Hey #nostr , I'm working on a brand new project (extremely WIP) and I need your help reviewing the use cases section
Can you take a look into it and share on this thread if you can understand what the thing is about?
https://github.com/KoalaSat/samiz?tab=readme-ov-file#samiz
I promise some appreciation zaps 😁
Could you do Lightning invoices while you're at it? 🙏
Maybe there's a DVM-like flow that would make sense here? Though I guess in this case it could be a literal Vending Machine!
"I want this thing"
"Ok, someone pay this invoice"
"Here's that thing!"
But Lightning requires in nternet connection, I'm trying to always keep in kind the app will work ona "no access to the internet" environment
It's a different use-case: sometimes QR codes just don't scan very well.
I agree that focus is important, but it might be overly narrow here. What if I want to post to nostr but only *my* internet is out? Or, my device just doesn't have internet. Consider the IoT sensor possibilities! That's a much larger market than two nostr users in proximity with no internet.
Also applies to #meshtastic
Your last user story touches on this idea that the notes eventually make it to the Internet 🤙
Ah! I understand, that's a great idea. If theprojects goes well, maybe I'll dig into the ESP32 world and create a Samix implementation for it 🙂
Hacking a new message type in the Meshtastic firmware wasn't the most fun, but it didn't take more than a couple days. Getting other people to adopt it... that would be another story 😅
Nutzapping frens locally(i.e. getting their 10019s) with loaded nip61 wallet beforehand and paying for festival food while network down, checkout when reaching network as locked to the pubkey?
Basically yes, in all the possible ways allowed by nostr
Not necessarily. LNMesh already allows for mesh networking to be used to cache transactions that then go 'live' when a connection to the internet is found.
ONWARD 🫡
This is all I want our technology to do. Mesh P2P networks. Whatever you need to do this, your effort to make it happen will not go unnoticed.
Wen apk
Great idea. So if I understand correctly, it’s to allow note distribution within an internet-disconnected group via Bluetooth. Also bridge the disconnected group to and from the internet once an edge node can connect to the net.
You're building an mesh network on nostr that transmits notes over Bluetooth?
Are the notes encrypted?
Do I have to grant Bluetooth access to every user or how will the app handle it?
- Yes!
- It's just nostr, regular notes are public and private ones encrypted
- No, you only need to grant permissions to the app. BLE connections doesn't require permissions since it's just a P2P communication technology. Just like radio.
Sounds awesome! Great project you're building here!🔥
Would be amazing.
Sounds great if can be implemented, would be beneficial especially in curbing government censorship and and misinformation, we get first hand unaltered events as they happen. Community reach and networking would also be greatly improved, most especially to the most vulnerable or rural areas, most of the areas without good affordable internet can't access Nostr, especially if on a limited plan, Primal is the cheapest way so far.
This is some really cool shit!
Samiz offers a P2P/local relay network for Nostr using BLE as either an alternative or backup system in case the internet goes down or your ISP decides to wreck havoc with dictator-level censorship.
You can have your phone on airplane mode cutting off all forms of internet connectivity including WIFI & still be able to relay your Nostr notes to others, receive from others you have an open channel with, and eventually it’ll reach someone who has an open channel with someone else connected with the internet, thus relaying your Nostr notes to the masses.
Brilliant! 🫡
That sounds amazing actually
Agreed! A decentralized, non-internet, mesh network to relay nostr notes. If there is a way to implement more “other stuff through relays” in an offline environment such as P2P monetary payments, live-streaming the Super Bowl, communicate with our loved ones during a city/state/nation-wide blackout, etc., the world is our oyster!
All credit goes to nostr:nprofile1qqsxg45ph8gx0vdrvtzta6xal7v86frx6jvstsnvhrlvtehmwwh4epq2rgc6h and potential dev contributors who can make this happen 🙏🏼
That's dope af! Just need to make sure it's all secure.
Not too technical here. Read it and understood how it works and what it does. Don't see myself use it though due to concern of privacy. Also if someone will post some illegal stuff I wouldn't want it to be registered from my ip. Also if I do decide to take the risk of posting I'd like to get some incentive like Sats.
Great project! Felt I understood the general concept and use case 🤙
Feels like a kind of “Bluetooth relay” that people who join can sync up.
How much does proximity play into the equation?
More like every device is a relay that automaticallysynchronizes with the other in range. Obviously the reachability of the Bluetooth plays big here.
Nice! So does that mean you’re self hosting your relay?
Transmitting through proximity is really cool! Would it automatically transmit to anyone around using it, or can you limit reach to follows / followers or anything like that :)
The first version is going to be an indiscriminate sinchronization of all notes found in the wild.
But I already considered the idea of creating private sync groups, filters, etc...
We need more such projects. Just followed you for this LFG 💜🧡
It might be useful in areas with inconsistent Internet access but you seem to not be seeing two major use cases for this.
