Question # What are blockchain nodes?

cryptopirate said Apr 24, 2023 Edited

1. A node is really just a computer running the software of a specific blockchain. In many cases, your phone can be a blockchain node, if you download the app for it.
2. All nodes are connected to each other and they share the  digital record  .
3. There are full nodes that store the complete record and validate new transactions.
4. There are light nodes that are limited in their functionality but more efficient and easier to set up and maintain.

Why do we need blockchain nodes anyway?The question should really be 'why do we need as many blockchain nodes as possible'? The more nodes a blockchain network runs the more secure and decentralized they are.Soon more detailed guides on different nodes on different blockchain networks will follow... and then.. we build them!

damko said Apr 25, 2023

Instead of <h2></h2> you can prefix your sentence with "## " (notice the space after the last hash) and it will be interpreted as markdown syntax and the output will be what you were looking for.

damko said Apr 25, 2023 Edited

I will chip in by adding that nodes are often the "portal door" to a blockchain meaning that you'll wallet will have to connect to one node (usually a random node) in order to submit a transaction (when you are sending or recording something on the blockchain) or to check the transactions that happened on your wallet address since last time you opened your wallet application (someone paid you).Knowing this, it's also clear that one good reason to run your own node is to give more privacy to your transactions (your IP address will be seen by your own node) and to risk less (if you can trust your own node better than a random one)

cryptopirate said  May 1, 2023

damko sounds wonderful and I think this will be the next 'chapter' and intermediate advanced to build our own validation nodes to connect to the blockchain networks.
The default Metamask Remote Procedure Call (RPC) provided by Infura is now logging everything and you have to manually change to other providers such as QuickNode.
Running your own node is the only thing that will make you free, so lets go there!

cryptopirate said said Jun 12, 2023

What about dev-ops and hardware requirements, redundancy?

damko said Jun 21, 2023

dev-ops is a profession/activity which, bottom line, means: automate the configuration of the software you need. There are world-famous tools like Ansible which are designed precisely for this activity. If you write a very detailed Ansible recipe (a set of instructions for Ansible) you can automate (sometimes 100% automated) the setup of a computer/server. Ex.: imagine you want to create several validation nodes: you can write a detailed recipe which is capable to spin up a virtual machine in seconds or minutesredundancy: it's a principle coming from old-school engineering vastly applied in aeronautics, for instance. It means: let's duplicate a mechanism so that if it breaks there is another mechanism in place that can substitute the broken one in real time so that the system, as a whole, won't be affected by the breakdown.

Fortunately, when it comes to nodes, you don't need old-school redundancy because redundancy is already embedded in the concept of decentralization. Your node will be just an atom of a much bigger worldwide system. If your node goes down, the entire system won't be affected. That's the beauty of decentralization.