Tutorial steps

List of actions needed to execute the hashcat example.
This section contains steps you need to execute in order to run our hashcat password-recovery example. As this tutorial is designed to inspire you to create your own Golem applications, we will explain all the needed details of Golem application implementation.
Before we begin
In order to develop applications for the Golem network, you need to install yagna daemon on your machine. We're going to assume you're already familiar with the setup of the environment required to run Python high-level API examples. If you're not, please make sure you proceed through our quick primer to get up to speed:
Requestor development: a quick primer
/requestor-tutorials/flash-tutorial-of-requestor-development
Once you're done with the tutorial above, make sure you're again in yapapi's main directory and move to:
cd examples/yacat
So now, we're going to assume that:
The yagna deamon is running in the background. 
The YAGNA_APPKEY environment variable is set to the value of the generated app key.
The payment is initialized with yagna payment init -sender  (please keep in mind that it needs initialization after each launch of yagna service run).
The virtual python environment for our tutorial is activated.
Dependencies are installed and the yapapi repository (containing the tutorial examples) is cloned.
In your current directory (examples/yacat) there are two files that will be used and discussed in this example:
yacat.Dockerfile - the Docker file used for the definition of the provider's container images
yacat.py - requestor agent's entry point which deals with orchestration of the container runs.
Let's get to work - the Dockerfile
Let's start with the Dockerfile (yacat.Dockerfile). Do we always need a dedicated Dockerfile for our own Golem application?
Golem is designed to use existing Docker images, so you can use any existing docker image. There are no Golem-specific conditions that need to be met by the image.
If there is (for example on the docker hub) no docker image that you need, you will have to create a custom one.
For the yacat example we're going to use the following Dockerfile (yacat.Dockerfile):
FROM golemfactory/base:1.5
​
MAINTAINER Radek Tereszczuk <[email protected]>
​
RUN apt-get update && apt-get install -y alien clinfo
​
# Install Intel OpenCL driver
ENV INTEL_OPENCL_URL=http://registrationcenter-download.intel.com/akdlm/irc_nas/9019/opencl_runtime_16.1.1_x64_ubuntu_6.4.0.25.tgz
​
RUN mkdir -p /tmp/opencl-driver-intel
WORKDIR /tmp/opencl-driver-intel
RUN curl -O $INTEL_OPENCL_URL; \
    tar -xzf $(basename $INTEL_OPENCL_URL); \
    for i in $(basename $INTEL_OPENCL_URL .tgz)/rpm/*.rpm; do alien --to-deb $i; done; \
    dpkg -i *.deb; \
    mkdir -p /etc/OpenCL/vendors; \
    echo /opt/intel/*/lib64/libintelocl.so > /etc/OpenCL/vendors/intel.icd; \
    rm -rf *
​
ENV HASHCAT_VERSION        hashcat-5.1.0
ENV HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION  1.9
​
# Update & install packages for installing hashcat
RUN apt-get update && \
    apt-get install -y wget p7zip make build-essential git libcurl4-openssl-dev libssl-dev zlib1g-dev
​
RUN mkdir /golem/yacat
​
WORKDIR /golem/yacat
RUN wget --no-check-certificate https://hashcat.net/files/${HASHCAT_VERSION}.7z && \
    7zr x ${HASHCAT_VERSION}.7z && \
    rm ${HASHCAT_VERSION}.7z
​
RUN wget --no-check-certificate https://github.com/hashcat/hashcat-utils/releases/download/v${HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION}/hashcat-utils-${HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION}.7z && \
    7zr x hashcat-utils-${HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION}.7z && \
    rm hashcat-utils-${HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION}.7z
​
#Add link for binary
RUN ln -s /golem/yacat/${HASHCAT_VERSION}/hashcat64.bin /usr/bin/hashcat
RUN ln -s /golem/yacat/hashcat-utils-${HASHCAT_UTILS_VERSION}/bin/cap2hccapx.bin /usr/bin/cap2hccapx
​
RUN cp /golem/yacat/${HASHCAT_VERSION}/hashcat.hcstat2 /golem/yacat
RUN chmod -R 777 /golem/yacat
​
RUN apt clean
​
WORKDIR /golem/work
​
VOLUME /golem/work /golem/output /golem/resource
As Golem does not need any specific elements in the Dockerfile,yacat.Dockerfileis just a standard Dockerfile.
