot Apollo and cross fingers
You should be able to access bitcoin-cli from any user now, as long as you specify -rpcuser= -rpcpassword=.

Lightning will need to know those parameters as well, though.
Add to lightningd.conf and reboot again:

Ran it, here is the result 

error: Could not locate RPC credentials. No authentication cookie could be found, and RPC password is not set.  See -rpcpassword and -stdinrpcpass.  Configuration file: (/root/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf)

No, no, that all looks good. It just means Bitcoin Core is running as a different user. I get that when running bitcoin-cli as a different user than the actual Bitcoin Core bitcoind daemon.

I seriously hope it isn't the case, but it is possible that on default Futurebit OS, Core runs as root. To verify, try sudo bitcoin-cli getinfo.

If my suspicion holds true, you would need to create RPC credentials like the error message suggests.

Hi N0nce,

I followed the steps you outlined to install bitcoin-cli.  Doesn't appear to have worked, unfortunately.  I am getting the same error after installation in the debug file and when I ran bitcoin-cli echo 'hello world', I got the following:

error: Could not locate RPC credentials. No authentication cookie could be found, and RPC password is not set.  See -rpcpassword and -stdinrpcpass.  Configuration file: (/home/futurebit/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf)

I'm thinking I don't actually have bitcoin-cli installed as when I entered the command sudo install -m 0755 -o root -g root -t /usr/local/bin bin/bitcoin-cli, the command line simply reloaded to the base user and nothing was communicated about installation.  I tried tweaking your instructions so that I was in the folder with bitcoin-cli:

cd /home/futurebit/bitcoin-23.0/bin
sudo install bitcoin-cli

But I got the following error about suffixes, unsure of which one to use after reviewing the help install --help text (if this alternative would even work for installing bitcoin-cli):

install: missing destination file operand after 'bitcoin-cli'
Try 'install --help' for more information

Just reading; such logs are plain English and tell you exactly what's going on.
Some logs prepend a short label like 'INFO', 'DEBUG', 'ERROR' to allow people to scan it more quickly.

Errors are usually towards the end (because they cause the binary to exit); therefore I recommended the tail command.
In this case, the error is: bitcoin-cli not found.

I don't understand why FuturebitOS ships without bitcoin-cli. It's a small utility to interact with Bitcoin Core (bitcoind). Sure; it's not strictly needed for Futurebit, since they use RPC directly, but it's such a small binary that they might as well leave it in and prevent users such headache.

You could download the latest build and install bitcoin-cli from there:

Like the log file states, you can verify if it worked like this:

If it exits without errors and echoes back 'hello world', Lightning should start up as well.

Hi N0nce,
I ran the debug and this was the following result:

2022-11-16T09:06:37.986Z DEBUG   lightningd: Opened log file /home/futurebit/.lightning/debug.log
2022-11-16T09:06:37.986Z DEBUG   lightningd: Opened log file /home/futurebit/.lightning/debug.log
2022-11-16T09:06:38.003Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204939) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/autoclean
2022-11-16T09:06:38.018Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204940) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/bcli
2022-11-16T09:06:38.030Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204941) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/fetchinvoice
2022-11-16T09:06:38.047Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204942) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/funder
2022-11-16T09:06:38.060Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204943) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/topology
2022-11-16T09:06:38.076Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204944) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/keysend
2022-11-16T09:06:38.090Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204945) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/offers
2022-11-16T09:06:38.106Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204946) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/pay
2022-11-16T09:06:38.120Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204947) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/txprepare
2022-11-16T09:06:38.134Z DEBUG   plugin-manager: started(2204948) /usr/local/bin/../libexec/c-lightning/plugins/spenderp
2022-11-16T09:06:38.154Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_channeld
2022-11-16T09:06:38.163Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_closingd
2022-11-16T09:06:38.172Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_connectd
2022-11-16T09:06:38.183Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_gossipd
2022-11-16T09:06:38.192Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_hsmd
2022-11-16T09:06:38.199Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_onchaind
2022-11-16T09:06:38.206Z DEBUG   lightningd: testing /usr/local/libexec/c-lightning/lightning_openingd
2022-11-16T09:06:38.214Z DEBUG   hsmd: pid 2204956, msgfd 39
2022-11-16T09:06:38.271Z DEBUG   connectd: pid 2204957, msgfd 43
2022-11-16T09:06:38.272Z DEBUG   hsmd: new_client: 0
2022-11-16T09:06:38.275Z DEBUG   connectd: Proxy address: 127.0.0.1:9050
2022-11-16T09:06:38.275Z DEBUG   connectd: Created listener on 127.0.0.1:9735
2022-11-16T09:06:38.275Z DEBUG   connectd: REPLY WIRE_CONNECTD_INIT_REPLY with 0 fds
2022-11-16T09:06:38.275Z DEBUG   connectd: connectd_init_done
2022-11-16T09:06:38.300Z **BROKEN** plugin-bcli: \nbitcoin-cli not found. Is bitcoin-cli (part of Bitcoin Core) available in your PATH?\n\nMake sure you have bitcoind running and that bitcoin-cli is able to connect to bitcoind.\n\nYou can verify that your Bitcoin Core installation is ready for use by running:\n\n    $ bitcoin-cli echo 'hello world'\n
2022-11-16T09:06:38.301Z INFO    plugin-bcli: Killing plugin: exited before we sent init


