OpenBazaar

The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.

This article or section needs language, wiki syntax or style improvements. See Help:Style for reference.

Reason: No citation for experimental warning. Pro: & Con: instead of proper English sentences. Some sentences miss articles. (Discuss in Talk:OpenBazaar)

OpenBazaar is an open source project developing a protocol for e-commerce transactions in a fully decentralized marketplace using cryptocurrencies.

This is experimental software. Use at your own risk.

Installation

The openbazaar^AUR package provides the client and openbazaard^AUR provides the server.

Start server

You can view the configuration options with openbazaard start --help.

We will use Tor for more anonymity and --allowip=127.0.0.1 so only you have access to your OB server.

Also consider the options --password= to encrypt the database, and --disablewallet to disable the wallet functionality of the node.

As user

We will store the OB server files in ~/.local/share/openbazaar.

As user with Tor Browser

Pro: less configuration, con: you must start Tor Browser first. see torbrowser-launcher-git^AUR

Run as user:

$ openbazaard start -d ~/.local/share/openbazaar --tor --allowip=127.0.0.1 --verbose

with the --tor option, OB server will use your Tor Browser as the Tor entry node.

As user with Tor

To use your system-wide Tor proxy, you must configure Tor first.

Choose a password to secure your Tor Control Port. Run

$ tor --hash-password password

to get the password hash.

Add to your /etc/tor/torrc file:

ControlPort 9051
HashedControlPassword hash

setting HashedControlPassword to your password hash.

Now you can start the OB server as user:

$ openbazaard start -d ~/.local/share/openbazaar --torpassword=your_tor_control_password --allowip=127.0.0.1 --verbose

setting --torpassword to your Tor password.

System-wide

We will store the OB server files in /var/lib/openbazaar.

openbazaard will run as user openbazaar in group openbazaar.

We will use system-wide Tor, not Tor Browser.

Read section #As user with Tor to configure tor.

Edit server configuration file /etc/conf.d/openbazaard as root

# OB_ARGS="-d /var/lib/openbazaar --torpassword=your_tor_control_password --allowip=127.0.0.1 --verbose"

To init the server files run as root

# mkdir /var/lib/openbazaar
# chown openbazaar:openbazaar /var/lib/openbazaar
# chmod 0700 /var/lib/openbazaar

The openbazaard systemd service seems broken at the moment. It will look good, but not start the OB server. openbazaard status will only show your database status, and whether tor is available. it will not show, whether OB server is running.

Instead, run as root

# source /etc/conf.d/openbazaard
# sudo -u openbazaar openbazaard start $OB_ARGS

You should see some ASCII art

________                      __________
\_____  \ ______   ____   ____\______   \_____  _____________  _____ _______
 /   |   \\____ \_/ __ \ /    \|    |  _/\__  \ \___   /\__  \ \__  \\_  __ \ 
/    |    \  |_> >  ___/|   |  \    |   \ / __ \_/    /  / __ \_/ __ \|  | \/
\_______  /   __/ \___  >___|  /______  /(____  /_____ \(____  (____  /__|
        \/|__|        \/     \/       \/      \/      \/     \/     \/

... along with error-free log messages

Wait for

[INFO] [cmd/newHTTPGateway] Gateway/API server listening on /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/4002

For more server configuration, see

openbazaard gencerts --help
openbazaard setapicreds --help

To generate SSL certificates, or set username and password for 'API access' to allow clients to connect. Both will need the option -d dir or --datadir=dir

Start client

Run openbazaar as user.

The default server configuration should be fine.

If your server admin did configure a login with openbazaard setapicreds then fill the Username and Password fields.

To connect to a tor-hidden OB server, set Server IP to the .onion address, activate Use Tor, and enter your_tor_control_password to connect via your system tor node.

Otherwise, when using the localhost OB server, the Use Tor setting should not be needed.