Joining the Live ILP Network

A previous blog post described how to join the ILP testnet. This post is for those who want to go further, and join the first pioneering users of the Interledger live network.

You’ll be using Moneyd to connect to the live network. To reiterate the previous post on Moneyd:

Moneyd is a daemon that lets programs on your computer use the Interledger network. You can think of it as your “home router” for the internet of value. If you’re new to Interledger, this is a good place to start.

Moneyd uses “uplinks” to connect to Interledger. So far, we’ve published moneyd-uplink-xrp, which uses payment channels on XRP to connect to peer with an Interledger connector. We’re working on modules for Ethereum and Lightning too, but they’re not yet ready to publish. Stay tuned for progress on them.

Because this tutorial is using moneyd-uplink-xrp on the live network, you’ll need to own some XRP to complete this tutorial. Around 35 XRP is required. Information about exchanges that list XRP is available on Ripple’s website.

If you don’t have XRP and don’t want to buy any, stay tuned for future tutorials that describe how to join the network with Ethereum and Bitcoin.

Don’t use an XRP wallet with more than the minimum required balance, for safety reasons. Always exercise caution when you work with live funds!

Prerequisites

• Install Node.js (version 8.9.4 or higher)
• Set up node to install modules globally
• Have your XRP secret/seed (The base58 string that begins with s)
• Have at least 35 XRP in your account
• If you already have Moneyd installed, make sure to upgrade to the latest version. Moneyd version 4 or higher is required.

Now you can install and configure Moneyd for the live network.

This command will open a payment channel to a parent connector, locking up 10 XRP. Additionally, while this channel is open, your account reserve increases by 5 XRP.

This XRP can be taken out of the channel by following the instructions for cleaning up channels.

npm install -g moneyd moneyd-uplink-xrp
moneyd xrp:configure
moneyd xrp:start

Enter your secret/seed when the xrp:configure command prompts you. This will be written to a file so that Moneyd can automatically open channels for you. Never use a secret with more XRP than you need.

Give Moneyd a few seconds to create the payment channel. Once that’s done, you’ll be connected to the ILP livenet!

What Can You Do on the Livenet?

When you’re running Moneyd on the livenet, any ILP-enabled services on your machine will also be on the livenet.

• If you run an SPSP receiver (as described in the SPSP tutorial), then it will allow you to receive livenet funds.
• If you run a paid API (as described in the HTTP-ILP tutorial), it will receive charge for its API calls on the livenet.

If you want to be a sender, the services described in the other tutorials have livenet counterparts:

• If you’ve followed the Paid API Tutorial, you can access alpha.unhash.io and beta.unhash.io on the live network (In place of unhash.ilp-test.com).
• If you’ve followed the Simple Payment Setup Protocol Tutorial, you can pay to $harafian.com, my personal SPSP payment pointer.
• If you followed the Sending out of the Interledger Network Tutorial, you can pay to $spsp.siren.sh/r... in place of $settle.ilp-test.com/r....