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Cosmovisor is a process manager designed for Cosmos SDK–based blockchains that simplifies the management of binary (chain) upgrades. This guide provides step‐by‐step instructions to set up Cosmovisor for your Injective Network node.
Note: These instructions assume you already have an existing chain binary (e.g., injectived) and a working Go environment if you choose to install Cosmovisor from source. Adjust the names and paths as needed for your specific setup.

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Table of Contents

  1. Installation
  2. Environment Variables
  3. Directory Structure
  4. Running Cosmovisor
  5. Handling Chain Upgrades
  6. Running Cosmovisor as a Systemd Service

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Installation

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Installing via Go

If you have Go installed, you can install Cosmovisor with the following command: 
go install cosmossdk.io/tools/cosmovisor/cmd/cosmovisor@v1.5.0
Tip: Ensure that your Go binary installation path (commonly $GOPATH/bin or $HOME/go/bin) is added to your system’s PATH. You can verify the installation by running: 
which cosmovisor

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Environment Variables

Set up the following environment variables so that Cosmovisor knows which binary to run and where to locate it:
  • DAEMON_NAME
    The name of your chain’s binary (e.g., injectived).
  • DAEMON_HOME
    The home directory for your node (e.g., ~/.injectived).
You can set these variables in your shell’s profile (like ~/.bashrc or ~/.profile) or export them directly in your terminal session: 
export DAEMON_NAME=injectived
export DAEMON_HOME=~/.injectived

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Directory Structure

Cosmovisor expects a specific folder structure in your node’s home directory:
  1. Create the Genesis Directory This directory holds the initial (genesis) binary. 
    mkdir -p $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/genesis/bin
  2. Copy Your Current Binary Place your current chain binary (e.g., injectived) into the genesis folder. Make sure the file name matches the DAEMON_NAME value (see next section). 
    cp $(which injectived) $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/genesis/bin/injectived

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Running Cosmovisor

Instead of running your chain’s binary directly, start your node with Cosmovisor by executing: 
cosmovisor run start
Cosmovisor will:
  • Look for the binary in $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/genesis/bin (or the appropriate upgrade folder).
  • Start your node using that binary.
  • Monitor for any on-chain upgrade signals and automatically switch binaries when needed.

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Handling Chain Upgrades

When an upgrade is announced on-chain, prepare the new binary so Cosmovisor can switch to it automatically:
  1. Create an Upgrade Directory Use the upgrade name provided on-chain (e.g., v1.14.0): 
    mkdir -p $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/upgrades/<upgrade_name>/bin
  2. Place the New Binary Compile or download the new binary, then copy it into the upgrade directory. Ensure the binary name matches DAEMON_NAME. 
    cp /path/to/new/injectived $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/upgrades/<upgrade_name>/bin
cp /path/to/new/libwasmvm.x86_64.so $DAEMON_HOME/cosmovisor/upgrades/<upgrade_name>/bin
TIP: If you have downloaded the injectived binary package from GitHub, we copy libwasmvm.x86_64.so to the upgrade bin directory. An environment variable will be later added to the systemd service to add this directory to LD_LIBRARY_PATH.
  1. Upgrade Process When the upgrade height is reached, Cosmovisor will detect the scheduled upgrade and automatically switch to the binary located in the corresponding upgrade folder.

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Running Cosmovisor as a Systemd Service

For production environments, it is common to run your node as a systemd service. Below is an example service file.
  1. Create the Service File Create a file (e.g., /etc/systemd/system/injectived.service) with the following content. Adjust the paths and <your_username> accordingly: 
    [Unit]
Description=Injective Daemon managed by Cosmovisor
After=network-online.target

[Service]
User=<your_username>
ExecStart=/home/<your_username>/go/bin/cosmovisor run start
Restart=always
RestartSec=3
Environment="DAEMON_NAME=injectived"
Environment="DAEMON_HOME=/home/<your_username>/.injectived"
Environment="PATH=/usr/local/bin:/home/<your_username>/go/bin:$PATH"
Environment="DAEMON_ALLOW_DOWNLOAD_BINARIES=false"
Environment="DAEMON_RESTART_AFTER_UPGRADE=true"
Environment="UNSAFE_SKIP_BACKUP=true"
Environment="LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/home/<your_username>/.injectived/cosmovisor/current/bin"

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
  2. Enable and Start the Service 
    sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable injectived.service
sudo systemctl start injectived.service
  3. Check Logs Verify that your service is running smoothly: 
    journalctl -u injectived.service -f