VOLUME: the input/output
The one thing we need to remember while preparing the Dockerfile is to define a place (or places) in the container file system that will be used for the file transfer. We are going to use input (from requestor to the provider) and output (from provider to the requestor) file transfers here.
The volume is defined in the last line of the above Dockerfile:
VOLUME /golem/work /golem/output /golem/resource
This makes /golem/work a location we will use for our input/output file transfer. For the requestor agent code, which we are going to discuss in the next chapter, we need to know the volume (or volumes) name(s) and use it as a directory for the file transfers.
On the provider side, all the content of the VOLUME directories is stored in the provider's os file system.
All the changes in other (non VOLUME mounted) container directories content are kept in RAM. The rest of the VM image file system (not changed, non VOLUME mounted) content is stored as VM image in the provider's os file system.
Please mind that tasks within a single worker instance - so effectively part of the same activity on a given provider node - run within the same virtual machine and share the contents of a VOLUME between each other.
That means that as long as the execution takes place on the same provider, and thus, on the same filesystem, files in the VOLUME left over from one task execution will be present in a subsequent run.
If your provider side code creates large temporary files, you should store them in the directory defined as VOLUME. Otherwise, the large files will be stored in RAM. RAM usually has a capacity limit much lower than disk space.
Build process
Now we may proceed with a regular Docker build, using yacat.Dockerfile:
docker build . -f yacat.Dockerfile -t yacat
As Golem cannot currently use raw docker images and uses its own, optimized gvmkit image format, we have to convert our Docker image the following way:
pip install gvmkit-build
gvmkit-build yacat
gvmkit-build yacat --push
The important fact is that the last of the above commands, will provide us with a gvmkit image hash, that looks like this:
2c17589f1651baff9b82aa431850e296455777be265c2c5446c902e9
This hash will identify our image when our Golem application is run. Please copy and save it somewhere as in the requestor agent code, we will need to pass it to the Engine in order to have providers use the correct image for the container instances.
The details of docker image conversion are described here:
How to convert a Docker image into a Golem image?
/requestor-tutorials/convert-a-docker-image-into-a-golem-image
The requestor agent code
Let's look at the core of our hashcat example - the requestor agent. Please check the yacat.py file below.
The critical fragments of yacat.py will be described in the following sections of the tutorial so now, you can just do a quick scan over the big code block below.
#!/usr/bin/env python3
import asyncio
from datetime import datetime, timedelta
import pathlib
import sys
​
from yapapi import Executor, NoPaymentAccountError, Task, WorkContext, windows_event_loop_fix
from yapapi.log import enable_default_logger, log_summary, log_event_repr  # noqa
from yapapi.package import vm
​
examples_dir = pathlib.Path(__file__).resolve().parent.parent
sys.path.append(str(examples_dir))
​
from utils import (
    build_parser,
    TEXT_COLOR_CYAN,
    TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT,
    TEXT_COLOR_GREEN,
    TEXT_COLOR_RED,
    TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW,
)
​
​
def write_hash(hash):
    with open("in.hash", "w") as f:
        f.write(hash)
​
​
def write_keyspace_check_script(mask):
    with open("keyspace.sh", "w") as f:
        f.write(f"hashcat --keyspace -a 3 {mask} -m 400 > /golem/work/keyspace.txt")
​
​
def read_keyspace():
    with open("keyspace.txt", "r") as f:
        return int(f.readline())
​
​
def read_password(ranges):
    for r in ranges:
        path = pathlib.Path(f"hashcat_{r}.potfile")
        if not path.is_file():
            continue
        with open(path, "r") as f:
            line = f.readline()
        split_list = line.split(":")
        if len(split_list) >= 2:
            return split_list[1]
    return None
​
​
async def main(args):
    package = await vm.repo(
        image_hash="2c17589f1651baff9b82aa431850e296455777be265c2c5446c902e9",
        min_mem_gib=0.5,
        min_storage_gib=2.0,
    )
​
    async def worker_check_keyspace(ctx: WorkContext, tasks):
        async for task in tasks:
            keyspace_sh_filename = "keyspace.sh"
            ctx.send_file(keyspace_sh_filename, "/golem/work/keyspace.sh")
            ctx.run("/bin/sh", "/golem/work/keyspace.sh")
            output_file = "keyspace.txt"
            ctx.download_file("/golem/work/keyspace.txt", output_file)
            yield ctx.commit(timeout=timedelta(minutes=10))
            task.accept_result()
​
    async def worker_find_password(ctx: WorkContext, tasks):
        ctx.send_file("in.hash", "/golem/work/in.hash")
​
        async for task in tasks:
            skip = task.data
            limit = skip + step
​
            # Commands to be run on the provider
            commands = (
                "rm -f /golem/work/*.potfile ~/.hashcat/hashcat.potfile; "
                f"touch /golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile; "
                f"hashcat -a 3 -m 400 /golem/work/in.hash {args.mask} --skip={skip} --limit={limit} --self-test-disable -o /golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile || true"
            )
            ctx.run(f"/bin/sh", "-c", commands)
​
            output_file = f"hashcat_{skip}.potfile"
            ctx.download_file(f"/golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile", output_file)
            yield ctx.commit(timeout=timedelta(minutes=10))
            task.accept_result(result=output_file)
​
    # beginning of the main flow
​
    write_hash(args.hash)
    write_keyspace_check_script(args.mask)
