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Let's have some fun education and support. We can open a periodic "beginner saloon" for anybody that have questions about "how to use that and that" or "I have a problem, how to fix it".

Ask your Bitcoin only questions, about apps, nodes, wallets, merchant solutions, protocols, issues, improvements, support with specific use cases etc.

Please keep it Bitcoin related and serious discussions about technology and not price and other bullshit.

I encourage everybody that knows the answers to those questions to get in and give support or a pertinent answer. If you are not sure that you will give a correct and pertinent answer, you better stay out and just read.

Don't be shy to ask questions, we know you are a noob and without knowledge in these things so we will just try to help you.

Your lack of understanding today, will cost you a fortune tomorrow.

Please do not zap hardly this post. Important is that people will start asking pertinent questions and they get their answers. This post is not for "stacking sats", is for stacking knowledge. Knowledge is power.

101 sats \ 2 replies \ @Lux 2h

I see many bitcoiners trying to simplify onboarding for new users, and then recomend some flashy designed hww for cold storage, or Muun, or some other app with colors, and not mention eg Electrum because 'it's too complicated'.

How can a newbie make the first steps to learn a solid foundational knowledge?
What should an advisor to that newb focus on teaching first?

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What should an advisor to that newb focus on teaching first?

One of the most important questions.
I think the advisor should start with "what is money?" and "why bitcoin?" questions will be more indicated.
Most of nocoiners start with the dumb question "where can I buy some BTC?", without even knowing what they get into...

As I explained in this guide of 5 stages to became a bitcoiner:

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11 sats \ 0 replies \ @SHA256man 6m
"What should an advisor to that newb focus on teaching first?"

for a proper bitcoin education session:

  • rest well, take a shower, clip fingernails, rinse the nose, dress as if for a private seminar, etc.
  • come prepared to learn and take notes; have intelligent questions ready
  • take a deep breath and meditate before receiving the firehose of information

if the student has no questions or good feedback after one-two thorough sessions, perhaps move on; the best newB will have the desire to keep coming back and to do the reading;

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93 sats \ 1 reply \ @siggy47 2h

This is a great idea. My advice to beginners is to get your questions answered by @DarthCoin now, because soon he will be back to building his citadel. I think this saloon needs him to be tending bar.

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hahaha yeah, I have some rainy days so not work on the offgrid site :)

needs him to be tending bar.

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If you had a 2BTC stack, what size UTXOs would you recommend

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The size of UTXOs is not only the one thing you should care. Also the spread onto multiple wallets and levels.
The 3 levels stash is more important than UTXO size.

As of how to spread the UTXOs, I wrote a detailed guide here:
https://darth-coin.github.io/beginner/be-your-own-bank-en.html

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That UTXO table is very useful!

So a follow up question considering in your table a 50k sat UTXO is dust at a high fee environment

If using a proper self custody lightning wallet like zeus for example

What is the smallest amount you would recommend holding onchain

And the largest amount in Lightning?

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Good question. But you didn't mention: private or public LN node? This is an important aspect when you choose the size of an UTXO / channel.

A TLDR will be:

  1. For public nodes, at least min 3M sats/channel. No maximum. More is better for public nodes.
  2. For private nodes, a min 300k sats and a max 3M sats / channel is enough. Or at least size the channel for how much you are willing to spend in a certain period.

These limits are NOT about the value in fiat of the channels or payments, but about efficiency of making payments.

What is the smallest amount you would recommend holding onchain

A LN wallet should NOT hold onchain almost anything. You only keep in onchain a single UTXO of max 100k sats, required for when you get a force closed channel in a high fee period and you are stuck with a low fee closing tx. So you can bump it easily from the same wallet.

If you want to read more details:

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Ah yes I should have been more specific, it really links to my original question

If you are holding in cold storage on chain, what is the minimum UTXO size you recommend, seeing as 50k as per your table is too small and 100M could be considered too large

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You asked about using Zeus as LN wallet, not onchain cold storage...
Are two different things.
A LN wallet should NOT be used for long storage, only for sporadic or daily routine payments. DO NOT put into / open LN channels if you do not use them!

For onchain holding, I've explained in more details in that guide I mentioned before:

  • think about how often you will open new LN channels in the future, then size them accordingly
  • think about how much you will want to move out of long cold storage, someday in the future. So create many different sizes UTXOs for each of these oacassions. So when you will have to move out, move only the UTXOs that are appropiate of that use amount.

