shadowoftime

Monad testnet validator

Independent operator running dedicated infrastructure for the Monad network. Focused on reliability, transparency and long-term participation.

Testnet full node online · monad v0.14.1
Monad network · live
217
Mainnet
validators
257
Testnet
validators
Applied
VDP Wave 2
via validator-info registry
MonadPulse Deep network intelligence for the Monad ecosystem monadpulse.xyz ↗
01About

About

Solo operator, built for the long run.

I've been running blockchain infrastructure for more than 7 years across multiple L1 and L2 networks, both Proof-of-Stake and zero-knowledge protocols. Over that time I've learned the rhythms of upgrade cycles, epoch boundaries, slashing windows, snapshot restores and the hundred other things that only reveal themselves when you actually operate production nodes.

Today my focus is the Monad Validator Delegation Program. I run an unmodified testnet full node with careful operations practice and continuous monitoring, and I believe in decentralization through geographic and operator diversity. I'm committed to the vanilla Monad consensus — no custom MEV infrastructure, no third-party block-building.

I've also written two open references for the Monad ecosystem: a practical full-node install guide with all the rakes the official docs politely step around, and a network reference covering MonadBFT, parallel execution, tokenomics and the live testnet / mainnet coordinates. Both are free for anyone to use.

02Past

Experience

Earlier networks I've run nodes on.

Monad isn't my first chain. Over the last few years I've operated nodes across several different architectures — each taught me something about the specific class of problems you only see when you actually run production infrastructure.

Active nodes 3
  1. StarknetActive · full node
    Running a full node on the STARK-based rollup. Cairo VM and validity proofs — a very different mental model from every EVM chain, with its own operational rhythm around proof submission and L1 settlement.
  2. Oasis NetworkActive · node operator
    ParaTime-based architecture with confidential compute. Operating in the Oasis ecosystem taught me how to handle multiple runtime environments sharing consensus and the peculiarities of privacy-preserving execution.
  3. MonadActive · testnet · current focus
    My current primary focus. Running an unmodified testnet full node with a dedicated TrieDB, the full monitoring stack and a long-term operations plan targeting the Validator Delegation Program.
Past nodes 6
  1. MinaBlock producer
    Zero-knowledge L1 with SNARK-based consensus. Hands-on experience with a delegation-driven block production model and the quirks of verifying succinct proofs at runtime.
  2. SolanaValidator
    High-throughput L1 that forces you to care about hardware, network latency and disk I/O. Extensive metrics, skip rate, vote credit accounting, aggressive monitoring.
  3. CosmosValidator · multiple zones
    Tendermint-based networks with on-chain governance, bonding and slashing semantics. Learned the discipline of epoch-aware operations, double-sign avoidance and graceful upgrades.
  4. SuiFull node
    Object-centric state model with the Move VM. Different mental model for state, different storage pressure profile — a useful contrast to EVM-family chains.
  5. ArchwayValidator
    CosmWasm-based smart contract chain with developer incentives baked into the protocol. Interesting fee-sharing model and a good case study in operator alignment.
  6. DymensionValidator · RollApp era
    Modular blockchain hub for app-specific rollups built on the Cosmos stack. Hands-on experience with the RollApp architecture, sequencer dynamics and DA-layer interactions.
03Live

Live status

Technical snapshot of the node.

Values captured directly from the running node at build time. Service SLA computed from a rolling tick log sampled every minute by the internal monitoring stack.

disk / 5% · 34 / 814 GB
triedb 11.89% · 212.62 / 1750 GB
nvme temps 33° 34° 36° 37°
ntp sync yes
client monad 0.14.1 · unmodified
snapshot · 2026-04-16 13:47 UTC
04Ops

Monitoring & Operations

Alerting that wakes me up before delegators do.

The validator is monitored continuously by a custom Telegram-integrated stack — systemd-level failure alerts, cron-based periodic health checks, and a long-poll command bot for remote status queries. Anti-spam suppression keeps incidents surfacing cleanly without noise.

  • 18 health checks on a 5-minute cron — services, RPC liveness, block progress, peer count, disk, TrieDB capacity, NVMe temperature, NTP drift, kernel errors, SSH anomalies.
  • Hourly deep checks for NVMe SMART health, wear level, critical warnings, pending security updates and new client releases.
  • systemd OnFailure alerts the moment monad-bft, monad-execution or monad-rpc crash or exit unexpectedly.
  • SLA tracker with per-minute sampling and rolling 1 h / 24 h / 7 d uptime percentages.
  • Interactive Telegram bot — 20+ read-only and destructive (confirmation-gated) commands for remote operations.
  • Hardened firewall — iptables v4 + v6 with policy DROP, only SSH, P2P (8000 tcp/udp, 8001 udp) and ICMP exposed.
  • OpenTelemetry metrics collector bound strictly to localhost, scraped by the internal monitoring stack only.
  • Documented runbook and persistent state tracker for reproducible recovery and on-boarding.
05Keys

Validator identity

On-chain references.

These are the public node identifiers and the EVM control address used for registration and governance operations.

NODE NAME
shadowoftime
SECP PUBKEY
029337dc788d1dd262280524a47cefa68b7ea5651016279b54cc20305a2e1aa7b6
BLS PUBKEY
86902ce27a2bf311007e3b625243c37d52dc4a06ca96a394781408b043fea8a108ffd5167602f9c13e2e2fb27a7b7e21
EVM ADDRESS
0x92936497B6ad2BA84b3f7Af22C9afF15f00b13B5
NETWORK
Monad Testnet · chain_id 10143
EXPLORERS
MonadVision · Monadscan · Socialscan