(I can't believe I am making this post... so many emotions have crossed my mind while dedicating some more time at the beginning of this year. And oh boy... back then... I was SOOOOO NAIVE!)
π Learned SO Much! And π to keep learning...
It was and is a realisation to get here... can't possibly point to how many people helped me understand so many things (without boring you all), even if 90% of the time I haven't bothered any with technical questions, many of you helped me understand a lot of things. This is what keeps me tied to this family... (and many other things)
All from an amazing place like this...
π€ What am I talking about?
Well, back in 2021/22 New Year, I announced my comeback as a backup witness on Hive Blockchain as @atexoras.witness. And I still remember how that felt... π back then, across many struggles of "time-machine" style things (aka IRL), in 2024/25 I have acknowledged how hard this was (and can be), but still demonstrated my motivation and the "never giving up" attitude.
I was being really me...
2026 is the year I am finally ON it!
Within this, I have met a LOT more Hive people than I had anticipated, across TWO IRL @hivefest's that I absolutely loved... and I would be lying if I didn't admit that they did actually helped huge with motivation.
But don't get me wrong, this was not easy (reaching this point)... especially because of my stubbornness of not wanting to bother anyone and learning on my own terms. Yes, I did ask a few things to some of the witnesses, but I think many can confirm that whatever I have asked was mainly related to verifications of my already formed opinions. That said, I think many of the top 100 witnesses (even some below that) are super mega powerful super beings just for being able to do this!
That said, please don't do as me... ask away! I just am this me, person that want to do trustless stuff.
But don't get me wrong... I know how to spot the difference in skill depth, both between me and others, and also between others themselves. Although the point of all this is not ranking or winning more than others within the same family, it's the collaborating, the trustless and decentralised building!
Before we get there...
Back in the 2022 days... this was me thinking it was too exciting...



This is today!

What an evolution! π€―π± 4 years ago! And NOW I present you with?
The π₯ "New Zealand" based Public API Hive Node

I think I am the first one in my country... and I hope there will be more following in my footsteps... may the force be with us!
https://hive.atexoras.com:2096
(yes, I do make use of free ports from Cloudflare, why not)
Note: 1.27.11 is shown on the swagger, but behind its 1.28.5 (people who know will know) - it will change sooonnnn when I move to the new version... currently on 1.28.6 release candidate challenges...
Please consider this a still young (hopefully not premature) experience, as even if I learned lots, I know I still have to learn lots more to be able to withstand something of quality for the entire world Hive community.
π Do you want to know how all this started?
I think it's about time to record this experience here, for anyone to validate.
Back in the days when I was playing lots of Hive games, I felt the need to learn more about how certain apps were being created. And I knew much of the information was on chain, so... back then, because I knew most of the information would be stored on Hive-Engine, I decided to give it a go...
Step by step, I brought a Hive Engine (full node) into the backup witnesses of the Hive Engine layer. And back then, my only intention was merely learning... Then, I stepped into the next challenge while doing so. Being in New Zealand, far away from all HiveD nodes, introduced a lot of latency, and I could not run my witness on Hive Engine reliably as I wished.

I have then decided to run again (as mentioned above) a witness node back in 2021/22 to support my own Hive-Engine node, on getting updated blocks from Hive.
Month by month, I had learned lots due to so many of the witnesses in there... eventually, my participation there brought me to continuously exploration and eventually through my own processess an great internet, provide a reliable HE Full node (even if that, for some, was just a full node for all this time, which for me was not, but I don't want to brag about it).
Then, at some point, I upgraded a few things on my servers and decided to also run a Hive Engine History node... one of the biggest challenges in terms of infrastructure performance improvements I had to make.

