doc(features): Document optional `zebrad` features and clean up README (#4680)

* Document configs that need compile-time features

* Document features in zebrad/src/lib.rs

* Link to the feature list from the README

* Remove some outdated README info

* Move some detailed README info to the `zebrad` crate docs
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@ -25,51 +25,25 @@ consensus-compatible implementation of a Zcash node, currently under
development. It can be used to join the Zcash peer-to-peer network, which helps
keeping Zcash working by validating and broadcasting transactions, and maintaining
the Zcash blockchain state in a distributed manner.
[Zcash](https://doc.zebra.zfnd.org/zebrad/index.html#about-zcash)
is a cryptocurrency designed to preserve the user's privacy.
If you just want to send and receive Zcash then you don't need to use Zebra
directly. You can download a Zcash wallet application which will handle that
for you.
Please [join us on Discord](https://discord.gg/na6QZNd) if you'd
like to find out more or get involved!
Zcash is a cryptocurrency designed to preserve the user's privacy. Like most
cryptocurrencies, it works by a collection of software nodes run by members of
the Zcash community or any other interested parties. The nodes talk to each
other in peer-to-peer fashion in order to maintain the state of the Zcash
blockchain. They also communicate with miners who create new blocks. When a
Zcash user sends Zcash, their wallet broadcasts transactions to these nodes
which will eventually reach miners, and the mined transaction will then go
through Zcash nodes until they reach the recipient's wallet which will report
the received Zcash to the recipient.
### Using Zebra
The original Zcash node is named `zcashd` and is developed by the Electric Coin
Company as a fork of the original Bitcoin node. Zebra, on the other hand, is
an independent Zcash node implementation developed from scratch. Since they
implement the same protocol, `zcashd` and Zebra nodes can communicate with each
other and maintain the Zcash network together.
If you just want to send and receive Zcash then you don't need to use Zebra
directly. You can download a Zcash wallet application which will handle that
for you. (Eventually, Zebra can be used by wallets to implement their
functionality.) You would want to run Zebra if you want to contribute to the
You would want to run Zebra if you want to contribute to the
Zcash network: the more nodes are run, the more reliable the network will be
in terms of speed and resistance to denial of service attacks, for example.
These are some of the advantages or benefits of Zebra:
- Better performance: since it was implemented from scratch in an async, parallelized way, Zebra
is currently faster than `zcashd`.
- Better security: since it is developed in a memory-safe language (Rust), Zebra
is less likely to be affected by memory-safety and correctness security bugs that
could compromise the environment where it is run.
- Better governance: with a new node deployment, there will be more developers
who can implement different features for the Zcash network.
- Dev accessibility: supports more developers, which gives new developers
options for contributing to Zcash protocol development.
- Runtime safety: with an independent implementation, the detection of consensus bugs
can happen quicker, reducing the risk of consensus splits.
- Spec safety: with several node implementations, it is much easier to notice
bugs and ambiguity in protocol specification.
- User options: different nodes present different features and tradeoffs for
users to decide on their preferred options.
- Additional contexts: wider target deployments for people to use a consensus
node in more contexts e.g. mobile, wasm, etc.
Zebra aims to be
[faster, more secure, and more easily extensible](https://doc.zebra.zfnd.org/zebrad/index.html#zebra-advantages)
than other Zcash implementations.
## Beta Releases
@ -78,11 +52,7 @@ Every few weeks, we release a new Zebra beta [release](https://github.com/ZcashF
Zebra's network stack is interoperable with `zcashd`,
and Zebra implements all the features required to reach Zcash network consensus.
The goals of the beta release series are for Zebra to act as a fully validating Zcash node,
for all active consensus rules as of NU5 activation.
Currently, Zebra validates all of the Zcash consensus rules for the NU5 network upgrade.
(As of the second NU5 activation on testnet.)
But it may not validate any:
- Undocumented rules derived from Bitcoin
@ -106,7 +76,7 @@ for your platform:
2. Install Zebra's build dependencies:
- **libclang:** the `libclang`, `libclang-dev`, `llvm`, or `llvm-dev` packages, depending on your package manager
- **clang** or another C++ compiler: `g++`, `Xcode`, or `MSVC`
3. Run `cargo install --locked --git https://github.com/ZcashFoundation/zebra --tag v1.0.0-beta.11 zebrad`
3. Run `cargo install --locked --git https://github.com/ZcashFoundation/zebra --tag v1.0.0-beta.11 zebrad`
4. Run `zebrad start` (see [Running Zebra](https://zebra.zfnd.org/user/run.html) for more information)
If you're interested in testing out `zebrad` please feel free, but keep in mind
@ -114,6 +84,15 @@ that there is a lot of key functionality still missing.
For more detailed instructions, refer to the [documentation](https://zebra.zfnd.org/user/install.html).
### Optional Features
For performance reasons, some debugging and monitoring features are disabled in release builds.
You can [enable these features](https://doc.zebra.zfnd.org/zebrad/index.html#zebra-feature-flags) using:
```sh
cargo install --features=<name> ...
```
### System Requirements
The recommended requirements for compiling and running `zebrad` are:
@ -206,8 +185,6 @@ So Zebra's state should always be valid, unless your OS or disk hardware is corr
## Known Issues
There are a few bugs in Zebra that we're still working on fixing:
- [Old state versions are not deleted #1213](https://github.com/ZcashFoundation/zebra/issues/1213)
- When Zebra changes its state format, it does not delete the old state directory. You can delete old state directories if you need the space.
- [No Windows support #3801](https://github.com/ZcashFoundation/zebra/issues/3801)
- We used to test with Windows Server 2019, but not anymore; see issue for details
@ -217,7 +194,6 @@ Features:
- Wallet functionality
Performance and Reliability:
- Reliable syncing on Testnet
- Reliable syncing under poor network conditions
- Additional batch verification
- Performance tuning

