My first time with cli_wallet

in HiveDevs2 years ago (edited)

Just a quick rant :o)

My account grew recently to the point where I could afford claiming account tokens. Since I have friends, family and people I cooperated with on other projects to (potentially) onboard, I thought I need to start claiming now, even if the cost will eat almost all my RC every time. Normally I'm using Ecency desktop wallet, but it has no option to perform such operation. The most natural was to build and use cli_wallet.


It was the first time for me. I mean, I've used similar wallets in the past and I know they tend to be rough. I've seen `cli_wallet` being used, I've used it myself in some tests through python scripts, but it was the first time I was setting it up from scratch on a computer that had nothing to do with Hive in the past. It turns out, under the thick layer of makeup provided by `test_tools` there is not a prince charming but an ugly ogre (no, not this one).


First of all, it doesn't really work without local node. Ugh, first wall. But since I wanted to try some not yet released features, and in the same time test how my new computer performs, instead of following suggestions I found online on how to pair it with public API nodes, I pulled a block_log and run replay. Eleven and a half hours later I got myself a live synced node. Wahey! that's half of what I have expected, and I didn't even have to map shared_memory.bin to RAM. One thing bothers me. While I'm not really short on space at the moment and it is nice the block_log with artifacts only takes 365GB, it would've been a lot nicer if it consumed 2GB. For the node that will be run once a week for couple of minutes that would be reasonable. Pruning, make it happen.


cli_wallet finally started. Created new empty wallet. Wants me to set password. Ok, let's see how it is done.

set_password --help

Nooo! Lol. It set my password to --help. Unlock. Another attempt to set password. What? It can't contain special characters? Why? Finally third attempt succeeded. But I would prefer it made sure I can actually repeat what I typed in before making the change. Maybe that's the reason it is in open text and without specials? Import key. Ok, that was pretty straightforward. But how to claim token?

help

OMG! What is that wall of garbled mess? I guess claim_account_creation is the only thing with name that somewhat resembles what I want to do.

gethelp claim_account_creation

Didn't really help. But at least confirmed that it is the thing I was looking for. Run the claim. Why am I spammed with irrelevant data that looks like content of account_object (twice) or dynamic_global_property_object? If there was something about how much I've paid RC, that would be nice and expected, but not this.


In the end I've done what I wanted, but the experience could have been much better. Now I'm convinced that in the future the fastest way to find the command to use the token I've acquired will be to look through the wallet code. And while I'm at it, I'll better make sure it does not use my password as seed for keys for new account :o)

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In the end I've done what I wanted, but the experience could have been much better.

That's I believe is cli_wallet's marketing tag line ;-)

Pruning, make it happen.

Soon(TM) a.k.a. Someday.

FWIW, there's a great @andablackwidow's post about potential optimizations that among others includes pruning.

Some time ago I've made a Support, Maintenance and Development Meta-issue for cli_wallet so if anyone to add some more issues, or pitas related to cli_wallet then please do it directly on GitLab, or if just reply to my comment here, and I will file an issue for you.

Soon(TM) a.k.a. Someday.

Yeah, I know the definition of "Soon". I was complaining about insane resources needed to run then Steem node on my very first day on the platform. It was almost 5 years ago. But seriously, pruning is the only thing missing on my basic list of features from back then (I wanted cli_wallet on Windows, but since my new computer has Ubuntu, I don't need that anymore 😉 ). The Steem-Hive split was great not only for the health of the community, but also from technical standpoint. I have high hopes for more improvements in the future.

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