Cosmos-sdk: inconsistent generation of genesis.json on `gaiad init`

[zramsay]

reproduction: two fresh DO instance, run this script on each:
https://gist.github.com/zramsay/35e158dab11be5380c03b3489ef0e43e

then run gaiad init on each. result is an unpredictable genesis.json:

{
  "consensus_params": {
    "block_size_params": {
      "max_bytes": 22020096,
      "max_txs": 100000,
      "max_gas": -1
    },
    "tx_size_params": {
      "max_bytes": 10240,
      "max_gas": -1
    },
    "block_gossip_params": {
      "block_part_size_bytes": 65536
    },
    "evidence_params": {
      "max_age": 100000
    }
  },
  "validators": [
    {
      "pub_key": {
        "type": "AC26791624DE60",
        "value": "c7UMMAbjFuc5GhGPy0E5q5tefy12p9Tq0imXqdrKXwo="
      },
      "power": 100,
      "name": ""
    }
  ],
  "app_hash": "",
  "genesis_time": "2018-05-11T15:52:25.424795506Z",
  "chain_id": "test-chain-Q6VeoW",
  "app_state": {
    "accounts": [
      {
        "address": "718C9C23F98C9642569742ADDD9F9AB9743FBD5D",
        "coins": [
          {
            "denom": "Token",
            "amount": 1000
          },
          {
            "denom": "steak",
            "amount": 50
          }
        ]
      }
    ],
    "stake": {
      "pool": {
        "total_supply": 50,
        "bonded_shares": "0",
        "unbonded_shares": "0",
        "bonded_pool": 0,
        "unbonded_pool": 0,
        "inflation_last_time": 0,
        "inflation": "7/100"
      },
      "params": {
        "inflation_rate_change": "13/100",
        "inflation_max": "1/5",
        "inflation_min": "7/100",
        "goal_bonded": "67/100",
        "max_validators": 100,
        "bond_denom": "steak"
      },
      "candidates": null,
      "bonds": null
    }
  }
}

or

{
  "app_hash": "",
  "app_state": {
    "accounts": [
      {
        "address": "6DCF9B36086732D9EC8FB44FCB6C61E670AA1FCD",
        "coins": [
          {
            "denom": "Token",
            "amount": 1000
          },
          {
            "denom": "steak",
            "amount": 50
          }
        ]
      }
    ],
    "stake": {
      "pool": {
        "total_supply": 50,
        "bonded_shares": "0",
        "unbonded_shares": "0",
        "bonded_pool": 0,
        "unbonded_pool": 0,
        "inflation_last_time": 0,
        "inflation": "7/100"
      },
      "params": {
        "inflation_rate_change": "13/100",
        "inflation_max": "1/5",
        "inflation_min": "7/100",
        "goal_bonded": "67/100",
        "max_validators": 100,
        "bond_denom": "steak"
      },
      "candidates": null,
      "bonds": null
    }
  },
  "genesis_time": "2018-05-11T15:59:30.143586646Z",
  "chain_id": "test-chain-lha4nT",
  "consensus_params": {
    "block_size_params": {
      "max_bytes": 22020096,
      "max_txs": 100000,
      "max_gas": -1
    },
    "tx_size_params": {
      "max_bytes": 10240,
      "max_gas": -1
    },
    "block_gossip_params": {
      "block_part_size_bytes": 65536
    },
    "evidence_params": {
      "max_age": 100000
    }
  },
  "validators": [
    {
      "pub_key": {
        "type": "AC26791624DE60",
        "value": "nd0VwHlkErW+26GSvcHyEEZv4Rf09RpeLXJSj5mTbWg="
      },
      "power": 100,
      "name": ""
    }
  ]
}

Any user familiar with tendermint/gaia will be expecting something like:

  "genesis_time": "2018-05-11T15:59:30.143586646Z",
  "chain_id": "test-chain-lha4nT",
  "consensus_params": {

at the top, rather than a randomized shuffling of fields

[cwgoes]

Can we sort all JSON keys in codec.MarshalJSON actually? We need this for transaction signing/verification too, see https://github.com/cosmos/ledger-cosmos/pull/43.

[rigelrozanski]

Sounds like a go-amino change

[liamsi]

See https://github.com/tendermint/go-amino/issues/171#issuecomment-402327416

[liamsi]

Any user familiar with tendermint/gaia will be expecting something like:

The reason this behaves differently, is here: https://github.com/cosmos/cosmos-sdk/issues/1531
We are discussing to add the possibility to sort keys in JSON in amino (for signing purposes). This doesn't solve the above issue though.

[ebuchman]

It seems this issue is because we're using a map for the genesis. Can we just use a struct for it? Then it will be deterministic.

Possibly changing go-amino is a separate issue.

[rigelrozanski]

Yeah I think it is - as per Liamsi comment it looks like this issue will be addressed with #1531 not using keys

[ebuchman]

@alexanderbez want to tackle this ?

[alexanderbez]

For sure! ⚡️