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Beam Node is an essential part of the Beam blockchain and is responsible for validating transactions and blocks. It runs on all platforms: Linux, Windows and Mac (for detalied list of supported and tested platforms please see user_supported_platforms)
Beam Node can be run in either Mining or Validating mode.
Beam Node supports two options for mining Beam:
Using Internal Miner
Beam Node has built in GPU and CPU miners. To start the node with internal miner, specify miner type using miner_type parameter. Built in GPU mining is only supported on Linux and Windows platforms.
Using External Miner via Statum Server API
Beam Node provides built in support for Startum API allowing to connect multiple external mining clients to a single node. (see :ref: user_beam_stratum_server for more details). To start the node with stratum server use stratum_port and stratum_secrets_path parameters. Stratum clients can be run together with the Internal Miner
Mining keys management
In order for the mining node to be able to attribute mining rewards to your wallet, it needs a special secret mining key. The mining key is derived from the primary secret key by running export_miner_key command with --subkey=<node id> parameter in the Beam CLI Wallet (See
user_cli_wallet_guidefor more details). You can generate a multiple separate mining keys for different mining nodes.Optionally, in order to allow each mining node to be able to see all rewards mined by all your mining nodes Beam provides an additional option called owner_key. Owner key is a secret view key, it can not be used to spend coins, just to identify your mining rewards regardless of which node was used to mine it. Owner key is derived from primary secret key as well using the same key_export command, but without additional parameters.
Both keys are protected using Wallet Password, which should also be provided
By default (without --miner_type flag) Beam Node is run in validating mode, meaning that mining is disabled. Validating nodes are still very important for the overall health and safety of the network since they:
- Help in propagating transactions and blocks through the network
- Relay SBBS messages to enable Wallet to Wallet communication.
- Serve as Dandelion Stem relays to improve P2P level security
If possible, always prefer running a local node either with or without mining!
Beam Node allows to provide the settings via command line or using a configuration file called beam-node.cfg and located in the same folder as Beam Node binary.
Command line parameters override configuration file settings
The configuration file is loaded automatically and sets all parameters that were not provided via command line. To reload configuration file after a change you should manually restart Beam Node
| Parameter | Description & Example |
| --port | Port to start the server on port=10000 |
| --log_level | Log level [infoverbose] log_level=info |
| --file_log_level | File log level [infoverbose] file_log_level=info |
| Parameter | Description & Example |
| --storage | Path to node database file (defaults to node.db in the same folder) storage=node.db |
| --history_dir | Path to folder where compressed (cut-through) history files are stored. Defaults to same folder. history_dir=. |
| --temp_dir | Path to temp folder for compressed (cut-through) history files. Must be on the same volume as history_dir temp_dir=. |
| --miner_type | Type of built in miner [cpu|gpu]. Only relevant for Linux and Windows builds which support GPU mining. In case of CPU mining uses number of threads specified in the mining_threads parameter (see below). miner_type=cpu |
| --mining_threads | Number of concurrent threads used in CPU mining (if set to 0, mining is disabled) Relevant for CPU mining only mining_threads=0 |
Using CPU mining is not recommended
Beam uses Equihash mining algorith with (150,5) parameters and customized data path. It is efficiently mined on GPUs. Using CPU is most likely to be not cost effective.
| Parameter | Description & Example |
| --miner_key | Secret key to attribute mining rewards mined by the node to your wallet Created using CLI walelt export_miner_key command with --subkey=<miner id> parameter See user_cli_wallet_guide for more details |
| --owner_key | Secret key allowing the node to monitor mining rewards mined by all mining nodes marked by this key. Created using CLI walelt export_owner_key command See user_cli_wallet_guide for more details |
| --pass | Wallet password. It is required since both Miner Key and Owner Key are protected by walelt password |
| --stratum_port | Port on which stratum server will listen to incoming connections. 0 if stratum server is disabled. stratum_port=0 |
| --stratum_secrets_path | Path to folder containing stratum certificates stratum_secrets_path=. |