Onion Monero Blockchain Explorer

Monero blockchain explorer websites exist in the clearnet. Although useful, their limitations are that they use JavaScript, have images (might be used for coockless tracking), track users activates through google analytics, are not open sourced, and are not available as hidden services. These things are of importance for privacy-oriented users.

In this example, these limitations are addressed by development of an Onion Monero Blockchain Explorer. It is build in C++, and it not only shows how to use Monero C++ libraries, but also demonstrates how to use:

• crow - C++ micro web framework
• lmdb++ - C++ wrapper for the LMDB
• mstch - C++ {{mustache}} templates
• rapidjson - C++ JSON parser/generator

Onion Monero Blockchain Explorer features

• no javascript, no web analytics trackers, no images
• open source
• made fully in C++
• the only explorer showing encrypted payments ID
• the only explorer with the ability to search by encrypted payments ID, tx public keys, outputs public keys, input key images
• the only explorer showing ring signatures for inputs

Prerequisite

Everything here was done and tested using Monero 0.9.4 on Xubuntu 16.04 x86_64.

Instruction for Monero 0.9 compilation and Monero headers and libraries setup are as shown here:

• Compile Monero 0.9 on Ubuntu 16.04 x64
• lmdbcpp-monero

C++ code

int main(int ac, const char* av[]) {

    // get command line options
    xmreg::CmdLineOptions opts {ac, av};

    auto help_opt = opts.get_option<bool>("help");

    // if help was chosen, display help text and finish
    if (*help_opt)
    {
        return EXIT_SUCCESS;
    }

    auto port_opt           = opts.get_option<string>("port");
    auto bc_path_opt        = opts.get_option<string>("bc-path");
    auto custom_db_path_opt = opts.get_option<string>("custom-db-path");
    auto deamon_url_opt     = opts.get_option<string>("deamon-url");

    //cast port number in string to uint16
    uint16_t app_port = boost::lexical_cast<uint16_t>(*port_opt);

    // get blockchain path
    path blockchain_path;

    if (!xmreg::get_blockchain_path(bc_path_opt, blockchain_path))
    {
        cerr << "Error getting blockchain path." << endl;
        return EXIT_FAILURE;
    }

     // enable basic monero log output
    xmreg::enable_monero_log();

    // create instance of our MicroCore
    // and make pointer to the Blockchain
    xmreg::MicroCore mcore;
    cryptonote::Blockchain* core_storage;

    // initialize mcore and core_storage
    if (!xmreg::init_blockchain(blockchain_path.string(),
                               mcore, core_storage))
    {
        cerr << "Error accessing blockchain." << endl;
        return EXIT_FAILURE;
    }

    // create instance of page class which
    // contains logic for the website
    xmreg::page xmrblocks(&mcore, core_storage, *deamon_url_opt);

    // crow instance
    crow::SimpleApp app;

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/")
    ([&]() {
        return xmrblocks.index2();
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/page/<uint>")
    ([&](size_t page_no) {
        return xmrblocks.index2(page_no);
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/block/<uint>")
    ([&](size_t block_height) {
        return xmrblocks.show_block(block_height);
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/block/<string>")
    ([&](string block_hash) {
        return xmrblocks.show_block(block_hash);
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/tx/<string>")
    ([&](string tx_hash) {
        return xmrblocks.show_tx(tx_hash);
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/tx/<string>/<uint>")
    ([&](string tx_hash, uint with_ring_signatures) {
        return xmrblocks.show_tx(tx_hash, with_ring_signatures);
    });


    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/search").methods("GET"_method)
    ([&](const crow::request& req) {
        return xmrblocks.search(string(req.url_params.get("value")));
    });

    CROW_ROUTE(app, "/autorefresh")
    ([&]() {
        uint64_t page_no {0};
        bool refresh_page {true};
        return xmrblocks.index2(page_no, refresh_page);
    });

    // run the crow http server
    app.port(app_port).multithreaded().run();

    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Compile this example

The dependencies are same as those for Monero, so I assume Monero compiles correctly. If so then to download and compile this example, the following steps can be executed:

# download the source code
https://github.com/moneroexamples/onion-monero-blockchain-explorer.git

# enter the downloaded sourced code folder
cd onion-monero-blockchain-explorer

# create the makefile
cmake .

# compile
make

Other examples

Other examples can be found on github. Please know that some of the examples/repositories are not finished and may not work as intended.

How can you help?

Constructive criticism, code and website edits are always good. They can be made through github.

Some Monero are also welcome:

48daf1rG3hE1Txapcsxh6WXNe9MLNKtu7W7tKTivtSoVLHErYzvdcpea2nSTgGkz66RFP4GKVAsTV14v6G3oddBTHfxP6tU