>> i'm not really certain how to read the results, but if it helps for your troubleshooting thought I'd send it over.  Really appreciate working through this, learning a lot regardless

Alas, I'm giving it my best shot here but I'm stuck with the following error message and resulting status info after going through the whole process again.  Made sure to double check my files and to use futurebit as the user instead of bitcoin:


sudo service lightningd start:
Job for lightningd.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status lightningd.service" and "journalctl -xe" for details.

systemctl status lightningd.service:
● lightningd.service - C-Lightning daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/lightningd.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Wed 2022-11-16 01:06:38 PST; 1min 24s ago
    Process: 2204936 ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/lightningd --daemon --conf /home/futurebit/.lightning/bitcoin/lightningd.conf (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)

Nov 16 01:06:38 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Scheduled restart job, restart counter is at 5.
Nov 16 01:06:38 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: Stopped C-Lightning daemon.
Nov 16 01:06:38 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Start request repeated too quickly.
Nov 16 01:06:38 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Nov 16 01:06:38 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: Failed to start C-Lightning daemon.

I think I might just be in over my head.  I'll probably give it another try to implement on my futurebit after learning some more about working in linux.  Thanks again for your help N0nce and for putting together the guide.  And if any other troubleshooting ideas come to mind, let me know I'll give it a go.

You shouldn't modify the debug file (doesn't hurt if you try, just won't do anything); it's made for you to look at and identify a possible issue.
That's why I recommended to output its contents with cat; but probably, tail -100 debug.log would be a better idea; no need to output the whole file.

No worries; I'd love for people to get Core Lightning and Electrum on their Apollos, even if they don't want to replace the base OS! Troubleshooting in forum threads can help future readers as well.

Hi N0nce,
I did notice the difference in the guide between creating the 'bitcoin' user.  I believe I accounted for that in following the guide step by step and just used the futurebit user where necessary.  I just tried briefly to make the update you suggested to the debug file, however it is still not working.  I'll need to dive in a bit more tonight once my kid is asleep, maybe try again from scratch.  Thanks again for your help with a noobie like myself trying to fully utilize my apollo

Did you do this as root? I.e. sudo systemctl daemon-reload?

Oh, also I should mention to replace bitcoin user with futurebit's default user, unless you created the bitcoin user yourself..
If you don't have the bitcoin user, this command should have failed, though: su - bitcoin.

Also make sure to cat /home/bitcoin/.lightning/debug.log to check if Core Lightning has an issue.
Of course, if you didn't install it under the bitcoin user, but e.g. futurebit-user (not sure about the default futurebit username right now), the path would be: /home/futurebit-user/.lightning/debug.log

Ya I see that..

I tried removing entirely as you suggested.  I am getting this error now:

Warning: The unit file, source configuration file or drop-ins of lightningd.service changed on disk. Run 'systemctl daemon-reload' to reload units.
Job for lightningd.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status lightningd.service" and "journalctl -xe" for details.