​
    # By passing `event_consumer=log_summary()` we enable summary logging.
    # See the documentation of the `yapapi.log` module on how to set
    # the level of detail and format of the logged information.
    async with Executor(
        package=package,
        max_workers=args.number_of_providers,
        budget=10.0,
        # timeout should be keyspace / number of providers dependent
        timeout=timedelta(minutes=10),
        subnet_tag=args.subnet_tag,
        driver=args.driver,
        network=args.network,
        event_consumer=log_summary(log_event_repr),
    ) as executor:
​
        sys.stderr.write(
            f"Using subnet: {TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}{args.subnet_tag}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}, "
            f"payment driver: {TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}{executor.driver}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}, "
            f"and network: {TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}{executor.network}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}\n"
        )
​
        keyspace_computed = False
        start_time = datetime.now()
​
        # This is not a typical use of executor.submit as there is only one task, with no data:
        async for _task in executor.submit(worker_check_keyspace, [Task(data=None)]):
            keyspace_computed = True
​
        if not keyspace_computed:
            # Assume the errors have been already reported and we may return quietly.
            return
​
        keyspace = read_keyspace()
​
        print(
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_CYAN}"
            f"Task computed: keyspace size count. The keyspace size is {keyspace}"
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
        )
​
        step = int(keyspace / args.number_of_providers) + 1
​
        ranges = range(0, keyspace, step)
​
        async for task in executor.submit(
            worker_find_password, [Task(data=range) for range in ranges]
        ):
            print(
                f"{TEXT_COLOR_CYAN}Task computed: {task}, result: {task.result}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
            )
​
        password = read_password(ranges)
​
        if password is None:
            print(f"{TEXT_COLOR_RED}No password found{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}")
        else:
            print(f"{TEXT_COLOR_GREEN}Password found: {password}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}")
​
        print(f"{TEXT_COLOR_CYAN}Total time: {datetime.now() - start_time}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}")
​
​
if __name__ == "__main__":
    parser = build_parser("yacat")
​
    parser.add_argument("--number-of-providers", dest="number_of_providers", type=int, default=3)
    parser.add_argument("mask")
    parser.add_argument("hash")
​
    args = parser.parse_args()
​
    # This is only required when running on Windows with Python prior to 3.8:
    windows_event_loop_fix()
​
    enable_default_logger(log_file=args.log_file)
​
    loop = asyncio.get_event_loop()
    task = loop.create_task(main(args))
​
    try:
        loop.run_until_complete(task)
    except NoPaymentAccountError as e:
        handbook_url = (
            "https://handbook.golem.network/requestor-tutorials/"
            "flash-tutorial-of-requestor-development"
        )
        print(
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_RED}"
            f"No payment account initialized for driver `{e.required_driver}` "
            f"and network `{e.required_network}`.\n\n"
            f"See {handbook_url} on how to initialize payment accounts for a requestor node."
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
        )
    except KeyboardInterrupt:
        print(
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}"
            "Shutting down gracefully, please wait a short while "
            "or press Ctrl+C to exit immediately..."
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
        )
        task.cancel()
        try:
            loop.run_until_complete(task)
            print(
                f"{TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}Shutdown completed, thank you for waiting!{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
            )
        except KeyboardInterrupt:
            pass
So what is happening here?
worker_check_keyspace
The first step is to check the keyspace size. This is done in 3 steps, executed only once using one task fragment:
Preparing the keyspace.sh script which contains the password mask. As the hashcat --keyspace -a 3 {mask} -m 400 command outputs the keyspace size to stdout, we just need to redirect the command output to the keyspace.txt file. The  keyspace.sh then looks like: hashcat --keyspace -a 3 {mask} -m 400 > /golem/work/keyspace.txt
Execute the keyspace.sh script on the provider's container.
