# Collator ## Functionalities of the Collators To resonate with the collator staking model, we [reworked the tokenomics model](https://heima.subsquare.io/democracy/referenda/37) to allow the collators and their backed users to share the block production rewards. A short summary: * 30% of the network's gas fees will be allocated as rewards for collator staking participants. * This dynamic reward model ensures that rewards scale with network usage, incentivizing active participation and growth. ### Requirements to run a collator #### Hardware requirements Same as the [polkadot validator reference hardware](https://wiki.polkadot.network/docs/maintain-guides-how-to-validate-polkadot#requirements) #### bonding requirements There's a minimum (self)-bond to join the collator candidate pool and be eligible to get selected to author blocks. Currently it's set to **5000** HEI, you'll have to specify the bond amount when joining the candidate pool via `parachainStaking.joinCandidates` #### **whitelisting** Before we fully activate the DPoS model, the collator set is managed by the whitelist from the Heima team. It means you'll need to get your collator account whitelisted to be able to join the candidate pool. ### How to run a collator ***Currently collator is still the old "Litentry" version. The Heima new version doc update will come very soon.*** #### using docker (preferred) 1\. create a local directory to store the chain database: ```shell mkdir /var/lib/litentry # or use sudo if you don't have permission sudo mkdir /var/lib/litentry ``` 2\. make sure the permission and ownership of the local directory are correctly set: ``` sudo chown -R $(id -u):$(id -g) /var/lib/litentry ``` 3\. run the following docker command, you can replace the `--name="heima-node"` with your own node name: ```shell docker run -d --network=host -v /var/lib/litentry:/data \ -u $(id -u):$(id -g) \ litentry/litentry-collator:v0.9.22-02 \ --base-path=/data \ --chain=litentry \ --name="litentry-collator" \ --collator \ --execution wasm \ --state-cache-size 0 \ -- \ --execution wasm \ --chain polkadot ``` {% hint style="warning" %} `litentry/litentry-collator:v0.9.22-02` is used as an example, please check [github release page](https://github.com/litentry/heima/releases) for the up-to-date releases {% endhint %} The command will run the docker container in the background and the container ID will be printed in the console. With `docker logs -f ` you should be able to see the node starts to sync:

node syncing

{% hint style="info" %} Wait until syncing is done. Depending on the hardware and network status it could take several days to fully sync the parachain and relaychain database. {% endhint %} 4\. generate a session key by sending an RPC call to the http endpoint of the parachain with the `author_rotateKeys` method: ```shell curl http://127.0.0.1:9933 -H \ "Content-Type:application/json;charset=utf-8" -d \ '{ "jsonrpc":"2.0", "id":1, "method":"author_rotateKeys", "params": [] }' ``` An exemplary result: ```json {"jsonrpc":"2.0","result":"0x56066a71efc51e4a6f0f838cac959a08b238e22d478bd5dc0cdc2ac5b40d2e66","id":1} ``` Note down the result, this is your session key. In this case `0x56066a71efc51e4a6f0f838cac959a08b238e22d478bd5dc0cdc2ac5b40d2e66` {% hint style="info" %} Alternatively you could use `author_insertKey` to insert the pre-generated session key. The session key for heima-node is a sr25519 [aura](https://docs.substrate.io/reference/glossary/#authority-round-aura) key. {% endhint %} 5\. bind your collator account to the generated session key, this includes: * prepare a heima-node account. This account will be registered to receive block production rewards. * bind this account to the session key generated in step 4 by submitting extrinsic `session.setKeys`**from the collator account**:

session.setKeys

{% hint style="warning" %} parameters: * keys: the hex string key from step 4 * proof: `0x` {% endhint %} 6\. request to join the collator candidate by submitting extrinsic `parachainStaking.joinCandidates` **from the collator account**:

join the candidate pool

{% hint style="info" %} To be able to successfully join the collator candidates, you have to: * stake the minimum bonds * get added to the candidate whitelist by the admin (whitelisting will be removed once the DPoS is fully activated) {% endhint %} 7\. check your node actually starts to collate Once the extrinsic is sent without errors, wait until the next [round](https://github.com/litentry/litentry-parachain/blob/47386434b0743a6723b29dbd50a45dd86596891d/runtime/litentry/src/lib.rs#L652) begins and you should be able to see your node starting to produce blocks:

new collator produces a block

You should see your node gets chosen from time to time to author blocks according to the emitted events:

the new collator is chosen

{% hint style="warning" %} If the collator doesn't produce blocks after a long time (\~12 hours) while you believe everything is correctly set, please try to restart the node. {% endhint %} {% hint style="success" %} Congratulations! You have managed to run a collator node that starts to produce blocks for the Heima parachain! {% endhint %} #### using binary Running a collator node with the raw binary is very similar to the docker setup above, it only differs a bit in the command line arguments. So instead of steps 1-3 above, run: ``` ./target/release/litentry-collator \ --chain=litentry \ --name="litentry-collator" \ --collator \ --execution wasm \ --state-cache-size 0 \ -- \ --execution wasm \ --chain polkadot ``` By default, the database is stored at `~/.local/share/`, you can override it by using `--base-path=`. {% hint style="warning" %} To get the binary, you could either download it directly from Heima's [Github release page](https://github.com/litentry/heima/releases) (**Linux x86-64** only), or [build](broken://pages/r7BbS90k7gpmTLJqJRMm) it from the source. {% endhint %} The remaining steps to configure the session key and join the collation are the same as the docker method, so it's not repeated here. ### How to update the client Heima constantly works on improving the parachain client and following the upstream changes. Therefore, it's not uncommon to update the client to have the newest features and security patches. Updating the client is simple: **If using docker:** 1. `docker container stop ` 2. run the docker command in step 3 in [#using-docker-preferred](#using-docker-preferred "mention") , with the desired docker image version **If using binary:** 1. stop/kill the `heima-node` process 2. download the desired binary 3. start the new binary using the commands in # using binary --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://docs.heima.network/collator.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.