>>I executed system systemctl daemon-reload and tried again but got the same error.  Here is the system ctl status:


● lightningd.service - C-Lightning daemon
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/lightningd.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Mon 2022-11-14 15:26:49 PST; 28s ago
    Process: 1043529 ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/lightningd --daemon --conf /home/bitcoin/.lightning/bitcoin/lightningd.conf (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)

Nov 14 15:26:49 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Scheduled restart job, restart counter is at 5.
Nov 14 15:26:49 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: Stopped C-Lightning daemon.
Nov 14 15:26:49 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Start request repeated too quickly.
Nov 14 15:26:49 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: lightningd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Nov 14 15:26:49 futurebitbtc systemd[1]: Failed to start C-Lightning daemon.

Thanks so much for your help, please don't hesitate to let this be at any moment as it is totally possible I screwed something up that you can't see in the instructions you provided.  I will take no offense to that. Cheers!

That's odd; it should exist: https://github.com/jstefanop/apolloapi/blob/master/scripts/apollo.service

However, try just deleting that line completely and see if it works that way. Might be fine.
Worst-case, Lightning won't start after a reboot and you'll have to execute sudo service lightningd restart manually.

Hi n0nce,

Thanks for the quick reply.  I tried just now to update and replace bitcoind.service with apollo.service.  Seems to be a similar issue, I got the following message:

Failed to start lightningd.service: Unit apollo.service not found

Very welcome! Indeed, it seems that 'Apollo OS' doesn't use a Systemd service to start up Bitcoin Core, and instead starts it headless using screen. 

I found this magnificent piece of shellcode in the latest image.. *sigh*.

I'd probably just take out the Requires=bitcoind.service line completely and replace it with Requires=apollo.service; it should work.

Hi N0nce,
Thanks so much for this guide.  I thought I'd give it a go on my futurebit apollo ( I did not flash a custom install of linux ; I am using futurebit's latest OS).  I am pretty new to linux and working with it, but I thought I did a decent job getting through the steps you outlined.  However, I got to the point where I did: sudo service lightningd start, and I got the following message: Failed to start lightningd.service: Unit bitcoind.service not found

Any ideas or help you can provide would be greatly appreciated, would love to dive into lightning.  Thanks again I see you posting all the time and find you to be very helpful to the community.

Hey, thanks for chiming in! I linked both guides to the common 'base' guide on top of which either (or both) of the guides can be applied. Maybe the hyperlink is too small, but it's there.


I am pretty sure Armbian has SELinux disabled by default.

Honestly, I would have preferred something a little 'more enterprise' like openSUSE (or CentOS, why not) - however availability of compiled operating systems for this SBC is severely limited. I could have compiled something myself, but these guides are aimed at people who bought the device as an 'all in one solution' (as I mentioned, it was advertised like that), but who to this day can only run Bitcoin Core without Electrum or Lightning on it (so rather useless besides 'help the network').

I am not sure which distro your guide is based on (same goes for the Miner thread), but if it's one that has SELinux enabled such as CentOS, you might want to turn that off to avoid arbitrary crashes from ill-understood "policy violations".
(run as root)

Reserved

Reserved

Core Lightning
[1] Install dependencies

[2] Create another Tor hidden service for C-Lightning. Similar procedure as before.

[3] Below the other hidden service, add this info for Lightning.

[4] Then restart Tor and retrieve the new v3 Tor hostname for your Lightning installation. Copy it somewhere so you have it handy in step 7.

[5] Log into bitcoin user and download + build Lightning. v0.11.1 is the currently latest version.

[6] Create Lightning config.

[7] Enter the following. Alias can be chosen at will! Replace onion_address_you_got with the hidden service hostname you got in step 4!

[8] Log back out of the unprivileged bitcoin account to install Lightning and create the service.

[9] In the service file, we need the following contents.

[10] Start the Lightning service

[11] To check if it's running, we can use the lightning-cli command as bitcoin user with any of its parameters.