Frustrated technical newbie Ubuntu - VPS - issue after issue!!

[JellyfishJon]

I have a VPS running Ubuntu with plenty of space...

There's all these guides out there and I have root access (obviously) and I have done light programming before. I'm not a complete idiot...but I swear to God I've sat for 20 hours straight and I'm hitting issue after issue....none of the How To's for Ubuntu Linux seem to work. All other programs work without issue.

I'm pulling my hair out and it shouldn't be this hard.

Can someone please help me and tell me how to approach this so I don't throw my laptop through a winfowt? I've been in IT consulting my whole life on the business side. I shouldn't be having this much trouble.

Just a method of approach, anything....it seems easy but every single how to doesn't seem to work - some error ALWAYS pops up.

I just want an approach, a framework for getting a node up. I have plenty of resources and the will power to push through but I feel like the last 4 days I've just been spinning my wheels and I feel like an idiot.

Just a basic approach - "definitely read X first, get your hardware details in a document for later reference, etc..."

I'm dying a little inside every time I think something is finally going to work and BOOM yet another issue!! Argh!!!

[mocacinno]

Well... It's kind of hard to give you advice without knowing the specifics of what you're doing...

You have an ubuntu VPS... Sure, but which version (cat /etc/os-release), which VPS provider (digitalocean, ramnode,...), which virtualisation technology (openVZ, XEN,,...), which resources (vCPU's, RAM, disks,...).

Walktroughs seldomly work out-of-the-box unless you follow a walktrough that's tailored to your exact linux distro and version AND the VPS provider you're using... Even then, there are providers that offer openVZ, KVM, Vmware,... virtualisation... There can be a different approach when using ubuntu 18.04 on ramnode's openVZ cluster vs ramnode's KVM cluster...

Bottom line: if you want some advice, it might be good if you told us which exact package from which VPS provider you purchased and which exact OS image you installed on the VM... If not, telling us which error you encounter might also help... But i don't think there's any "general" advice i can give you

[JellyfishJon]

Well... It's kind of hard to give you advice without knowing the specifics of what you're doing...

You have an ubuntu VPS... Sure, but which version (cat /etc/os-release), which VPS provider (digitalocean, ramnode,...).

Walktroughs seldomly work out-of-the-box unless you follow a walktrough that's tailored to your exact linux distro and version AND the VPS provider you're using... Even then, there are providers that offer openVZ, KVM, Vmware,... virtualisation... There can be a different approach when using ubuntu 18.04 on ramnode's openVZ cluster vs ramnode's KVM cluster...

Ok this is helpful. I'll get all this info no problem. Once I have it, what should I do next? When I hit an issue I can't resolve, where can I go for direction?

I want to do this and I have no problem doing the steps. I just need the approach outlined so I can feel like I'm actually going to get it done. If it takes another month, I'll still do it....I just need confidence that I can get there.

[mocacinno]

Ok this is helpful. I'll get all this info no problem. Once I have it, what should I do next? When I hit an issue I can't resolve, where can I go for direction?

I want to do this and I have no problem doing the steps. I just need the approach outlined so I can feel like I'm actually going to get it done. If it takes another month, I'll still do it....I just need confidence that I can get there.

I'm responsible for about 60 x86 servers myself nowadays (my company is moving away from our power architecture towards x86), all my x86 machines are running SLES (everything from 11SP1 till 12SP4), they have tons of good documentation i can access whenever i run into issues. IIRC, ubuntu offers less off the shelve documentation, but they do have good community support forums you can join if you need help. Also, if you post specific, general, questions in this thread, i might be able to point you into the correct direction.

Might i ask which service you're trying to setup? Maybe you're making things to complex? Depending on the virtualisation sollution your VPS provider is offering there might be turnkey sollutions available?

[JellyfishJon]

Ok this is helpful. I'll get all this info no problem. Once I have it, what should I do next? When I hit an issue I can't resolve, where can I go for direction?

I want to do this and I have no problem doing the steps. I just need the approach outlined so I can feel like I'm actually going to get it done. If it takes another month, I'll still do it....I just need confidence that I can get there.