Transfer the keyspace.txt file back to the requestor.
Knowing the keyspace size, we can start looking for the password using multiple workers, running on multiple providers at the same time.
worker_find_password
In order to look for passwords in the given keyspace range, for each of the workers employed to perform our job, we are executing the following 3 steps:
Send the in.hash file that contains the password hash. 
Executehashcat with proper --skip and --limit values
Get the hashcat_{skip}.potfile from the provider to the requestor
read_password
The final action is to scan over all the received *.potfiles received. If there is a password, it will be displayed to the user.
How does the code work?
Package
To tell the Golem platform, what our requirements against the providers are, we are using the package object. The image_hash parameter points to the image that we want the containers to run - here we use the hash received from gvmkit-build. The min_mem_gib and min_storage_gib parameters specify memory and storage requirements for the provider.
 package = await vm.repo(
     image_hash="2c17589f1651baff9b82aa431850e296455777be265c2c5446c902e9",
     min_mem_gib=0.5,
     min_storage_gib=2.0,
 )
Executor
The package object is passed to the Executor object with several other options, such as:
budgetdefines maximal spendings for executing all the tasks in the whole run on Golem
max_workers defines the maximal number of simultaneously running workers (and that is, the maximum number of providers that the task fragments will be distributed to).
timeout defines the timeout. It is important for the timeout to be large enough to include the image download time plus the computation time.
subnet_tag specifies the providers subnet to be used. It's best to leave the default value in place unless you mean to run your own network of test providers to test the app against,
next are the driver and network parameters that select the Ethereum blockchain and the payment driver for you. For example, you would not use the mainnet network for tests but you'll probably want to run the real-live tasks on the mainnet to be able to use all the providers that participate in the Golem network.
Due to current golem market implementation, please use timeout value between 8 and 30 minutes.
You can also specify the timeout value for the particular provider side execution batch that is triggered by ctx.commit(timeout=timedelta(...)).
async with Executor(
    package=package,
    max_workers=args.number_of_providers,
    budget=10.0,
    # timeout should be keyspace / number of providers dependent
    timeout=timedelta(minutes=10),
    subnet_tag=args.subnet_tag,
    driver=args.driver,
    network=args.network,
    event_consumer=log_summary(log_event_repr),
) as executor:
Main loop
Golem high-level API that we use to interact with the Golem network uses asynchronous programming a lot. The asynchronous execution starting point is in line 162. We catch the KeyboardInterrupt twice because after normal break, we ideally want the code to finalize the cleanup but if the user is determined to break the execution at all cost, we'd like to catch the exception there too:
loop = asyncio.get_event_loop()
task = loop.create_task(main(args))
​
try:
    loop.run_until_complete(task)
except NoPaymentAccountError as e:
    handbook_url = (
        "https://handbook.golem.network/requestor-tutorials/"
        "flash-tutorial-of-requestor-development"
    )
    print(
        f"{TEXT_COLOR_RED}"
        f"No payment account initialized for driver `{e.required_driver}` "
        f"and network `{e.required_network}`.\n\n"
        f"See {handbook_url} on how to initialize payment accounts for a requestor node."
        f"{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
    )
except KeyboardInterrupt:
    print(
        f"{TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}"
        "Shutting down gracefully, please wait a short while "
        "or press Ctrl+C to exit immediately..."
        f"{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
    )
    task.cancel()
    try:
        loop.run_until_complete(task)
        print(
            f"{TEXT_COLOR_YELLOW}Shutdown completed, thank you for waiting!{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
        )
    except KeyboardInterrupt:
        pass
In the main function, the most important fragment begins in line 119:
async for _task in executor.submit(worker_check_keyspace, [Task(data=None)]):
    keyspace_computed = True
This calls the worker_check_keyspace once with no additional task parameters. The next step is getting the keyspace variable from the keyspace.txt file:
keyspace = read_keyspace()
Now we can split the whole keyspace by the args.number_of_providers:
 step = int(keyspace / args.number_of_providers) + 1
​
 ranges = range(0, keyspace, step)
Having the ranges list, we can call the worker_find_password for each of the fragments, passing only the given range:
async for task in executor.submit(
    worker_find_password, [Task(data=range) for range in ranges]
):
    print(
        f"{TEXT_COLOR_CYAN}Task computed: {task}, result: {task.result}{TEXT_COLOR_DEFAULT}"
    )
After the hashcat.potfile file is returned for all the fragments, we need to scan over them, as one of them possibly contains the password we are looking for:
password = read_password(ranges)
worker_check_keyspace
The worker_check_keyspace is also interesting. Here we need to execute the following command on only one of the providers:
hashcat --keyspace -a 3 {mask} -m 400
As this command is using the stdout to display the keyspace size information, we need the stdout to be captured.
