cardano-node-api

Cardano Node API

An HTTP API for interfacing with a local Cardano Node and providing the node internal data for HTTP clients. This service communicates with a Cardano full node using the Ouroboros network protocol via a UNIX socket and exposes the underlying Node-to-Client (NtC) Ouroboros mini-protocols to clients via a REST API or UTxO RPC gRPC API.

Usage

The recommended method of using this application is via the published container images, coupled with Blink Labs container images for the Cardano Node.

docker run -d \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -p 9090:9090 \
  -v <mount for cardano-node IPC> \
  ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node-api:main

Configuration

Configuration can be done using either a config.yaml file or setting environment variables. Our recommendation is environment variables to adhere to the 12-factor application philisophy.

Environment variables

Configuration via environment variables can be broken into two sets of variables. The first set controls the behavior of the application, while the second set controls the connection to the Cardano node instance.

Application configuration:

• API_LISTEN_ADDRESS - Address to bind for API calls, all addresses if empty (default: empty)
• API_LISTEN_PORT - Port to bind for API calls (default: 8080)
• DEBUG_ADDRESS - Address to bind for pprof debugging (default: localhost)
• DEBUG_PORT - Port to bind for pprof debugging, disabled if 0 (default: 0)
• GRPC_LISTEN_ADDRESS - Address to bind for UTxO RPC gRPC, all addresses if empty (default: empty)
• GRPC_LISTEN_PORT - Port to bind for gRPC calls (default: 9090)
• LOGGING_HEALTHCHECKS - Log requests to /healthcheck endpoint (default: false)
• LOGGING_LEVEL - Logging level for log output (default: info)
• METRICS_LISTEN_ADDRESS - Address to bind for Prometheus format metrics, all addresses if empty (default: empty)
• METRICS_LISTEN_PORT - Port to bind for metrics (default: 8081)

Connection to the Cardano node can be performed using specific named network shortcuts for known network magic configurations. Supported named networks are:

• mainnet
• preprod
• preview
• sanchonet

You can set the network to an empty value and provide your own network magic to connect to unlisted networks.

TCP connection to a Cardano Node without using an intermediary like SOCAT is possible using the node address and port. It is up to you to expose the node's NtC communication socket over TCP. TCP connections are preferred over socket within the application.

Cardano node configuration:

• CARDANO_NETWORK - Use a named Cardano network (default: mainnet)
• CARDANO_NODE_NETWORK_MAGIC - Cardano network magic (default: automatically determined from named network)
• CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_PATH - Socket path to Cardano node NtC via UNIX socket (default: /node-ipc/node.socket)
• CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_TCP_HOST - Address to Cardano node NtC via TCP (default: unset)
• CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_TCP_PORT - Port to Cardano node NtC via TCP (default: unset)
• CARDANO_NODE_SOCKET_TIMEOUT - Sets a timeout in seconds for waiting on requests to the Cardano node (default: 30)

Connecting to a cardano-node

You can connect to either a cardano-node running locally on the host or a container running either inputoutput/cardano-node or ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node by mapping in the correct paths and setting the environment variables or configuration options to match.

Together with ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node in Docker

Use Docker to run both cardano-node and cardano-node-api with Docker volumes for blockchain storage and node-ipc.

# Start mainnet node
docker run --detach \
  --name cardano-node \
  -v node-data:/opt/cardano/data \
  -v node-ipc:/opt/cardano/ipc \
  -p 3001:3001 \
  ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node run

# Start cardano-node-api
docker run --detach \
  --name cardano-node-api \
  -v node-ipc:/node-ipc \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -p 9090:9090 \
  ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node-api:main

Using a local cardano-node

Use the local path when mapping the node-ipc volume into the container to use a local cardano-node.

# Start cardano-node-api
docker run --detach \
  --name cardano-node-api \
  -v /opt/cardano/ipc:/node-ipc \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -p 9090:9090 \
  ghcr.io/blinklabs-io/cardano-node-api:main

Development

There is a Makefile to provide some simple helpers.

Run from checkout:

go run .

Create a binary:

make

Create a docker image:

make image