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@ -95,11 +95,15 @@ pub struct TracingSection {
/// The address used for an ad-hoc RPC endpoint allowing dynamic control of the tracing filter.
///
/// Install Zebra using `cargo install --features=filter-reload` to enable this config.
///
/// If this is set to None, the endpoint is disabled.
pub endpoint_addr: Option<SocketAddr>,
/// Controls whether to write a flamegraph of tracing spans.
///
/// Install Zebra using `cargo install --features=flamegraph` to enable this config.
///
/// If this is set to None, flamegraphs are disabled. Otherwise, it specifies
/// an output file path, as described below.
///
@ -125,6 +129,8 @@ pub struct TracingSection {
/// The use_journald flag sends tracing events to systemd-journald, on Linux
/// distributions that use systemd.
///
/// Install Zebra using `cargo install --features=journald` to enable this config.
pub use_journald: bool,
}
@ -147,6 +153,8 @@ impl Default for TracingSection {
pub struct MetricsSection {
/// The address used for the Prometheus metrics endpoint.
///
/// Install Zebra using `cargo install --features=prometheus` to enable this config.
///
/// The endpoint is disabled if this is set to `None`.
pub endpoint_addr: Option<SocketAddr>,
}

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@ -1,18 +1,90 @@
//! ![Zebra logotype](https://zfnd.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/zebra-logotype.png)
//!
//! Hello! I am Zebra, an ongoing Rust implementation of a Zcash node.
//! Zebra is a Zcash node written in Rust.
//!
//! Zebra is a work in progress. It is developed as a collection of `zebra-*`
//! libraries implementing the different components of a Zcash node (networking,
//! chain structures, consensus rules, etc), and a `zebrad` binary which uses them.
//!
//! Most of our work so far has gone into `zebra-network`, building a new
//! networking stack for Zcash, and `zebra-chain`, building foundational data
//! structures.
//! The `zebrad` binary uses a collection of `zebra-*` crates,
//! which implement the different components of a Zcash node
//! (networking, chain structures, validation, rpc, etc).
//!
//! [Rendered docs from the `main` branch](https://doc.zebra.zfnd.org).
//!
//! [Join us on the Zcash Foundation Engineering Discord](https://discord.gg/na6QZNd).
//!
//! ## About Zcash
//!
//! Zcash is a cryptocurrency designed to preserve the user's privacy. Like most
//! cryptocurrencies, it works by a collection of software nodes run by members of
//! the Zcash community or any other interested parties. The nodes talk to each
//! other in peer-to-peer fashion in order to maintain the state of the Zcash
//! blockchain. They also communicate with miners who create new blocks. When a
//! Zcash user sends Zcash, their wallet broadcasts transactions to these nodes
//! which will eventually reach miners, and the mined transaction will then go
//! through Zcash nodes until they reach the recipient's wallet which will report
//! the received Zcash to the recipient.
//!
//! ## Alternative Implementations
//!
//! The original Zcash node is named `zcashd` and is developed by the Electric Coin
