What are the good configurations for having a running cluster of 3 nodes?

External question — Stellar Stack Exchange Author: Parker Original post: https://stellar.stackexchange.com/questions/2024 License: CC BY-SA 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. I am trying to set up a private stellar cluster with at least 3 nodes. I am able to setup a 2-nodes cluster but when it comes to add another node, the cluster is broken and only one node is synced. Here is how I configured my 2-nodes cluster. I started a docker container on each node by running : docker run --rm -d -p "80:80" -p "8000:8000" -p "11625:11625" -p "11626:11626" -v "/home/ubuntu/stellar:/opt/stellar" --name private-cluster stellar/quickstart --standalone I logged into the node on 101, stop stellar-core, recreated core database and updated stellar-core.cfg with : HTTP_PORT=11626 PUBLIC_HTTP_PORT=true NETWORK_PASSPHRASE="MyStandalone Network ; December 2018" NODE_SEED="SAOQ42SRGOLSVRGJI2BCX4F5PEI3QA3IWN55GCFHQ5PIMJ2CJQTBNCGQ" NODE_IS_VALIDATOR=true PREFERRED_PEERS=["192.168.8.102"] DATABASE="postgresql://dbname=core host=localhost user=stellar password=mypassword" COMMANDS=["ll?level=debug"] FAILURE_SAFETY=0 UNSAFE_QUORUM=true [QUORUM_SET] THRESHOLD_PERCENT=50 VALIDATORS=["GCYJMPMSMOINIXGLYA7ID45GJ2N46U7LMHFOTYKWHHNBLAA4K6X4FYGE", "GDMEEIAG6KJQAN5RRQHRAB6BDRDJKKPTTTJDQ4WSKEZITQ7S63QGELN7"] [HISTORY.vs] get="cp /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{0} {1}" put="./cp-and-set-permissions.sh {0} /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{1}" mkdir="./mkdir-and-set-permissions.sh -p /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{0}" Then I cleaned stellar db : sudo -u stellar stellar-core --newdb --conf etc/stellar-core.cfg Moreover I created the history with : sudo -u stellar stellar-core --newhist vs --conf etc/stellar-core.cfg I ran : sudo -u stellar stellar-core --forcescp --conf etc/stellar-core.cfg Then started stellar-core : supervisorctl start stellar-core For the node on 102, I stopped stellar-core, recreated the core database and edited the configuration file like this : HTTP_PORT=11626 PUBLIC_HTTP_PORT=true NETWORK_PASSPHRASE="MyStandalone Network ; December 2018" NODE_SEED="SB6O2IMZJH63X4XUHBKUECMBFYB4HAT32G4ALBGNSVFWJLICGHPRQWQD" NODE_IS_VALIDATOR=true PREFERRED_PEERS=["192.168.8.101"] DATABASE="postgresql://dbname=core host=localhost user=stellar password=mypassword" COMMANDS=["ll?level=debug"] FAILURE_SAFETY=0 UNSAFE_QUORUM=true [QUORUM_SET] THRESHOLD_PERCENT=50 VALIDATORS=["GCYJMPMSMOINIXGLYA7ID45GJ2N46U7LMHFOTYKWHHNBLAA4K6X4FYGE", "GDMEEIAG6KJQAN5RRQHRAB6BDRDJKKPTTTJDQ4WSKEZITQ7S63QGELN7"] [HISTORY.vs] get="cp /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{0} {1}" put="./cp-and-set-permissions.sh {0} /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{1}" mkdir="./mkdir-and-set-permissions.sh -p /opt/stellar/core/history/vs/{0}" [HISTORY.h1] get="curl -sf http://192.168.8.101/{0} -o {1}" I didn't forcescp on 102 as I wanted it to join the cluster on 101. I just cleaned stellar-core db, created my history archive and started stellar-core. The node on 101 get synced automatically, whereas the one on 102 went to "Joining SCP", then "Catching Up", then "Getting history" and finally "Synced". I did some transfers and when I checked the root account balance it was updated on both nodes. Thus, I had a successful running 2-nodes cluster. I tried to add one more node in this cluster following the same pattern but whatever configuration I use nodes are not all synced or neither share the same root account balance. Any help would be welcome.

External answer — Stellar Stack Exchange Author: Stanislaw Baranski Original post: https://stellar.stackexchange.com/a/4378 License: CC BY-SA 4.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. You can use this docker-compose.yml . Its basically fork of stellar-quickstart adjusted to work on private clusters. It works in ephemeral mode, you don't have to mount any volume, you can shut it down and start again and it will start fresh each time. Additionally, it supports confd configuration, so you can just pass stellar-core.cfg parameters using environment variables.