benzo-explorer

The branded BenzoNet block explorer — a Blockscout deployment for explorer.benzo.space, with the Caddy edge that also fronts rpc.benzo.space and stats.benzo.space.

BenzoNet is a validatorOnly sovereign L1 (chain 68420, gas token BGAS), so no public explorer can index it — we self-host one. This repo is the deployment config, not application code (Blockscout is upstream). Backend + contracts live in Miny-Labs/benzo.

Live: https://explorer.benzo.space · RPC https://rpc.benzo.space

Architecture

internet ─▶ Caddy :443 (host-net, auto-TLS)
             ├─ explorer.benzo.space ─▶ 127.0.0.1:8090  (Blockscout nginx → frontend + /api)
             ├─ stats.benzo.space    ─▶ 127.0.0.1:8091  (Blockscout stats)
             └─ rpc.benzo.space      ─▶ 127.0.0.1:9650  (native node, POST → /ext/bc/<id>/rpc)

Blockscout backend ─▶ host.docker.internal:19650 ─(socat)─▶ 127.0.0.1:9650  (native avalanchego)

The node runs natively on the VM (systemd avalanchego.service) on 127.0.0.1:9650; a socat bridge exposes it to containers, and the node's http-allowed-hosts is * (safe — it's internal-only behind the firewall).

Deploy runbook (on the VM)

1. Node bridge — socat service so containers reach the native node:

   sudo tee /etc/systemd/system/benzonet-rpc-bridge.service <<'EOF'
   [Unit]
   After=network.target docker.service
   [Service]
   ExecStart=/usr/bin/socat TCP-LISTEN:19650,fork,reuseaddr,bind=0.0.0.0 TCP:127.0.0.1:9650
   Restart=always
   [Install]
   WantedBy=multi-user.target
   EOF
   sudo systemctl enable --now benzonet-rpc-bridge
   

2. Node accepts proxied Host — add "http-allowed-hosts": "*" to ~/.avalanchego/configs/node.json, sudo systemctl restart avalanchego.
3. Blockscout — git clone https://github.com/blockscout/blockscout, copy docker-compose.override.yml from this repo into blockscout/docker-compose/, set BENZONET_BLOCKCHAIN_ID in a .env there, then docker compose up -d.
4. Caddy — copy caddy/ here, substitute BENZONET_BLOCKCHAIN_ID, then:

   docker run -d --name benzo-caddy --network host --restart unless-stopped \
     -v $PWD/caddy/Caddyfile:/etc/caddy/Caddyfile:ro \
     -v $PWD/caddy/brand:/srv/brand:ro -v benzo-caddy-data:/data caddy:2
   

5. DNS — A-records explorer / rpc / stats.benzo.space → the VM IP; open firewall 80/443; keep the node ports private.

Gotchas (learned)

• The latest backend requires DB TLS → the db service self-signs + ssl=on.
• The node is pruned → ETHEREUM_JSONRPC_DISABLE_ARCHIVE_BALANCES=true.
• NFT-media / user-ops indexers crash without writable dets → disabled.
• Blockscout's nginx needs the visualizer/stats upstreams up, or it won't start — run the full docker compose up -d.

Brand

Benzo mark (caddy/brand/), violet #7342E2, dark "vault" #161E2D, BGAS currency. Tokens per Miny-Labs/benzo brand kit.