Node as a Service

Prerequisites

Download or compile the gear executable file for the operating system. See more

Configuration

Copy the gear executable to the /usr/bin directory:

sudo cp gear /usr/bin

To run the Vara node as a Linux service, configure the systemd file:

cd /etc/systemd/system
sudo nano gear-node.service

Configure and save:

[Unit]
Description=Vara Node
After=network.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=root
WorkingDirectory=/root/
ExecStart=/usr/bin/gear --name "NODE_NAME" --telemetry-url "wss://telemetry.rs/submit 0"
Restart=always
RestartSec=3
LimitNOFILE=10000

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Service Configuration

The ExecStart directive points to the gear binary location (default: /usr/bin).

Tip: You can append optional launch parameters (like --name or --validator) directly to the execution command if needed.

Starting the Node

Run the following command to start the service:

sudo systemctl start gear-node

Enable the service to start on boot:

sudo systemctl enable gear-node

Check the status of the gear-node service:

sudo systemctl status gear-node

Checking Logs

To view the service logs, run:

journalctl -u gear-node

Use navigation keys to browse the logs and the q key to exit.

View the last 50 lines of logs by adding the -n 50 parameter:

journalctl -u gear-node -n 50

See the last lines of logs in continuous mode (press Ctrl+C to exit):

journalctl -u gear-node -fn 50

Updating the Node to a New Version

After running the node for a while, updating to the latest version may be necessary.

Replace the node executable (gear) with the latest version and restart the service. For example, if the Linux executable is located at /usr/bin/gear (as configured above), run:

curl https://get.gear.rs/gear-v1.1.1-x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.xz | sudo tar -xJC /usr/bin
sudo systemctl restart gear-node

Removing the Node

If running the node is no longer needed, completely purge it from the disk.

Irreversible Action

Once the node is deleted, it cannot be fully restored.

Before proceeding, ensure you have followed the Backup and Restore instructions to save your important data.

Remove the node's storage, the service configuration, and the executable:

sudo systemctl stop gear-node
sudo systemctl disable gear-node
sudo rm -rf /root/.local/share/gear
sudo rm /etc/systemd/system/gear-node.service
sudo rm /usr/bin/gear

Configuring a Node as a Linux Service