MattDodsonEnglish / trueblocks-explorer

TrueBlocks Explorer

TrueBlocks lets you explore the Ethereum blockchain in a fully-local and therefore fully-private way. This repo provides a frontend (this repo) application for the backend, [https://github.com/TrueBlocks/trueblocks-core](TrueBlocks core).

Prerequisites

Prior to proceeding, you must install the TrueBlocks Core.

Installing

Assuming you have the TrueBlocks core properly installed and can successfully run the following command:

> chifra --version

Then, you need to serve the index on your local machine:

chifra serve

Installing the TrueBlocks Account Explorer

From your development folder:

git clone [e-mail]:TrueBlocks/trueblocks-explorer.git
cd trueblocks-explorer
cp .env.example .env
yarn
yarn develop

Now, the application should be running at localhost:1234:

NPM Scripts

• compile | compile:ui | compile:electron compile TypeScript into JavaScript, usually before packing new Electron bundle
• develop | develop:ui | develop:electron run development server for UI and opens the app in Electron.
• test | test:e2e run unit or E2E tests

Requirements

• Note: In order for the TrueBlocks to work, you must have access to an Ethereum node with --tracing enabled. An excellent choice is Turbo-Geth (now called XXX). TrueBlocks defaults to using Parity at the RPC endpoint http://localhost:8545, but you may use any node supporting tracing and any endpoint (Infura, Quiknodes, for example). Performance will be greatly reduced if you use a remote server. A good solution to this problem is to run a node on the dAppNode or Ava.do platforms and use [http://github.com/TrueBlocks/trueblocks-docker](the TrueBlocks docker image).

Getting Data on the Command Line

Assuming TrueBlocks is installed correctly, and that you have a node endpoint, and that the tools are in your $PATH, you should be able to run the following command at a command prompt:

> chifra blocks 100

and get valid data from your node:

{
  "data": [
    {
      "gasLimit": 5000,
      "gasUsed": 0,
      "hash": "0xdfe2e70d6c116a541101cecbb256d7402d62125f6ddc9b607d49edc989825c64",
      "blockNumber": 100,
      "parentHash": "0xdb10afd3efa45327eb284c83cc925bd9bd7966aea53067c1eebe0724d124ec1e",
      "miner": "0xbb7b8287f3f0a933474a79eae42cbca977791171",
      "difficulty": 17916437174,
      "price": 0,
      "finalized": true,
      "timestamp": 1438270443,
      "transactions": []
    }
  ]
}

If that works, try this command:

> chifra blocks 0-latest:10000

Which exports every 10,000th block in the chain from first to last. Or, try this command:

> chifra blocks --uniq_tx 4001001

Which shows every address that appears anywhere in block 4,001,001. There are literally hundreds of other options to chifra and the other tools. See the documentation.

Getting Data from the API

The TrueBlocks Explorer uses an API to access data provided (that is ultimately provided by chifra). Assuming everything is installed correctly and you've started the API server, you should be able to get the same data from the API:

> curl "http://localhost:8080/blocks?blocks=4001001&uniq_tx"

which returns the same as the preceding chifra blocks --uniq_tx command.

Change data formats.

By default, everything from the API is returned as JSON.

However, you can change this by adding the options &fmt=txt or &fmt=csv to your request.

Get docs

For documentation on the API, you may do this:

> open "http://localhost:8090"

Scraping the Chain

To begin the process of creating the address index, enter this command in a seperate window or tmux session. You will need to keep this process running continually to keep the index fresh.

> chifra scrape

• Note: This requires a --tracing node to produce a full list of appearances. It will work (with some configuration changes) on non-tracing nodes, but many of the appearances will not be included. Note also, this takes a loooong time. Depending on your setup at least 2-3 days (local node endpoint) or significantly longer (remote, rate-limited RPC endpoints).

Examples:

There are many, many options to use TrueBlocks. Here are a few:

• Get a list of every appearance anywhere on the chain for a specific address:

  • curl http://localhost/list?address=0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359

• Get full details of every transaction for specific address to CSV:

  • curl http://localhost/export?address=0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359&fmt=csv

• Using the command line, get tab-seperated list of every log that an address appears in:

  • > chifra export --logs 0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359 --fmt txt

• Get JSON details of every trace in which a specific address appears:

  • curl http://localhost/export?trace&address=0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359

• Get the name of an address:

  • chifra names 0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359 // Ethereum Tip Jar
  • chifra names 0x6b175474e89094c44da98b954eedeac495271d0f // DAI
  • curl http://localhost/names?0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359 // TrueBlocks Tip Jar

• From the command line, get tab-seperated text of every balance change in US dollars for an addresses:

  • > chifra export --balances --deltas 0xfB6916095ca1df60bB79Ce92cE3Ea74c37c5d359 --dollars

• Get balance of DAI for an address at current block on command line:

  • chifra tokens 0x6b175474e89094c44da98b954eedeac495271d0f (ethNames -ca true)

There are literally hundreds of other options. Also, you may specify as many addresses as you wish on each command.

FAQ

I'm running geth, do I need to run Parity instead?

Yes - Parity delivers the necessary articulated traces so that TrueBlocks can build its address index. We don't yet support Geth.

More coming soon...

Troubleshooting

More coming soon...

Contributing

Please read CONTRIBUTING.md for details on our code of conduct, and the process for submitting pull requests to us.

Authors

• Thomas Jay Rush - tjayrush
• Ed Mazurek - wildmolasses

See also the list of contributors who participated in this project.

License

Licensing information pending...

References