Running IBC Relayer

An IBC relayer is a software component that facilitates communication between two distinct blockchain networks that support the Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC) protocol. Built-in oracle, Minitswap, and other cross-chain services require it to function with your rollup.

Weave currently only supports Rapid relayer configuration generation. It will support running the rapid relayer directly in the future. For more detailed information about Rapid relayer, see the Rapid relayer documentation.

Weave only supports IBC relayer setup between Initia L1 and Interwoven Rollups. Setting up relayers between other arbitrary networks is not supported.

Setting Up

For this guide, you’ll need Weave v0.3.0 or newer. You can check your Weave version by running weave version. If you need to upgrade, run weave upgrade.

weave relayer init

This command will guide you through 2 major parts of the relayer setup:

• Setting up networks and channels to relay messages between
• Setting up the account responsible for relaying messages

For the former, Weave will present you with three options:

1. Configure channels between Initia L1 and a whitelisted Rollup (those available in Initia Registry)
2. Configure using artifacts from weave rollup launch (recommended for users who have just launched their rollup)
3. Configure manually

As for the latter, Weave will ask whether you want to use the OPinit Challenger bot account for the relayer. This is recommended as it is exempted from gas fees on the rollup and able to stop other relayers from relaying when it detects a malicious message.

Relayer requires funds to relay messages between Initia L1 and your rollup (if it’s not in the fee whitelist). If Weave detects that your account does not have enough funds, Weave will ask you to fund via Gas Station.

Running Relayer

Currently, Weave generates the relayer configuration file but does not run the relayer directly. You’ll need to manually set up and run the Rapid relayer using the generated configuration.

Make sure you have Node.js and npm installed on your system if you wish to run the relayer in the same machine.

1. Clone and Install Rapid relayer

   Clone the Rapid relayer repository and install its dependencies:

   git clone https://github.com/initia-labs/rapid-relayer
   cd rapid-relayer
   npm install
   
2. Copy Configuration File

   Move the generated configuration file to the Rapid relayer directory:

   cp ~/.relayer/config.json ./config.json
   
3. Start the Relayer

   Launch the relayer with the configuration:

   npm start
   

Help

To see all the available commands:

weave relayer --help