Howto: Compile Bitcoin 0.17.0rc3 with tor, ncurses2 on FreeNAS 11.2 iocage jail

[Bashern]

I keep a guide up to date here: https://github.com/seth586/guides/tree/master/FreeNAS

After fumbling around the internet, I've discovered that there are a ton of bitcoin node guides for linux, and virtually nothing for FreeBSD. This guide will get Bitcoin Core 0.17.0rc3 compiled from source (or anther release you choose) and running as a public and tor hidden service. This also includes instructions on installing ncurses2, a terminal user interface for your bitcoin node.

This should be a good starting point for your lnd, electrum, or btcpay servers.

I wrote a guide on medium, you can see it here. I'll make an abridged version here.

First of all, create your jail using the FreeNAS GUI. Give it a static lease and forward port 8333. SSH into your FreeNAS box.

iocage list
iocage console bitcoin_node

pkg install autoconf automake boost-libs git gmake libevent libtool openssl pkgconf wget nano tor


Go to https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/releases, find the tar.gz release we want to install. The latest release is 0.16.3 at https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/archive/v0.16.3.tar.gz

wget https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/archive/v0.16.3.tar.gz
tar xzvf v0.16.3.tar.gz
cd bitcoin-0.16.3
./autogen.sh
./configure --disable-wallet --without-gui --without-miniupnpc --disable-dependency-tracking
gmake
gmake install


This process may take a while. Once its done and installed, we need to add a service script and then call it on boot. FreeBSD ports maintains a service script we can use at https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd-ports/blob/master/net-p2p/bitcoin/files/bitcoind.in (click on the RAW link to get a direct link to the file)

cd /etc/rc.d/
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/freebsd/freebsd-ports/master/net-p2p/bitcoin/files/bitcoind.in
mv bitcoind.in bitcoind
chmod +x bitcoind
sysrc 'bitcoind_enable=yes'


Lets edit the startup script for our local environment:

nano bitcoind


The %%PREVIX%% variables need to be changed to local paths, and the users needs to be changed to _tor:

command="/usr/local/bin/bitcoind"
: ${bitcoind_user:="_tor"}
: ${bitcoind_group:="_tor"}
: ${bitcoind_config_file:="/root/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf"}


Lets make bitcoin's folders and configuration file:

mkdir /var/db/bitcoin
mkdir /root/.bitcoin
nano /root/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf


Add the collowing lines to bitcoin.conf:

datadir=/var/db/bitcoin
server=1
txindex=1


Configure Tor:

sysrc 'tor_enable=yes'
nano /usr/local/etc/tor/torrc


Add the following lines to tor’s configuration file:

ControlPort 9051
CookieAuthentication 1
CookieAuthFileGroupReadable 1


Restart your jail, and SSH back in. Check running processes. You should see bitcoind and tor running as uid "_tor":

ps auxww


Bitcoin-cli will reveal your tor address:

bitcoin-cli getnetworkinfo


And install ncurses2:

cd /root
pkg install py36-pip python3
git clone https://github.com/esotericnonsense/bitcoind-ncurses2
pip-3.6 install -r bitcoind-ncurses2/requirements.txt
python3 /root/bitcoind-ncurses2/main.py --datadir /var/db/bitcoin


Use CTRL+Z to suspend.

Enjoy! Please leave feedback and questions below! I'm a FreeBSD hobbyist, so I have no formal education, if something should be done better let me know!

Edit: 9/18/2018: version 0.17.0rc3 superseded by 0.16.3

 

[Bashern]

And here is my problem, I can't compile with wallet support (see flag --disable-wallet). The FreeBSD build guide on bitcoin's github explains how to install the berkeley db 4.8 dependancy, but it fails.

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/build-freebsd.md

I tried pkg install db48, but when I run the ./configure I get an error:

configure: error: libdb_cxx headers missing, Bitcoin Core requires this library for wallet functionality (--disable-wallet to disable wallet functionality)

So I tried the following to compile Berkeley Database 4.8:
wget 'http://download.oracle.com/berkeley-db/db-4.8.30.NC.tar.gz'
tar -xzvf db-4.8.30.NC.tar.gz
cd db-4.8.30.NC/build_unix/
../dist/configure --enable-cxx --disable-shared --with-pic --prefix=/home/theusername/bitcoin/db4/
make install


And I get the following error:

../dist/../dbinc/atomic.h:179:19: error: definition of builtin function '__atomic_compare_exchange'
static inline int __atomic_compare_exchange(
^
1 error generated.
*** Error code 1

Stop.
make: stopped in /db-4.8.30.NC/build_unix



 

[8-bit Yoda]

The following compiled for me...

Code:

pkg install autoconf automake boost-libs git gmake libevent libtool openssl pkgconf wget nano tor
git clone https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin
cd bitcoin
sh
./autogen.sh
./contrib/install_db4.sh `pwd`
export BDB_PREFIX='/root/bitcoin/db4'
./configure BDB_LIBS="-L${BDB_PREFIX}/lib -ldb_cxx-4.8" BDB_CFLAGS="-I${BDB_PREFIX}/include" --without-gui --without-miniupnpc --disable-dependency-tracking
gmake
gmake install

...but I have no clue how to test it.

 

[Bashern]

Ah, I was trying to do everything in tcsh. sh made it all work, thanks!

 

[Bashern]

If anyone plans on running bitcoind for lightning lab's lnd implementation, bitcoind needs to be compiled using ZeroMQ, run configure as below. Also, I found out why the dependancy tracking wasn't working, its a FreeBSD thing, make=gmake:

./configure MAKE=gmake BDB_LIBS="-L${BDB_PREFIX}/lib -ldb_cxx-4.8" BDB_CFLAGS="-I${BDB_PREFIX}/include" --without-gui --without-miniupnpc --with-zmq --enable-zmq