(please do consider that the data shown here is changing actively, and is not necessarily static)
The https://beacon.peakd.com is an open source tool from the @peakd team where everyone can contribute with. Once I am comfortable with my own API Hive node, I will add it there too!
But getting back to the scene, I have learned lots with many HE witnesses, especially and without any specific order of importance (sorry I have to give credit for this bunch of π€ people...), @reazuliqbal, @eonwarped, @primersion, @eturnerx, @rishi556 and @cryptomancer... You (but not limited to, and sorry for not mentioning all of you) contributed to part of what I am today in terms of Hive person.
Thank you!
Then, from across the MANY attempts to improve the things I had... the prospect was... aka the target... run things from New Zealand... even if at the start it was selfishly just for me to understand how hard it was for all the others!
WHY?
Well, the first thing I had in my mind was... "why is that game/apps struggle with access to Hive and Hive engine data?" - That made me realise that it was not just Hive Engine performance need. It was also Hive API access!
So, being a player who wanted sub-second asynchronous broadcasts and subsequent updates, I punched into my mind. HIVE FULL NODE it is!
There is a LOOOOTTTT OF PEOPLE I AM NOT MENTIONING here, and that sort of hurts... but they all crossed my learning curve, and I know WHO they are - just stating this... for the record.
Because it's just too much for a post like this. But I reached out to sooo many people that I "lost" count (not really, but you get my stance), and tried to help as much as I could. And will continue based on how I am feeling for doing the right thing for whom is trying to learn or striving for more future decentralised evolution.
Then in 2025 and 2026, it all changed π€©
HiveD become super easy to run, and the rest of the infrastructure is going through a mega upgrade of performance and optimisation that allows me to prove this is sustainable even from home!
We can now run HiveD from an 8GB Android Linux thing... Obviously, that's not a full API node, but it proves how decentralised the chain can be.
Welcome any feedback
And thank you @techcoderx, for your "patience" with me verifying "things" against your API node. π Don't want you to think I was hacking you, but it was nice to see you thought about it π - I am probably a lonely one that read all that HUGE MESSAGE! π€£
Anyhow... peeps... more work will be incoming! For now... ATΓ XΓRAS! ππ₯Ήπ
https://hive.atexoras.com:2096
Next steps? Be confortable it can be sustainable (within my own limits)... and then teach people or apps on either already allowed customized API's for their communication, to understand the right way to allow new API's like mine (not in a static, but instead in a failover way), by either automatic selection or manual failover methods.
Not yet for mass production, so please take it with a grain of salt, and please provide feedback.
I am on the chain daily!
My ποΈ motivation!
Have fun, play games, learn, and when possible, teach new things to newcomers, showing them how interesting this place can be. Check my own page too!

π€ Follow me on X
@forkyishere π (@forykw dark side) is a character I created, which emerged from Crimsonclad imagination π while dwelling over the dark dungeons of Discord chat levels.
Follow for #news about the #HIVE #Blockchain, and other stuff. I sometimes get crazy with what happens around social media. I am following all HIVE users! No promises of behaviour. π

In addition, if you are looking for a nice place to either reach out, share or just have a great time, come along to @atexoras.pub and say hello (tag @forykw or @forkyishere). We welcome everyone on the blockchain.
π° My Public Hive/Engine Infrastructure

- Cloudflare Protected
- Hive API (https://hive.atexoras.com:2096)
- HE RPC (https://v6-he.atexoras.com:2083)
- HE P2P (https://v6-he.atexoras.com:2053)
- HE History (https://v6-he.atexoras.com:8443)
Any feedback/problems, feel free to contact me! My stuff is being monitored via UpTimeRobot where you can find their current status or just come along to the ATX Discord server.
π Vote for Witnesses
(β‘Vote) - Hive-Engine here - voting uses staked WORKERBEE
(β‘Vote) - HIVE here - voting uses staked HIVE
(βDelegate) - 3Speak Network - You win 0.015% SPK tokens if you delegate LARYNX to other nodes, as opposed to only 0.010% from your powered LARYNX!
@forykw is running π @atexoras.witness on all the above πͺ and @atexoras.vsc on the Magi network.
π Vote for Proposals