Node Synchronization options

Sychronize the chain

Sync mode

You can sync to the chain using:

• Full mode: This is the default if nothing is specified and will download all the blocks data, you can also use --sync full.
• Warp mode: This is will download the latest state then all the blocks data. It's the fastest way to have a running node. Use --sync warp.
  • This is theoritically handled but is not supported and can fail after drastic updates.
• Fast / Fast Unsafe: This is currently not supported since it does not download data needed for Avail specific computation.

Unsafe sync

When importing blocks, their content go through an additional check to make sure that the DA commitments are valid. During initial sync, you can chose to ignore this check to increase the sync speed. This command is compatible with any sync mode.

• --unsafe-da-sync Using this flag, Warp / Fast / Fast unsafe become compatible with syncing. You can then remove this flag node and restart it.

Chain Sync Modes and Compatibility

This describes the different sync modes available for the substrate chain and their compatibility with the --unsafe-da-sync flag.

Compatibility Table

Sync Mode	Without --unsafe-da-sync	With --unsafe-da-sync
full	compatible	compatible
warp	partially compatible	compatible
fast / fast unsafe	not compatible	compatible (with warnings)