I'm responsible for about 60 x86 servers myself nowadays (my company is moving away from our power architecture towards x86), all my x86 machines are running SLES (everything from 11SP1 till 12SP4), they have tons of good documentation i can access whenever i run into issues. IIRC, ubuntu offers less off the shelve documentation, but they do have good community support forums you can join if you need help. Also, if you post specific, general, questions in this thread, i might be able to point you into the correct direction.

Might i ask which service you're trying to setup? Maybe you're making things to complex? Depending on the virtualisation sollution your VPS provider is offering there might be turnkey sollutions available?

Thank you for taking this time to respond. I'll try to see if I can give you the first project here:

I want to run a node and pull in the Blockchain data. Then I'm going to get the data into some MySQL tables and expose a RESTful API (secured). I have a WordPress WooCommerce plug-in but the transaction APIs out there don't always offer all the data points I need to provide a robust solution.

I've made an amazing client-side payment plug-in and it's alot of value for free. I'd like to make it even more user friendly but be able to monetize on a proprietary API in some way. I am not going to be transaction fee based because that seems like highway robbery. Still, I would love to be able to get more into this space as a full-time gig where I'm a tools guy to make user-friendly e-commerce solutions for entrepreneurs that don't have much technical understanding.

I'm really excited to do this and my buddy will make some awesome data APIs! But, I need the node running to give him data to leverage! I have the will and resources but I want to be the one to do something and learn this. Me and my buddy are both having trouble figuring out how to run a node.

I'm more than happy to link you the work and brand once I've incorporated and double checked the plug-in to be 100% sure there's no bugs. I've invested $12K already in total and the plug-in is amazing. I want to have this data API built!!

Step 1 -- run a Bitcoin Daemon on the VPS and get that Blockchain data so my friend can leverage it!!

The plug-in is already built and it is really robust. I want to keep making it more awesome. I'm just really getting discouraged now because of all these issues. My friend can't work his magic unless he has this data...I don't want to have so many 3rd party API dependencies for a monetized pro version and I don't want to make people pay for that.

Does this help? I'm really grateful you've responded

[mocacinno]

There are 3 sollutions to run bitcoind on ubuntu:

• use prebuilt binaries... a tutorial for ubuntu 16.04 can be found here: https://bitcoin.org/en/full-node#ubuntu-1604
• compile bitcoind yourself... a tutorial for ubuntu 16.04 can be found here : https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/build-unix.md
• you can download the linux binaries directly: https://bitcoin.org/bin/bitcoin-core-0.17.1/bitcoin-0.17.1-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz

If you want to run bitcoind as a service: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/contrib/init/bitcoind.service

[JellyfishJon]

There are 3 sollutions to run bitcoind on ubuntu:

• use prebuilt binaries... a tutorial for ubuntu 16.04 can be found here: https://bitcoin.org/en/full-node#ubuntu-1604
• compile bitcoind yourself... a tutorial for ubuntu 16.04 can be found here : https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/build-unix.md
• you can download the linux binaries directly: https://bitcoin.org/bin/bitcoin-core-0.17.1/bitcoin-0.17.1-x86_64-linux-gnu.tar.gz

If you want to run bitcoind as a service: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/contrib/init/bitcoind.service

Thank you! I will get all my environment details but I'm sure something will break. Where should I go for Ubuntu help that's not related to Bitcoin? And where should I go to get help on troubleshooting any issues with the node?

[mocacinno]

Thank you! I will get all my environment details but I'm sure something will break. Where should I go for Ubuntu help that's not related to Bitcoin? And where should I go to get help on troubleshooting any issues with the node?

Well... I use ubuntu from time to time, but not professionally... A quick google told me that https://ubuntuforums.org/ is the ubuntu support forum where you should be able to find an anwer to your ubuntu related questions...
As for issues with the node setup: bitcointalk's technical subforum => wallet software (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?board=37.0). This is the subforum that's been started for these issues, altough it's "abused" by people to post their non-core related questions aswell...