VMware Blockchain Four Node One Client Sample Deployment With Logging

The sample VMware Blockchain for Ethereum deployment includes a set of Helm charts for four Replica nodes and one Client node. The deployment on Kubernetes must only be on a supported host with a single cluster.

Replica nodes are the participants in the consensus algorithm, concord-bft. Client nodes are the clients in the blockchain network running ethrpc.

The current sample deployment has been tested on the following components:

• Minikube with VirtualBox, Hyperkit and Docker drivers

Prerequisites

Make sure that you implement all the required prerequisites. See Deployment Prerequisites.

ELK Setup

Install Elasticsearch, Logstash and Kibana

• Add helm repo if not already added

  helm repo add elastic https://helm.elastic.co
  helm repo add prometheus-community https://prometheus-community.github.io/helm-charts
  helm repo update
  

• Install Elasticsearch

  cat <<ELASTICSEARCH | helm install elasticsearch elastic/elasticsearch --version 7.17.3 -f -
  antiAffinity: "soft"
  esJavaOpts: "-Xmx256m -Xms256m"
  resources:
    requests:
     cpu: "100m"
     memory: "1024M"
    limits:
     cpu: "1000m"
     memory: "1024M"
  volumeClaimTemplate:
    storageClassName: "standard"
    resources:
      requests:
       storage: "200M"
  ELASTICSEARCH
  

• Install Kibana

  cat <<KIBANA | helm install kibana elastic/kibana --version 7.17.3 -f -
  KIBANA
  

• Install logstash

  cat <<LOGSTASH | helm install logstash elastic/logstash --version 7.17.3 -f -
  persistence:
    enabled: true
  logstashConfig:
    logstash.yml: |
      http.host: 0.0.0.0
      xpack.monitoring.enabled: false
  logstashPipeline:
    vmbc.conf: | 
      input {
         http {
           id => "vmbc-logs"
         }
      }
      filter {
         split {
         }
         json {
           source => "message"
         }
         date {
           match => [ "logtime", "yyyy-MM-dd'T'HH:mm:ss','SSS','Z", "yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss','SSS" ]
         }
         mutate {
           remove_field => [ "host", "headers", "logtime" ]
         }
      }
      output {
         elasticsearch {
           hosts => [ "elasticsearch-master.default.svc.cluster.local:9200" ]
           data_stream => "true"
         }
      }
  service:
    type: ClusterIP
    ports:
       - name: http
         port: 8080
         protocol: TCP
         targetPort: 8080
  LOGSTASH
  

VMware Blockchain four node one client deployment

The below section explains how to install VMware Blockchain four node one client deployment on minikube.

Quick Start

Deploy

helm install <name of blockchain> . --set global.imageCredentials.registry=<registry address> --set global.imageCredentials.username=<username> --set global.imageCredentials.password=<password>i

Note that it may take upto 5 mins for the blockchain to be operational the first time it's deployed. Please wait for 5 mins or until you see client_id=8 is serving - the pool is ready in the vmbc-deployment-client-0-clientservice-xxx-yyy pod logs.

Test

• Get ethrpc endpoint

  minikube service list
  

  Note: If you don't see a URL using the above command then try minikube service client-0-ethrpc

• Run ethrpc curl

  curl -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -H "Accept: application/json" -d '{"id": 1, "jsonrpc": "2.0", "method": "eth_getBlockByNumber", "params": ["0x00", true]}' <ethrpc url from above>
  

  You should see a sample output similar to below

  {"id":1,"jsonrpc":"2.0","method":"eth_getBlockByNumber","result":{"extraData":"0x","gasLimit":"0x7fffffffffffffff","gasUsed":"0x0","hash":"0x92e4414494ec1b4752faea0d80e79f618d447743f32eff4153c5e391be1d1a88","miner":"0x52a06a6cBEF9543244C530F52b602712FE5dfb74","nonce":"0x0000000000000000","number":"0x0","parentHash":"0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000","size":1,"stateRoot":"0xc5d2460186f7233c927e7db2dcc703c0e500b653ca82273b7bfad8045d85a470","timestamp":"0x1669680399","transactions":[{"blockHash":"0x92e4414494ec1b4752faea0d80e79f618d447743f32eff4153c5e391be1d1a88","blockNumber":"0x0","contractAddress":"0x","from":"0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000","gas":"0x0","gasPrice":0,"hash":"0x77f5bd9e7dbe2c2772f58f53431dfdfa205991ec4ff0b2bc385adecefd8895be","input":"0x","logs":[],"nonce":"0x0","to":"0xfb389874fb4e03182a7358275eaf78008775c7ed","transactionIndex":"0x0","value":"0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000007fffffffffffffff"}]}}
  

See Troubleshooting for any errors.

View logs in Kibana

• Open a port-forward to Kibana

  kubectl port-forward svc/kibana-kibana 5601:5601
  

• Open the following page to see logs http://localhost:5601/app/discover#
• On first open, it will ask to create an index.
• Click on "Create index pattern"
• Type logs-generic-default* in the Name field and select the @timestamp field from the Timestamp field drop down. If you don't see logs-generic-default, wait a few minutes for the index to be created after a blockchain has been deployed. If you haven't deployed a blockchain yet, then you will have to return to this page after the blockchain is deployed. The index is automatically created when the first blockchain is deployed.
• After you click Create index pattern on the page above, you should see a page to customize the index fields. You can leave this page as is as the defaults are fine.
• Now you can search and view logs on this page: http://localhost:5601/app/discover#. You can filter logs based on blockhain ID, service name etc.

Uninstall

Uninstall Blockchain

helm uninstall <name of blockchain>

Uninstall ELK

helm delete elasticsearch 
helm delete logstash
helm delete kibana

Detailed configurations for customization

• Configurations List of available configurations in values.yaml. Use "--set" param for setting up the params.

Name	Description	Value	Type
global.imageCredentials.registry	Container registry for image downloads	""	Mandatory
global.imageCredentials.username	Username to access/download for registry	""	Mandatory
global.imageCredentials.password	Password to access/download for registry	""	Mandatory
global.storageClass	Storage class for deployment	standard	Optional
global.ethPermissioningWriteEnabled	eth write permission enabled	false	Optional
global.ethPermissioningReadEnabled	eth read permission enabled	false	Optional
logManagement.endpoint_1.url	logstash endpoint url	http://logstash-logstash.default.svc.cluster.local	Optional
logManagement.endpoint_1.username	logstash setup username	""	Optional
logManagement.endpoint_1.password	logstash setup port	""	Optional
genesisBlock.timestamp	blockchain creation time in UTC, 24 hours format - YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm:ss	2022-12-02 00:01:00	Optional

Troubleshooting

The most common problems and errors are addressed with probable solutions to troubleshoot the problem. See, Troubleshooting.