NEXT Ecosystem Docs

Appearance

Run Node as a System Service ​

We recommend running NEXT as a system service. It offers control over starting, stopping, and restarting, runs in the background, and starts automatically on boot, ensuring availability and reliability.

Configuration ​

Rather than providing command line flags, the system service uses a config file at /etc/next/config.toml.

We provide ready-to-use example config files for each node type.

Run the following command to copy the example config file

bash
cp /usr/local/share/next/configs/testnet/full-node.toml \
  /etc/next/config.toml
bash
cp /usr/local/share/next/configs/testnet/api-node.toml \
  /etc/next/config.toml
bash
cp /usr/local/share/next/configs/testnet/validator-node.toml \
  /etc/next/config.toml

User/Group ​

By default, the systemd service will run as the user and group next with the home directory /var/lib/next.

You may change the user to your needs by running the following command.

shell
# Edit the service file
sudo systemctl edit next.service

# Add the following lines with an existing
# user and group of your choice.
[Service]
User=<user>
Group=<group>

Running the Node ​

Start the service and enable it on boot

shell
sudo systemctl start next.service
sudo systemctl enable next.service

Stop the service

shell
sudo systemctl stop next.service

Restart the service

shell
sudo systemctl restart next.service

Logging ​

By default, logging is handled by the system's logging service.

Tail the logs

shell
journalctl -t next -f

See the last 1000 lines of logs

shell
journalctl -t next -n 1000

Optionally, you can configure NEXT to log to a file.

shell
# Edit the service file
sudo systemctl edit next.service

# Add the following lines
[Service]
StandardOutput=append:/var/log/next.log
StandardError=append:/var/log/next.log

Console Access ​

shell
# Become the next user
sudo su next

# Attach to the console
./next attach