I know I might be talking to myself a little, but just documenting I guess. Started on Nostr with Damus. For whatever reason I could NOT follow people. Id click follow, and jt would follow, and then when I’d close the app and open it again, anyone that Id follow would be wiped. So I tried a different client app (Nos Social). When I started following people on there it would now start to show on there and Damus. And now the follow feature works on my Damus App. Glad everything seems to be working now, but idk yall. Idk if the average person would be as persistent as me to troubleshoot and tinker. I still don’t know exactly what was causing this. I heard it had to do with relays, but even before I got it to work, I was repairing and adding relays and that didn’t seem to work.
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Hmm @Bitcoin Forever how might I recreate this behavior on damus?
Did you create new keys on cellular connection? On wifi?
So actually before knowing anything about Nostr, I created keys from the Nostr site. Then later used them on Damus
Which nostr site?
Nostr.com
Can you walk me exactly step by step what you did?
For example
1) step 1 create keys on nostr.com
2) step 2 ______
3) step 3 paste keys in damus
Step 1: Went on Nostr.com from my iMac thinking it was a platform just like Instagram, X, etc., not realizing it was its own protocol that all these client apps would be built on.
Step 2: Created keys on Nostr.com.
(Didn’t do anything with those keys for about a week or two)
(Saw a video on Youtube about Nostr and which apps work well with it for iOS and Android. Then the concept of what Nostr is clicked)
Step 3: Downloaded Damus on my iPhone.
Step 4: Air dropped the keys file I previously made from Nostr.com into my iPhone from my iMac — because I didn’t want the keys to go to waste.
Step 5: Pasted keys into Damus and tried to build my profile and connect with people from there.
I had noticed that following people was seemingly glitchy, but figured it was just taking the relays time to update or something. But then after closing and opening the app intermittently I began to realize that the following function was just not working at all. It would show I followed if I clicked follow in one session. But if I opened and closed the app, the same person I had followed previously would show up as not followed. Then I tried a different client (Nos Social), followed some people on there, and then following now works on Damus. Also before that, the notifications section would not show anything, only after I made the fix did it start working.
I know that was lengthy, but just trying to give as much detail as possible.
I use primal and everything works well with my devices .... I recommend it !!!!
Thank you, attempting to recreate now
@Bitcoin Forever I was able to recreate your unhappy path of generating keys in nostr.com and plugging into iOS damus:
cc @Ben Arc @motorina0 @Daniel D’Aquino
GitHub
creating keys on nostr.com cannot post in damus iOS · Issue #223 · nostrability/nostrability
client initiating action nostr.com client receiving or observing action (or lack thereof) damus iOS timestamp https://njump.me/nevent1qqsz4lfaegxp2...
Well I was able to post notes, but mainly wasnt able to follow people
Yes, I confirmed the same behavior.
There is a ‘first aid’ in damus settings that could help here.
Maybe iOS damus should auto-surface this on detected missing contact / relay list @Daniel D’Aquino @jb55
Confirming first aid via iOS Damys helped fix the missing contact and relay list/inability to follow people
They're just keys generated clientside using a well used library. Where you generate keys is irrelevant to the issues you have.
TBH this happens every time I onboard someone to Damus. The default relays never seem to work as expected and it always has the most issues with following other users or saving profile data. I’ve mostly had to switch to Primal to get anyone properly set up.
So you would say it’s a Damus issue and not a Nostr issue?
What is happening under the hood is a private key/nsec is successfully generated *without* a contact list, a relay list.
Damus accepts the nsec, and does not overwrite the contact list. The rationale is that in certain situations the user might accidentally lose a larger contact list.
This is a crap experience for first time nostr joiners. Will investigate how to improve.
@Daniel D’Aquino s lets revisit/discuss automating first aid.
Oh wow. I’m not 100% sure I understand all of the ins and outs of the Nostr protocol, but I think I understand what you’re saying. Thank you for the help. I’ll be sure to recommend a client app directly when pointing someone to Nostr.
This really needs to get prioritized IMO, it’s probably leading to a lot of abandoned npubs and contributing to the “Nostr doesn’t work” myth.
@Bitcoin Forever thank you for your patience and persistence. I’ve documented the issue in detail, and am challenging the devs to improve the onboarding experience.

GitHub
creating keys on nostr.com cannot post in damus iOS · Issue #223 · nostrability/nostrability
client initiating action nostr.com client receiving or observing action (or lack thereof) damus iOS timestamp https://njump.me/nevent1qqsz4lfaegxp2...
@The Daniel 🖖 can you confirm this is for newly created keys with damus, or via nsec login flow?
If the latter, where are the keys created?
I’ve seen this problem occur both with keys created via Damus as well as other clients including Primal. I don’t have too much specific I can offer, only that Damus is one of the more frustrating clients when it comes to seeing newly created profiles, as well as publishing profile edits for new users with the default relay set.
so you're just referring to not seeing up to date profile info?
It’s hard for me to give you a detailed answer because it’s something I mainly observe when helping others onboard, which is infrequent.
Without the ability to manage multiple npubs in Damus and create new ones without signing out of this one, it’s not something I can quickly test.
I tried setting up a test profile using Damus running on my MacBook and didn’t run into any real issues so maybe it’s not a consistent problem.
This npub populated right away for me when I searched for it: @new npub who dis
For all I know, it could have been something to do with my own relay set, which is hopefully resolved now.
the "cold start" issue is real and a bad experience. it takes a bit for things to get into the cache, especially on mobile connections when downloading all the profile pictures and metadata.
@The Daniel 🖖 when you experienced this unhappy path are you on cellular, or wifi?
Last time it was on cellular when I was helping @Tara onboard in Vegas.
I'm guessing all it could take is one large pfp to wipe out the bandwidth on the connection and then nothing would load. need QoS or something