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Subsquid Network FAQ

Deploy a single processor squid

This is a quest to run a squid with a single processor. Here is how to run it:

I. Install dependencies: Node.js, Docker, Git.

On Windows

1. Enable Hyper-V.
2. Install Docker for Windows.
3. Install NodeJS LTS using the official installer.
4. Install Git for Windows.

In all installs it is OK to leave all the options at their default values. You will need a terminal to complete this tutorial - WSL bash is the preferred option.

On Mac

1. Install Docker for Mac.
2. Install Git using the installer or by other means.
3. Install NodeJS LTS using the official installer.

We recommend configuring NodeJS to install global packages to a folder owned by an unprivileged account. Create the folder by running

mkdir ~/global-node-packages

then configure NodeJS to use it

npm config set prefix ~/global-node-packages

Make sure that the folder ~/global-node-packages/bin is in PATH. That allows running globally installed NodeJS executables from any terminal. Here is a one-liner that detects your shell and takes care of setting PATH:

CURSHELL=`ps -hp $$ | awk '{print $5}'`; case `basename $CURSHELL` in 'bash') DEST="$HOME/.bash_profile";; 'zsh') DEST="$HOME/.zshenv";; esac; echo 'export PATH="${HOME}/global-node-packages/bin:$PATH"' >> "$DEST"

Alternatively you can add the following line to ~/.zshenv (if you are using zsh) or ~/.bash_profile (if you are using bash) manually:

export PATH="${HOME}/global-node-packages/bin:$PATH"

Re-open the terminal to apply the changes.

On Linux

Install NodeJS (v16 or newer), Git and Docker using your distro's package manager.

We recommend configuring NodeJS to install global packages to a folder owned by an unprivileged account. Create the folder by running

mkdir ~/global-node-packages

then configure NodeJS to use it

npm config set prefix ~/global-node-packages

Make sure that any executables globally installed by NodeJS are in PATH. That allows running them from any terminal. Open the ~/.bashrc file in a text editor and add the following line at the end:

export PATH="${HOME}/global-node-packages/bin:$PATH"

Re-open the terminal to apply the changes.

II. Install Subsquid CLI

Open a terminal and run

npm install --global @subsquid/cli@latest

This adds the sqd command. Verify that the installation was successful by running

sqd --version

A healthy response should look similar to

@subsquid/cli/2.5.0 linux-x64 node-v20.5.1

III. Run the squid

1. Open a terminal and run the following commands to create the squid and enter its folder:

   sqd init my-single-proc-squid -t https://github.com/subsquid-quests/single-chain-squid

   cd my-single-proc-squid

   You can replace my-single-proc-squid with any name you choose for your squid. If a squid with that name already exists in Aquarium, the first command will throw an error; if that happens simply think of another name and repeat the commands.

2. Press "Get Key" button in the quest card to obtain the singleProc.key key file. Save it to the ./query-gateway/keys subfolder of the squid folder. The file will be used by the query gateway container.

3. The template squid uses a PostgreSQL database and a query gateway. Start Docker containers that run these with

   sqd up

   Wait for about a minute before proceeding to the next step.

   If you get an error message about unknown shorthand flag: 'd' in -d, that means that you're using an old version of docker that does not support the compose command yet. Update Docker or edit the commands.json file as follows:

            "up": {
            "deps": ["check-key"],
            "description": "Start a PG database",
   -        "cmd": ["docker", "compose", "up", "-d"]
   +        "cmd": ["docker-compose", "up", "-d"]
          },
          "down": {
            "description": "Drop a PG database",
   -        "cmd": ["docker", "compose", "down"]
   +        "cmd": ["docker-compose", "down"]
          },

4. Prepare the squid for running by installing dependencies, building the source code and creating all the necessary database tables:

   npm ci
   sqd build
   sqd migration:apply

5. Start your squid with

   sqd run .

   The command should output lines like these:

   [api] 09:56:02 WARN  sqd:graphql-server enabling dumb in-memory cache (size: 100mb, ttl: 1000ms, max-age: 1000ms)
   [api] 09:56:02 INFO  sqd:graphql-server listening on port 4350
   [processor] 09:56:04 INFO  sqd:processor processing blocks from 6000000
   [processor] 09:56:05 INFO  sqd:processor using archive data source
   [processor] 09:56:05 INFO  sqd:processor prometheus metrics are served at port 33097
   [processor] 09:56:08 INFO  sqd:processor:mapping Burned 59865654 Gwei from 6000000 to 6016939
   [processor] 09:56:08 INFO  sqd:processor 6016939 / 17743832, rate: 5506 blocks/sec, mapping: 304 blocks/sec, 182 items/sec, eta: 36m
   

   The squid should sync in 10-15 minutes. When it's done, stop it with Ctrl-C, then stop and remove the auxiliary containers with

   sqd down

Quest Info

Category	Skill Level	Time required (minutes)	Max Participants	Reward	Status
Squid Deployment	$\textcolor{green}{\textsf{Simple}}$	~40	-	$\textcolor{red}{\textsf{500tSQD}}$	open

Acceptance critera

Sync this squid using the key from the quest card. The syncing progress is tracked by the amount of data the squid has retrieved from Subsquid Network.

About this squid

This squid captures USDC Transfer events on ETH, stores them in a database and serves the data over a GraphQL API.

The Ethereum data ingester ("processor") is located in src/main.ts. It can be started with sqd process. GraphQL server runs as a separate process started by sqd serve. You can also use sqd run to run all the services at once.

The squid uses Subsquid Network as its primary data source.