Spreading your stash into many pieces is important. Pieces means not only one wallet with multiple UTXOs, but also multiple (types) wallets with multiple UTXOs, multiple sizes.
Spread is good also for the so called "5$ wrench attack"... it works like a plausible deniability case.

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Correct, I should have explained in more detail

Thanks Darth

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Is ok, additional questions and explanations will make others to read here and learn.

at one point i connected an embedded LND Zeus wallet to nostr via NWC, and zaps wud come into zaplocker consistently, but zapping others wudn't work; it was a receive-send NWC configuration;

i then attached a Rizful wallet via NWC (send-receive configuration) into another nostr client, while keeping the Zeus-NWC attachment in the original client - zaps continued coming into the Zeus-zaplocker, and redeeming them was straightforward; the LN address was set as Zeuspay;

i cud also start sending zaps from Rizful...

how did this split occur? how do i fix the issue of sending zaps from Zeus via NWC connection?

Gracias sensei!

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Zeus have 3 options for receiving zaps to a LN address:

  • zaplocker (hold invoices)
  • cashu mint (redeemable tokens into a cashu wallet or straight to your own LN channels))
  • recently introduced FW to a NWC account (straight to your LN node of desire over NWC)

It's up to you which one you want to use.

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22 sats \ 1 reply \ @SHA256man 28m

thank u for the reminder - i see the major updates and have yet to experiment with the mints & forwarding;

it's still unclear to me how the piping worked in the configurations setup i have described; i think the main issue is the send from Zeus-NWC: persistent mode doesn't quite work, but maybe i have to tinker with background process settings a little bit;

it is a nifty trick tho - receiving into one NWC wallet type and sending out of another;

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I suggest to use LDK node if you use NWC sub-accounts. It syncs faster.
And you have 2 "persistent modes": one for the node and one for the NWC service. I wrote a guide on SN few months ago, see in my bio.
LND nodes are more for advanced users for specific cases.

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How to avoid getting screwed in the eCash hardfork?

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  1. Ignore that bullshit HF
  2. If you really want to get some more coins, follow this guide: #1478662
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  1. Move your BTC first — spend or CoinJoin before touching forked coins

To another wallet or to another address in the same wallet? Or does it not matter?

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better to a new wallet

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Thanks Darth, for this space.
I'm looking for bunch of merchant onboarding tools, to choose from for different people. Some with internet connection, others without internet. Particularly Lightning and Ecash tools.

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merchant onboarding tools

That term is quite too general.
For merchants you MUST treat each case in particular, you cannot have one "tool" for everybody.
Example: you cannot go to a street merchant selling few items / day and say "use BTCpay to be self-sovereign"...

Some merchants want only a smooth integration of BTC into their existing systems, some they want to go full bitcoin stack. You have to see first what are their intentions and workflow.,

others without internet.

For that particular case, the best example is what CUBA Bitcoin team did with their local merchants. You need somebody to be the "LN bank" for a bunch of small merchants without internet. You can use LNbits and a cashu mint for that use case.

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Some merchants want only a smooth integration of BTC into their existing systems, some they want to go full bitcoin stack. You have to see first what are their intentions and workflow.,

Exactly 💯.

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When you go to a merchant and want to onboard it, don't just jump in with a bunch of solutions that they understand nothing.

Start slow, first see what are their intentions, discuss about their business, try to get the "weak spot" where Bitcoin can really help them.
Then start explaining basic stuff about Bitcoin and how can help them in those weak spots. Merchants love solutions to their problems, not all are only interested in how to fuck banks or govs.... sometimes they have REAL problems that can be fixed with simple solutions based on BTC.

It's a long process, so have patience with them.

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10 sats \ 3 replies \ @anon 3h

How to kill gov?

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This guide is only for VIP subscription members (1BTC/year). And you get also some discount codes from our sponsors...

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Hahaha 🤣 🤣

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Fantastic idea, Thanks for the space

There is a shift in Nostr currnetly, about Spark wallets vs lightning wallets,
I've seen camp saying spark is easier to setup,
but I've seen people saying Spark is a trap ...
could you explain why the controversy?

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Is simple: Spark is NOT Bitcoin.

Read more technical details here: #1275977

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Cool idea.

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Gimme stuff I’m dum

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Ya I’m a newb

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