Reth error "file client has no tip" while importing blocks

[debjit-bw]

I have exported blocks using geth, and am trying to import them in reth. The file contains the RLPs concatenated, but for simplicity i'm just working with a file with 1 RLP.

./target/debug/reth import genesis.rlp --chain=./chiado_genesis_alloc.json

Running the above gives the following error:

% ./target/debug/reth import genesis.rlp --chain=./chiado_genesis_alloc.json         
2024-10-24T16:21:13.601843Z  INFO Initialized tracing, debug log directory: /Users/debjit/Library/Caches/reth/logs/chiado
2024-10-24T16:21:13.609322Z  INFO reth 1.0.8-dev (9a732f6b) starting
2024-10-24T16:21:13.620808Z  INFO Opening storage db_path="/Users/debjit/Library/Application Support/reth/chiado/db" sf_path="/Users/debjit/Library/Application Support/reth/chiado/static_files"
2024-10-24T16:21:13.650432Z  INFO Verifying storage consistency.
2024-10-24T16:21:13.798502Z  INFO Consensus engine initialized
2024-10-24T16:21:13.805114Z  INFO Importing chain file chunk
[/Users/debjit/.cargo/git/checkouts/reth-36d3ea1d1152b20c/9a732f6/crates/cli/commands/src/import.rs:96:13] "debug len:" = "debug len:"
[/Users/debjit/.cargo/git/checkouts/reth-36d3ea1d1152b20c/9a732f6/crates/cli/commands/src/import.rs:96:13] file_client.bodies_len() = 0
Error: file client has no tip

Location:
    /Users/debjit/.cargo/git/checkouts/reth-36d3ea1d1152b20c/9a732f6/crates/cli/commands/src/import.rs:98:47

I tried generating an RLP file using reth itself, and then manually decoded both the RLPs. Here's the difference:

RLP from Geth	RLP from Reth

There's the EIP-1559 field in reth that's not in geth, and a couple extra fields vice versa. Can this be causing the issue?

How can I solve this? If it's the EIP-1559 field, I tried setting londonBlock in the genesis to a high number, but still the same problem. In any case, can we make the error message better?

Aside:

I am doing something like this to copy over state and blocks from geth and getting them into reth. Since we have 2 extra fields in the header (pre-merge) which aren't in Eth Mainnet, is there a way to import the blocks without validating the hashes (because the default hasher will not include those 2 fields in the hashing)?

[debjit-bw]

Additionally, if we want to start the node from a non-genesis block, it is mandatory to import all the blocks from genesis (given we init-state with the full state)? Is it possible to just do with the last few blocks (sort of like snap sync)?

If it's mandatory to import all blocks, can we

• disable verification? or
• write custom hashing logic?

Because some old blocks have extra fields which will be ignored by reth, resulting in incorrect hashes.

[mattsse]

for op-mainnet there's now an option to skip block/receipt import entirely: https://reth.rs/run/sync-op-mainnet.html#minimal-bootstrap-recommended

the --without-ovm option doesn't quite fit for gnosis, but we could rename this.

note that this is only part of the OP CLI:

reth/crates/optimism/cli/src/commands/init_state/mod.rs

Lines 25 to 35 in fa59bd5

	/// **Optimism Mainnet Only**
	///
	/// Specifies whether to initialize the state without relying on OVM historical data.
	///
	/// When enabled, and before inserting the state, it creates a dummy chain up to the last OVM
	/// block (#105235062) (14GB / 90 seconds). It then, appends the Bedrock block.
	///
	/// - **Note**: **Do not** import receipts and blocks beforehand, or this will fail or be
	/// ignored.
	#[arg(long, default_value = "false")]
	without_ovm: bool,

[debjit-bw]

This sounds like an amazing idea. Can we move this into reth's cli (out of op-specific cli) while making it general purpose?

[mattsse]

yep tracking here #12090

[debjit-bw]

thanks a lot ^-^