Specific to the current (and possibly last N) tenures, the node must constantly make sure it has the latest blocks. It does so by executing a separate anti-entropy state machine for (1) determining what the current chain tip is, and (2) fetching the missing blocks from nodes that have a later chain tip than itself. It can perform (1) by piggy-backing the chain tip within a dedicated HTTP header, and in doing so, learn it in-band with any other HTTP-oriented protocol. It would run (2) constantly -- i.e. once per block time if need be.
Specific to the current (and possibly last N) tenures, the node must constantly make sure it has the latest blocks. It does so by executing a separate anti-entropy state machine for (1) determining what the current chain tip is, and (2) fetching the missing blocks from nodes that have a later chain tip than itself. It can perform (1) by piggy-backing the chain tip within a dedicated HTTP header, and in doing so, learn it in-band with any other HTTP-oriented protocol. It would run (2) constantly -- i.e. once per block time if need be.