CometBFT Configuration Manual

    Overview

    The CometBFT configuration has three distinct parts:

    1. The network parameters in genesis.json.
    2. The nodeID in node_key.json.
    3. The configuration of the node and its services in config.toml.

    Validator nodes also require a private/public key-pair to sign consensus messages.

    If a Hardware Security Module (HSM) is not available, CometBFT stores an unencrypted key-pair on the file system in the priv_validator_key.json file and the state of the last block signed in priv_validator_state.json.

    The HOME folder

    The CometBFT HOME folder contains all configuration (in the $HOME/config folder) for CometBFT as well as all the databases (in the $HOME/data folder) used during execution.

    Path to the folder is defined by these steps:

    1. The home folder for CometBFT is read from the CMTHOME environment variable.
    2. If the variable is undefined, it is assumed the default $HOME/.cometbft.
    3. The environment variable is overridden by the --home command-line parameter.

    By default, all configuration files are stored under the $CMTHOME/config directory. These can be overridden individually for each file in the config.toml file, for example to override the genesis_file location change it here.

    By default, all databases are stored under the $CMTHOME/data directory. This can be overridden at the db_dir parameter in the config.toml file.

    Decorative Orb