Node Extensions

Extensions are optional modules a node operator can enable alongside the core REST API for consumers that need direct access to binary data instead of JSON.

gRPC Server

The node ships a grpc-server module (built alongside the core node in node-scala) that exposes blocks and transactions directly in their protobuf-serialized binary format, rather than the JSON representation the REST API returns. This is the recommended way to consume chain data for a service that needs to process a large volume of blocks or transactions efficiently.

If you use your own node with the gRPC server enabled, you can send it a SignedTransaction object directly instead of composing a JSON transaction for the REST API’s POST /transactions/broadcast method. See the protobuf-serialization package for building and parsing these binary structures from JavaScript/TypeScript.

Enabling and configuring the gRPC server is done through the node’s own configuration file — see the grpc-server module in the node-scala repository for its current configuration options.