Witness Update from @c0ff33a - HF26 prepped and https://api.c0ff33a.uk supercharged on HF26 HAF Api Node

HF26 Hived full API Node running smoothly.

To be fair it has been a very long time since I did a Witness Update, or in fact any post other then my weekly vlog - sadly the challenges of running @whiterosecoffee and multiple issues this year including staff off sick for long periods, someone deciding to drive into the side of my car, pulling my back which took six weeks to fix itself (and I had to hobble around work for the Hive UK Meetup while still in agony with my back) and so many other things basically my life has just been an overworked nightmare.

But I have kept my Hive Blockchain Witnesses up and running, both @c0ff33a and @whiterosecoffee have been consistently signing blocks throughout this year, I have three servers dedicated to Hive Witness nodes so if one fails I have back ups to keep producing blocks without downtime. In preparation for HF26 I have one node synched up to HF26 RC3, one replaying HF26RC3 and my current producing node is still on HF25 Hived. Once I have two fully replayed HF26 nodes I will switch production to one of them in preparation for the Hard Fork date - but I will keep the HF25 node running just in case.

HF26 Witness Node

For a run down on the improvements in HF26 and a guide to manually building a witness node read this post by themarkymark

For Witnesses the best news in HF26 is the new compressed block log option, which will reduce server storage used by the block log from around 650gb to around 350gb, ram usage is also reduced to around 21gb which makes running a Hive Blockchain Witness even more accessible - which is important because increasing our Witness count not only adds stability to the Blockchain it also shows Hive has a large worldwide backing making it more appealing for new app developers.

You can view current Hive Witnesses and update your votes for them at

https://peakd.com/me/witnesses

https://wallet.hive.blog/~witnesses

https://api.c0ff33a.uk is now running on HF26 Hived using a new fast server.

For many years I have run a full API node on https://api.c0ff33a.uk - HF26 has brought significant enhancements to how full nodes work. Without getting too technical the HF26 Hived now pushes block data to a postgres database, and a new HAFAH processes then handles calls for information and it finds it in the database to then present when a front end or dapp/app asks for it.

Hivemind still uses it's own postgres database to serve the majority of calls, but now it feeds from the HAFAH process - this all means less load for HF26 Hived which can concentrate on just receiving blocks and adding them to the database used by HAFAH - and ultimately speeds up call requests from front ends, apps/dapps etc - giving a better user experience.

In what little spare time I have available many weeks have been spent trying to get a HF26 Hived API node running - but my existing hardware proved just a little slow to produce something reliable. So I decided to invest my Witness earnings into further supporting the Hive Blockchain and ordered a much more capable server from Privex

(DEDI-FI) 64G DDR4 RAM, 4x 1TB NVMe SSD, AMD Ryzen 7 3700X Octa-Core, 1gbps

Privex is run by Witness someguy123 and is a popular choice for Witness servers on Hive because you can pay your server rental in Hive or HBD. The 4 x 1Tb NVME is more then is currently needed, but gives scaling space for blockchain growth. The order process is very smooth, once you have the payment memo from Privex and send the Hive with payment memo to Privex account it registers very quickly - server details took a few days to arrive but this is reasonable and once into the server getting started out was relatively straight forward.

https://www.privex.io if you want to look up pricing and server options.

For the end result you can view the API Node ranks at

https://hive.ausbit.dev/

or

https://beacon.peakd.com/

Everything is running on the one server, HAF Hived V26 with it's postgres database, HAFAH companion process, Hivemind with it's own postgres database, Jussi routing the incoming calls to the correct ports for the relevant processes and nginx routing secure HTTPS traffic to Jussi.

For building yourself see

https://gitlab.syncad.com/hive/haf

https://gitlab.syncad.com/hive/HAfAH/-/tree/develop

https://gitlab.syncad.com/hive/hivemind/-/tree/develop

For quick fix set up guides see

https://peakd.com/haf/@techcoderx/techcoderxcom-node-is-haf-ready-and-how-you-can-run-one-too

Although older the below is good reference for nginx setup

https://peakd.com/hive-139531/@pharesim/details-about-the-setup-of-my-public-node

Moving forward I am going to still make use of the existing API node hardware to bring back https://rpc.c0ff33a.uk although it will be running on the existing Hived Api node option with the slower rocksdb database and hivemind - for now that is a work in progress though.

Finally anyone who went to Hive Fest might have seen one of the promotional give aways was bags of Hive Blockchain branded coffee from @whiterosecoffee - massive thanks to @steevc for carrying 8 x 250g bags from the UK to Amsterdam for the event - it was a bit of a last minute request for promotional items which the Hive Fund paid for - and shipping anything out of the UK is pretty much impossible at the moment so getting them carried over by someone attending really helped. For background the Hive Blockchain branded coffee is aimed at promoting Hive to the UK audience, it's deliberately priced keenly to spread the word the aim is with the Hive Branding on the front label and information on the back to encourage new people to get involved with the Hive Blockchain.

At the Hive UK Meetup in June we did a full roast session of the Hive Blockchain coffee and everyone who attended got to take a free bag home. It might be a little gesture in the grand scheme of Hive, but every little helps.

Active HIVE Witness alongside @derangedvisions, if you appreciate the effort and work we put into the HIVE blockchain please consider giving us a Witness vote.

We run five Hive servers, two Witness Servers, Hivemind Instance, Full Account History Node, FAT Node
https://api.c0ff33a.uk our full API server to use with your dapps and front end
https://hiveblog.c0ff33a.uk Our own condenser front end, exclusively using our own API server to access the Hive Blockchain. For the best experience use on Brave Browser with Hive Keychain plugin.

Proud sponsor with @derangedcontests of @lucksacks.com , free to play and cash out HIVE rewards, head to Lucksacks Website now and start playing.

Visit #brits Discord Channel Join #teamuk and make your posts easily found, post with the tag or create a post in teamuk community so your fellow Brits can easily find and support your work. Let's work together to make #hiveuk an active community on the Hive Blockchain. #teamuk tag and Brits discord is exclusively for use by United Kingdom Hive accounts or ex pats living abroad

I distribute coffee roasting machines and also espresso coffee machines and roast my own Speciality Coffee Range. being one of the premium coffee suppliers Yorkshire including a wide range of filter coffee sachets. Finally I have a dedicated website to my Artisan small batch roasted coffee featuring roast and post packs and super easy coffee subscriptions.

Become a White Rose Coffee Roasters affiliate and earn a percentage of the sales you bring in for sharing your affiliate page links Become A White Rose Coffee Roasters Affiliate now payout available via Pay Pal or HIVE based on the current exchange rate.

Catch me live and unleashed every week on @threespeak with my c0ff33 vlogs