Ethereum geth cannot connect to bootnode to access private ethereum network

Question

The following docker-compose.yml is used to start an Ethereum geth node, which needs to connect to a bootnode in order to access a private Ethereum network.

version: '2' 

    geth:
    image: ethereum/client-go:latest
    volumes:
        - ./node:/root/.ethereum
        - ./files/genesis.json:/root/genesis.json:ro
    ports:
        - "30303:30303"
        - "30303:30303/udp"
        - 8543:8545
    command: --rpc --rpcaddr 0.0.0.0 --networkid 13377331 --bootnodes="enode://692b8eda368ffc427fc1a047850557536a0ef0bfa3b66f998e03e8b83c3fd8f786e3c2b710a20e2e821a9eff34fc7b34ffa326a8a5fbcf3634b55b44596ada43@159.999.999.999:30303" --nodiscover

However after running docker-compose up, we see that the chain configuration echoed is the default one, and not the config that the bootnode is using

Initialised chain configuration config="{ChainID: 1 Homestead: 1150000 DAO: 1920000 DAOSupport: true EIP150: 2463000 EIP155: 2675000 EIP158: 2675000 Byzantium: 4370000 Constantinople: Engine: ethash}"

Question: Why is geth not connecting to the bootnode and not using the config that the bootnode has in its genesis.json?

docker-compose output:

geth_1  | WARN [07-15|00:48:33.310] Sanitizing cache to Go's GC limits       provided=1024 updated=666
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.310] Maximum peer count                       ETH=25 LES=0 total=25
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.317] Starting peer-to-peer node               instance=Geth/v1.8.13-unstable-2e0391ea/linux-amd64/go1.10.3
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.317] Allocated cache and file handles         database=/root/.ethereum/geth/chaindata cache=499 handles=1024
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.331] Writing default main-net genesis block 
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.632] Persisted trie from memory database      nodes=12356 size=1.88mB time=84.3549ms gcnodes=0 gcsize=0.00B gctime=0s livenodes=1 livesize=0.00B
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.636] Initialised chain configuration          config="{ChainID: 1 Homestead: 1150000 DAO: 1920000 DAOSupport: true EIP150: 2463000 EIP155: 2675000 EIP158: 2675000 Byzantium: 4370000 Constantinople: <nil> Engine: ethash}"
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.636] Disk storage enabled for ethash caches   dir=/root/.ethereum/geth/ethash count=3
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.636] Disk storage enabled for ethash DAGs     dir=/root/.ethash               count=2
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.636] Initialising Ethereum protocol           versions="[63 62]" network=1
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.637] Loaded most recent local header          number=0 hash=d4e567…cb8fa3 td=17179869184
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.637] Loaded most recent local full block      number=0 hash=d4e567…cb8fa3 td=17179869184
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.637] Loaded most recent local fast block      number=0 hash=d4e567…cb8fa3 td=17179869184
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.640] Regenerated local transaction journal    transactions=0 accounts=0
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.640] Starting P2P networking 
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.641] RLPx listener up                         self="enode://27175216e04387fb93e87a4069021b640fc6f87f985c86940e3297103a2b5e348bdecec4eea98af6ee2f106890fd28b49e1d983b6c5b8ce9ae1571c032bf2d5c@[::]:30303?discport=0"
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.644] IPC endpoint opened                      url=/root/.ethereum/geth.ipc
geth_1  | INFO [07-15|00:48:33.645] HTTP endpoint opened                     url=http://0.0.0.0:8545      cors= vhosts=localhost

genesis.json

{
    "config": {
    "chainId": 13377331,
    "homesteadBlock": 1,
    "eip150Block": 2,
    "eip150Hash": "0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000",
    "eip155Block": 3,
    "eip158Block": 3,
    "byzantiumBlock": 4,
    "clique": {
        "period": 15,
        "epoch": 30000
    }
    },
....

Answer 1

It seems that you were using default datadir instead of your private datadir initialized with genesis.json. As the result, geth started as a main network node by using default datadir (see database=/root/.ethereum/geth/chaindata and versions="[63 62]" network=1 in the output).

To boot up your private node, try the following steps:

1. Initialize your geth datadir with genesis.json. For example:

   geth --datadir path/to/custom/data/folder init genesis.json

2. Start your geth by using the datadir and networkid. For example:

   geth --datadir path/to/custom/data/folder --networkid 13377331

Note that these steps use --datadir option.

For more information, see the geth wiki.