//! Company as a fork of the original Bitcoin node. Zebra, on the other hand, is
//! an independent Zcash node implementation developed from scratch. Since they
//! implement the same protocol, `zcashd` and Zebra nodes can communicate with each
//! other and maintain the Zcash network together.
//!
//! ## Zebra Advantages
//!
//! These are some of the advantages or benefits of Zebra:
//!
//! - Better performance: since it was implemented from scratch in an async, parallelized way, Zebra
//! is currently faster than `zcashd`.
//! - Better security: since it is developed in a memory-safe language (Rust), Zebra
//! is less likely to be affected by memory-safety and correctness security bugs that
//! could compromise the environment where it is run.
//! - Better governance: with a new node deployment, there will be more developers
//! who can implement different features for the Zcash network.
//! - Dev accessibility: supports more developers, which gives new developers
//! options for contributing to Zcash protocol development.
//! - Runtime safety: with an independent implementation, the detection of consensus bugs
//! can happen quicker, reducing the risk of consensus splits.
//! - Spec safety: with several node implementations, it is much easier to notice
//! bugs and ambiguity in protocol specification.
//! - User options: different nodes present different features and tradeoffs for
//! users to decide on their preferred options.
//! - Additional contexts: wider target deployments for people to use a consensus
//! node in more contexts e.g. mobile, wasm, etc.
//!
//! ## Zebra Feature Flags
//!
//! The following `zebrad` feature flags are available at compile time:
//!
//! ### Metrics
//!
//! * `prometheus`: export metrics to prometheus.
//!
//! Read the [metrics](https://zebra.zfnd.org/user/metrics.html) section of the book
//! for more details.
//!
//! ### Tracing
//!
//! Sending traces to different subscribers:
//! * `journald`: send tracing spans and events to `systemd-journald`.
//! * `sentry`: send crash and panic events to sentry.io.
//! * `flamegraph`: generate a flamegraph of tracing spans.
//!
//! Changing the traces that are collected:
//! * `filter-reload`: dynamically reload tracing filters at runtime.
//! * `error-debug`: enable extra debugging in release builds.
//! * `tokio-console`: enable tokio's `console-subscriber`.
//! * A set of features that [skip verbose tracing].
//! The default features ignore `debug` and `trace` logs in release builds.
//!
//! Read the [tracing](https://zebra.zfnd.org/user/tracing.html) section of the book
//! for more details.
//!
//! [ignore verbose tracing]: https://docs.rs/tracing/0.1.35/tracing/level_filters/index.html#compile-time-filters
//!
//! ### Testing
//!
//! * `proptest-impl`: enable randomised test data generation.
//! * `lightwalletd-grpc-tests`: enable Zebra JSON-RPC tests that query `lightwalletd` using gRPC.
#![doc(html_favicon_url = "https://zfnd.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/zebra-favicon-128.png")]
#![doc(html_logo_url = "https://zfnd.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/zebra-icon.png")]