# Hyperledger Fabric Network Setup from Scratch

## Introduction

In this tutorial we will be setting up Hyperledger Fabric network from scratch without using any magical scripts that we use in test-network or first-network. Those scripts work great but they abstract many things that one needs to know in orderer to gain expertise in HLF.

We will be using Fabric version 2.2.3 LTS.
If this is your first time with Fabric version 2+ then, I will highly recommend to install the  [prerequisites](https://saifworks.hashnode.dev/install-hyperledger-fabric-v22xlts-or-v23-on-ubuntu) first before proceeding any further .

You can find the code used in this tutorial in my  [github repo ](https://github.com/SaifDeveloper/FabricNwScratch) 

Once you have cloned or downloaded the repository, you can place it inside the fabric-sample directory(comes with the fabric installation).

At this stage, you will be ready to follow along!

### What will we be building ?

We will be building a network which is similar to the "test-network" without using any scripts. The network consists of:

- Two organizations 
- One peer per organization
- One orderer (single node Raft) 
- Two CLIs for each organization

We will use docker-compose to orchestrate the network.


### Step 1: Generating the crypto materials

We point to the fabric binaries which comes with the HLF installation.

```export PATH=${PWD}/../bin:$PATH``` 

Then we will use cryptogen to generate the certificates as per the configurations provided in the `organizations/cryptogen` folder.

From your terminal: 

```
cryptogen generate --config=./organizations/cryptogen/crypto-config-org1.yaml --output=organizations

cryptogen generate --config=./organizations/cryptogen/crypto-config-org2.yaml --output=organizations

cryptogen generate --config=./organizations/cryptogen/crypto-config-orderer.yaml --output=organizations

``` 
You should be able to see two new directories created under organization

- ordererOrganizations  
- peerOrganizations

The directories will have the certificates and MSPs for the orderer and peers.

### Step 2: Genesis block generation


```
configtxgen -profile TwoOrgsOrdererGenesis -channelID system-channel -outputBlock ./system-genesis-block/genesis.block

``` 

This should generate `genesis.block` file under `system-genesis-block` directory.

### Step 3: Generate channel artifacts

Channel artifact consists of:

- Channel configuration transaction
- Anchor peer updates


```
configtxgen -profile TwoOrgsChannel -outputCreateChannelTx ./channel-artifacts/mychannel.tx -channelID mychannel

configtxgen -profile TwoOrgsChannel -outputAnchorPeersUpdate ./channel-artifacts/Org1MSPanchors.tx -channelID mychannel -asOrg Org1MSP

configtxgen -profile TwoOrgsChannel -outputAnchorPeersUpdate ./channel-artifacts/Org2MSPanchors.tx -channelID mychannel -asOrg Org2MSP
``` 

You will be able to see `mychannel.tx `, `Org1MSPanchors.tx`, `Org2MSPanchors.tx` in the `channel-artifacts` directory.

### Step 4 : Bring up the network

We will use the `docker-compose-test-net.yaml` to bring up the network. This file contains the following services:

- orderer.example.com
- peer0.org1.example.com
- peer0.org2.example.com
- cliorg1
- cliorg2

We first source the project environment variables the bring up the compose file.


```
. .env
docker-compose -f docker/docker-compose-test-net.yaml up -d
``` 

You should be able to see five containers up. 2 peers, 2 CLIs and 1 orderer.

![Screenshot from 2021-06-07 23-37-51.png](https://cdn.hashnode.com/res/hashnode/image/upload/v1623089408561/X0AnDqqIl.png)


### Step 4: Channel Genesis Block File

We will be using one of our CLIs for this step.

We log inside the `cliorg1`:

```docker exec -it cliorg1 bash``` 

From `cliorg1` we generate the `mychannel.block` file.

```
peer channel create -o orderer.example.com:7050 -c mychannel --ordererTLSHostnameOverride orderer.example.com -f ./channel-artifacts/mychannel.tx --outputBlock ./channel-artifacts/mychannel.block --tls --cafile $ORDERER_CA

``` 

### Step 5: Join peers to the channel

From `cliorg1`, we join peer0 of org1 to `mychannel`.


```
peer channel join -b ./channel-artifacts/mychannel.block

``` 

Now, we need to get inside cli of org2 to join its peer to `mychannel`.

```docker exec -it cliorg2 bash``` 

```
peer channel join -b ./channel-artifacts/mychannel.block

``` 

### Step 6: Anchor peer update

We go inside the `cliorg1` and update the anchor peer for org1.

```
peer channel update -o orderer.example.com:7050 --ordererTLSHostnameOverride orderer.example.com -c mychannel -f ./channel-artifacts/Org1MSPanchors.tx --tls true --cafile $ORDERER_CA

```

Simiarly, we go inside the `cliorg1` and update the anchor peer for org1.


```
peer channel update -o orderer.example.com:7050 --ordererTLSHostnameOverride orderer.example.com -c mychannel -f ./channel-artifacts/Org2MSPanchors.tx --tls true --cafile $ORDERER_CA

``` 

That's it! Congratualtions!!! You have successfully setup the HLF network from scratch, without using a single script. At this stage, chaincode can be deployed over the network.

### Clean up


```
docker-compose -f docker/docker-compose-test-net.yaml down --volume

docker volume prune
docker network prune

rm -rf channel-artifacts system-genesis-block organizations/ordererOrganizations organizations/peerOrganizations

``` 

Do leave a comment incase you face any issue or have any queries.