How to Setup a Qortal Node on a DigitalOcean VPS.

I recently set up my Qortal node on a VPS, and I figured that I would make a tutorial (for noobs) because it took me quite a while to figure everything out.

To preface this: I am not at all experienced with a terminal, but I am very good at looking things up. Here is what I did to install my node on a DigitalOcean VPS.

In order to Access the VPS without using a terminal, I first needed to install a program called x2go, which would allow me to access the VPS in a similar way to Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP)

In order to access the terminal on Digital Ocean, simply click the console button.

From here you will want to copy and paste the following into the terminal one at a time:

sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:x2go/stable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install x2goserver x2goserver-xsession

Now that you have x2go installed, you will want to install a desktop environment. I personally installed xfce4.

sudo apt-get install xfce4

At this point you’ll want to install x2go on your personal computer in order to connect to your VPS. Here is the link to download and install. https://wiki.x2go.org/doku.php/download:start

Before you can connect you will need to enter in a few more commands to the terminal in order to avoid an error with XFCE4 and x2go.

nano /root/.profile

Once you add the text, you’ll want to exit by using (CTRL+X) and then press Y to save, and then enter to confirm.

Congrats! Now you can connect to your VPS with x2go, and start installing the required programs for the Qortal Core.

Open up X2go on your personal computer and create a new session. You will want to fill out the information as I did below. Be sure to change the session type to XFCE.

Once you open up the session, you will be prompted for a login and password. The login will most likely be ‘root’ and the password is the one that you typed in while creating the digitalocean droplet.

Now that you’re connected to the VPS, you will want to open up the terminal to start installing a few programs.

You will want to install Java, Unzip, Firefox, and the Qortal UI.

Here are the commands to do so:

Java:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install default-jre
java -version

Unzip:

sudo apt install unzip

Firefox:

sudo apt install firefox

Qortal UI:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install snapd
sudo snap install qortal-ui

At this point, you will want to run the UI and create your account.

Now that you’ve created your wallet, you will want to install the Qortal Core on your VPS by going to the following link (on firefox) and downloading it. (you want the zip file)

Releases · QORT/qortal

By default, the qortal.zip file should end up in the downloads folder. You will need to open the terminal there.

Type the following command:

Unzip qortal-1.2.0.zip

the name of the file may change, but the format is “Unzip (filename)”

Now you will want to navigate to the Qortal folder within the downloads folder, and open the terminal.

To start the core, you will want to type the following:

Java -jar qortal.jar

You will need to leave this terminal open to continue running the node, but you should be good to go.

If you’re feeling kind, please consider using my DigitalOcean referral link. You will receive $100 in credit over 60 days.

Let me know what you think about this tutorial. It is the first of its kind that I have done. I figured that the best way to remember everything that I learned would be to reteach it.

References:

Install Qortal UI on Ubuntu using the Snap Store | Snapcraft

Connect to Ubuntu 18.04 Remote Desktop using X2Go - Dracula Servers