As we can not use ctx.run directly to redirect stdout to keyspace.txt, we are preparing keyspace.sh file with the following content:hashcat --keyspace -a 3 {mask} -m 400 > keyspace.txt.
Next, we're going to send keyspace.sh to one of the providers running our image and have them execute a single command:
ctx.run("/bin/sh","/golem/work/keyspace.sh")
Now we can transfer the keyspace.txt back to the requestor
output_file = "keyspace.txt"
ctx.download_file(f"/golem/work/keyspace.txt", output_file)
worker_find_password
This function is executed on each of the providers. First, we are sending them the in.hash file that contains the known hash. That needs only to be run once per worker run (which usually means once per provider).
ctx.send_file("in.hash", "/golem/work/in.hash")
Then, for each task fragment that this worker is executing, we are preparing the --skip and --limit parameters, and executing the commands on the provider:
skip = task.data
limit = skip + step
​
# Commands to be run on the provider
commands = (
    "rm -f /golem/work/*.potfile ~/.hashcat/hashcat.potfile; "
    f"touch /golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile; "
    f"hashcat -a 3 -m 400 /golem/work/in.hash {args.mask} --skip={skip} --limit={limit} --self-test-disable -o /golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile || true"
)
ctx.run(f"/bin/sh", "-c", commands)
If from the previous container execution (possibly on the same provider) there are any *.potfiles left, we are deleting them as they might interfere with current execution.
We also need to execute the touch /golem/work/hashcat.potfile command in order to have /golem/work/hashcat.potfile file present in the file system even if there is no password output by Hashcat.
The last step is downloading the /golem/work/hashcat.potfile file.
output_file = f"hashcat_{skip}.potfile"
ctx.download_file(f"/golem/work/hashcat_{skip}.potfile", output_file)
Now, as we know how the yacat works, let's run it!
Example run
While in the /examples/yacat directory, type the following:
python3 yacat.py '?a?a?a' '$P$5ZDzPE45CLLhEx/72qt3NehVzwN2Ry/'
Please note that on Windows, you need to:
use python instead of python3
not use the quote character in the command
So the windows version is:
python yacat.py ?a?a?a $P$5ZDzPE45CLLhEx/72qt3NehVzwN2Ry/
The above run should return "pas" as the recovered password. The computations will be executed using the default number of workers (which is 3).
A more computation-intensive example is:
python3 yacat.py '?a?a?a?a' '$H$5ZDzPE45C.e3TjJ2Qi58Aaozha6cs30' --number-of-providers 8
The above command should execute computations on 8 providers and return "ABCD".
yacat.py supports a few optional parameters. To get help on those, please type:
python3 yacat.py --help
One of the interesting options is to have log output to a file. This can be achieved by adding the following option to the yacat.py run:
--log-file LOG_FILE_NAME
Other languages support
The yacat example is written in Python using Golem's Python High-Level API (YAPAPI). Golem currently supports writing requestor agents using JavaScript/TypeScript High-Level API (YAJAPI) also.
Next steps
The complete reference of the Python High-Level API (yapapi) is available here:
Introduction to Golem's high-level Python API
/yapapi/yapapi
You can also have a look at our JavaScript/TypeScript API if you're interested in developing your requestor agent in JS/TS:
​https://github.com/golemfactory/yajsapi​
Closing words
Golem is waiting to serve your applications. Our decentralized - and open to everyone - platform is here (now in alpha).
We did our best to make developing Golem applications super easy.
Now it's time for your move!
And remember:
In case of any doubts or problems, you can always contact us on discord.
​https://chat.golem.network​
Hashcat
Next - Requestor tutorials
Debugging with the use of log files
Last updated 3 months ago