1. Disaster Area Emergency Communication
Perfect for a area hit by a disaster (tornado, fire, hurricane, man made ) cell towers are down, no internet and no cell service, but everyone still has their phones. Great way to obtain help, coordinate emergency response, check on Loved ones, etc.
2. Local Area Resistance
I would need to better understand the privacy and capabilities of the mesh, but seems like it could provide a means for people to communicate and coordinate in a repressed region where the internet is completely captured. Adding encryption would be great with this application.
I tried to be a little bit sarcastic with the use cases 😬
It's mesh networking. Convince all client devs to include the samiz library instead of creating a Samiz nostr client please. I notice you only once talk about "Samiz app" in the Readme, so maybe you already see it as an add-on to all Android clients.
I would add the example of a conference using a conference app that uses nostr as its data layer. It would work even if the wifi collapsed and users would have an incentive to install it before the collapse cause conferences do such things.
My idea is something in between, if I create a libraryfora all apps we'll have everyone having to implement it and multiple apps on your devices fighting for the usage.
The way I'm facing is to make the app connect to nostr:nprofile1qqs827g8dkd07zjvlhh60csytujgd3l9mz7x807xk3fewge7rwlukxgpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduhszrnhwden5te0dehhxtnvdakz7auvdel's Citrine and use it as primary DB. That way, for example, you should be able to connect Amethyst to Citrine and publish / read events that are passing through Samiz
So if I'm at the trucker protest in downtown Ottawa and they shut down the mobile network as long as someone is in range of available internet with BLE and this app with correct permissions my message can bonce from device to device until it hits a nostr node connected to internet.
Alternatively if they cut my bank accounts and I loose internet or ability to pay people, I can still zap people on nostr and they can zap me!
That is what I understood from it.
It looks like "Briar for Nostr", which I think is very awesome!
Most of my tech ideas are around isolated LANs, since many rural areas here have limited Internet access, if any.
I look forward to see this project flourish!
Might it also be possible to load Samiz to an OpenWRT router, giving an event/festival/etc it's own "Samiz hub", per se?
Correct. And doesn't even have to be a Samiz implementation, I'm using BLE for communications and negentropy for relay synchronization. Only protocols already settled and working in other areas 😁
Adding my related ideas here. It would be possible to place some nodes in the busy places, as we do for Meshtastic. They will be able to relay information around.
I was optimistic when I read through the use cases on the read me until I read use case C and was completely sold. This is incredible work.
This is awesome! Like StreetPass on the Nintendo 3DS
So dope def build it
🤙🏻
There are a few other projects like this below
Check out the most recent one here👇
Peer to Peer Nostr through mesh network now available for Android. 🚀
This seems fucking great!!! Thanks koalasat!
Very interesting.
What method would be used to determine if a Note has been published to a relay and thus no longer needs to be held in local Samiz node cache?
The best method used in nostr https://github.com/hoytech/negentropy
Oh excellent.
I wonder if Range-Based Set Reconciliation (RBSR) could be used to compare genomes..
there is no box.
Mesh Networking became popularized during the Arab Spring, and there was a lot of development work done to create apps that could cache information for later distribution once an internet connection was found. One of the largest at the time was FireChat, which was also used during political events in the US leading up to the 2016 election.
Adding mesh networking functionality to Nostr would be a huge step forward.
I designed a protocol for sharing notes in a mesh-network that does not rely on relays. Also it comes with built in spam protection and improved decentralized curation strategies. Reply to this note if you want to learn more (and I promise I will overwhelme you with info). :-D
Happy to receive as much knowledge/experience as possible about it 🚀
Before Nostr existed I created a similar protocol: #treebit This protocol was designed to thrive in mesh-networks. To prevent spam I invented #peercuration (crowd sourced filtration and propagation). Together with #opengroups this enables community building without moderators or gate keepers. The nodes you connect to and the bandwidth they use are also taken into consideration. Its a protocol based purely on incentives. You find everything here: https://github.com/baumbit Please ask me questions!
Loving that concept and idea.
It reminds me of some old attempts at mesh / relayed communication (can't remember the app name) that used Bluetooth.
I think BLE meshing applied to Nostr and ecash has the potential to unlock new societal paradigms !
Love the concept and the illustrations sealed the deal! 🎨
how do you make these images?
It was a whole nice afternoon learning how to deal with midjourney
That sounds awesome.
Cool 🧡
Epic stuff. This would change the landscape so much.
Poor Mike who lives in another country and can't join the festival
very challenging project to create bluetooth mesh for creating local decentralised network without internet connection on the case A,B . The case C is the easy part as his friend already connected with satellite internet , to broadcast all the note .
case A and B is rather challenging . man can use library mesh networking like bluetooth mesh SDK or googles nearby connection API. but the bluetooth as it named have very limited range like man should be approx 100m , depending on the bluetooth type . also latency and bandwidth , man cannot post many images or video on that A and B situation .
It is doable to create offline network messages using BLE (Bluetooth lower energy ) Mesh .
This project seems really interesting, especially for natural disasters where connectivity is crucial. Are there any security risks with using Bluetooth mesh?
Not really, nostr notes are public and the ones that shouldn't are already encripted, this mesh goles down into the layers con a way it's fully transaprent for the nostr protocol
I would help but I am a noob 😁
That reminds me of Pieter Hintjens's Edgenet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_dfrHxLOrc
I think he would like it.
I don't have much hope you will, but if you do get this working it will be unbelievably cool.
I am skeptical about the actual real world use cases, at least in the short term, but just having it working will be enough to attract interesting people who like that kind of stuff.
What do you think of this, nostr:npub1m2f3j22hf90mt8mw788pne6fg7c8j2mw4gd3xjsptspjdeqf05dqhr54wn?
This app should be very helpful to circumvent internet blackout during street protests in dictatorships.
Really, really interesting. Authorities in Iran and other such countries always trying to prevent people communication on mass actions.
Thank you.
Also this should be helpful during wars, if people have no internet connection and only a single man has it in one moment.
I love the images you create 💜⚡💫
This super cool, I have always been facinated by mesh networking and mesh messaging but so far there was not an open protocol shared by many app and people, this might be a chance to get it used and useful.
Go for it, I'll test as soon as I can.
Okay collecting notes:
1. I thought samiz was one of the people at first. Not realizing it was the name of the app. 🤦♂️
2. So just having the app allows anyone else with the app to synchronise? Hmm. Can this be abused?
Side note. How can this work but covid apps had to use a Google and Apple sponsored technology to use BLE?
3. Oh the posts go to the relay of the person who eventually connects to the internet? How does this mess with the outbox model?
P.S. I like that Samiz would be proactive in publishing notes it hasn't yet. How does it keep track of this?
P. P. S. You had me excited that there was already a release by having a "get it on obtainium" badge.
Now I am sad. 
1. Nice feedback 😂
2. I literally started studying BLE for 3 weeks, but it appears to me that most of the high level BLE libraries are proprietary, probably that's the reason why big techs were involved
3. Even if you have a lot of notes to publish, a mildly complex software can just group by pubjey, find its outbounds and push them there.
AirTags but with Nostr.
Alice takes a look at Bobs ass. Thats what comes thru in the first picture 😂
It's about HOT redhead WOMEN near YOUR area trying to get their cookies eaten
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The first two cases seem nearly identical.
Having diagrams for each use case showing how the messages spead under the different use cases would be helpful. It could also show how/why one note in use case C may go to relays A, B, and C, while a second note goes to relays C, X, Y, and Z.
If you haven't already looked into Briar and understand why they only pass messages to trusted individuals for transport, I'd recommend it. Decide up front whether you want to protect people's metadata. Whatever you decide, please make it clear to users what is and is not protected.
You could also consider using the Briar protocol as your underlying transport. Their chat app is just one example of what their protocol can do. What you are trying to do looks very similar top their goals in several ways.
What kind of metadata? The Mac address is randomizedd on BLE connections and the nostr notes are signed.
About location, every Samiz app will act as a relay for any note available on the local relay so the fact you received a note from device A doesn't means device A is the source, kind of like Tor and LN works.
I'll take a deeper look to Briar anyways thanks 🙂. I already took a look before and as you said the goals are very similar, but Samiz is supposed to support the nostr protocol, which I believe has way more potential than an isolatend platform like Briar.
The first thing that comes to mind is knowing who is DMing whom, when, how often, how long the messages are and so forth. This would likely be visible to every hop along the way. I suggest that would leak because that leaks to relays now, though this could be solved with protocol changes.
The Briar Protocol is just a transport layer, although that isn't always obvious if your first encounter with it is Briar Messenger. The briar protocol can be used to deliver email, Nostr notes, RSS feeds... or whatever. You have to write the Nostr parts, but the briar library can deal with getting the notes to their destinations.
IIRC they address messages to a public key. In your case, that'd be the public key of the relays. To jump from the mesh to the internet would just require a node to receive it (addressed to its public key), look at the contents of the note, and send it on the clearnet to the relays if that node has internet access. Just like you described in the third use case.
She likes the look of him and knows how to communicate with him (even though she doesn’t know who he is) because he is within proximity so she is either zapping him sats and/or a message.
That's amazing!
A private relay network on mobiles nearby?
And you got a grant from opensats to implement this?
This is how any communication app protocol should look like. 👍
My understanding from described UC's:
Samiz provides communication service for Nostr relays, so every user has to run local Nostr relay.
Since started, Samiz service automatically synchronizes messages with all available peer
nodes.
Communication is not encrypted on Samiz level.
Is the name abbreviation of Samizdat?
What about one where Alice's house was swept away by a hurricane and this allows her to send messages through network to rescue workers to family and friends telling them she's feeling ok and blessed.
I believe thiskinfd of situations is one of the mosthopefuls.
Unfortunately, for this to work you need to have Samiz in advance installed on your device, same as others. That requites a bigger network effect than a situation where you expect an internet shut down.
