Glossary#

Every term, in plain words first and precisely second. Sorted A to Z. Terms from the technical documents keep their technical name in code.

Account line#

One line of numbers per key in a circle's ledger: balance, wave, cap, carry, debt and a few counters, plus the status. Your wallet is this line. See the AI guide.

Act#

A signed deed of a person in a circle that is not a payment: join, leave, vote, propose a project, exclude, and so on (KIND 43916). It sits inside a block.

Balance#

The money you hold in the circle. It may be below zero (down to minus your wave) when you have given before you had. See the numbers.

Bank 3#

The name used for the future bank connection (a regulated bank or electronic-money institution) in the journey newcomer, member, wallet, bank. It is not built. See BalanceID.

BalanceID#

The person's public key used as an identity across layers: the same 64-character HEX key. Also the name of the future identity-and-compliance layer. See BalanceID.

Birth number (circle id)#

The fingerprint of a circle's founding charter: the event id of its found act, 64 characters of HEX. It is the circle's name for ever. It is not a key, so it cannot be stolen; another charter is another circle. The definitions call it the circle id; the directory calls it the birth number.

Block#

A numbered page of a circle's ledger (KIND 43911). It carries entries (payments, acts, rules, gravity, refusals) and the account lines they touched, and is signed by the witnesses. Each block names the previous one by its digest, so no page can be removed or swapped unseen.

Box relay#

The relay that a circle runs in its own "box" (its own server), the first of at least four relays of the circle. See new circle.

BSA#

Balanced Stage Account: the balanced account of a person in a circle of LetsBalance.Life. The word "BSA" appears in the older documents and in the kinds.

BSA ID#

The number of a BSA account: the person's Nostr public key, 64 characters of HEX. Never shown as npub.

BSA WIF#

The private key in the Lana apps' spelling (Wallet Import Format). Secret. Never typed into any page except the founder's own circle page, never shared.

Cap#

The highest your wave may grow. Default 100000000 minor units, that is 1,000,000.00 of the currency.

Carry#

The sub-cent remainder of gravity, in millionths of a minor unit (0 to 999,999), carried to the next morning so nothing is lost to rounding.

Chunk (snapshot chunk)#

A part of the full public snapshot at a daily seal (KIND 43918). Chunks together rebuild the whole state.

Circle#

A community with its own ledger, relays, rules, Circle Heart and witnesses, and one currency. Every circle is its own balanced cell: the sum of its balances is 0 after every block.

Circle Heart#

The people who created a circle and tend it. A single person in it is a Heart member (earlier called a steward; the technical names steward_* and stewards_required stay). Members do not elect the Heart; the Heart adds and removes its own members. See what the Heart can do.

Circle key#

A key that only stamps the circle's public record (KIND 30910). It is shown once at founding and written on paper. It can be replaced by a Heart act.

Circle record#

The circle as a directory lists it (KIND 30910): name, code, currency, time zone, Heart, witnesses, relays, rate source. Signed by the circle key.

Collector#

The part of a directory that reads circles' relays, verifies their chains and sends to the directory relay only what holds.

Compliance Passport#

A private, living, structured identity-and-economics profile for banks. Future, not built. See BalanceID.

Currency#

Every circle has exactly one: EUR, USD or GBP in version 0.3.0 (EURB, USDB, GBPB in the apps). It is fixed for ever at founding.

Daily seal#

The checkpoint a circle writes every morning after gravity (KIND 43917): which blocks the day covers, roots over the day and the state, the sum 0, the step-outward numbers. It carries a full public snapshot of every account. It is made every day, also without payments.

Debt (gravity debt)#

What a morning wanted to take but could not because there was not enough plus. It waits for the next plus and is never more than the wave. Not the same as being below zero.

Decided / proposal / open#

Labels in the source texts. Decided is a decision of the project owner on a date; proposal is recommended and waiting for a yes; open is a question to answer first.

Definitions 0.3.0#

The draft text of all BSA kinds (round 5, 23 Oct 2026). Not published as a Nostr event yet. See kinds.

Digest#

The name of a block or seal: sha256 of its NIP-01 serialization without the witness signatures. Unlike an event id, it does not change when witnesses sign.

Directory#

A public relay plus a small API that finds circles and people. It cannot forge, only omit or be late. See the directory.

Entry#

One item in a block: a payment, an act, a rule, one account's gravity, a refusal. Every entry has a circle-wide sequence number without gaps.

Found act#

The founding charter of a circle, signed by the founder (KIND 43916, type found). Its event id is the circle id.

Genesis (digest)#

Block 1 and its digest. With the circle id it is the circle's anchor: a reader accepts a chain only if block 1 embeds the found act and chains back to the genesis digest.

Gravity#

A rule that each morning takes a small part of a plus and gives it to the community. It touches only a positive balance, in whole numbers. See the exact rule.

Head#

A pointer to a circle's newest daily seal (KIND 30915), kept in directories.

HEX#

Hexadecimal: digits 0 to 9 and letters a to f. A key is always 64 lowercase HEX characters.

Home (member home)#

A short public record signed by a member (KIND 30916): this key belongs to this circle since block h, with a witness's confirmation. The truth is the circle's ledger; the home points to it.

Key#

A pair: a private key (secret) and a public key (64 HEX, the BSA ID).

KIND#

A number that says what type a Nostr event is. BSA uses 30910, 30915, 30916, 43910, 43911, 43916, 43917, 43918, 43919, 43921 and 43924. See kinds.

KYI (Know Your Impact)#

A planned, separate assessment of the effect of an activity on people, society and nature. Not KYC. See BalanceID.

Ledger#

A circle's book: the chain of blocks on its relays.

Minor unit#

The smallest unit of a currency, for EUR the cent. All amounts are whole minor units as strings.

Minus#

A balance below zero. Normal for someone who gave before they had. Must be settled before a reference can be issued.

Morning#

The daily moment (a circle setting, 04:00 local time in the pilot) when the day is cut, gravity is booked and the seal made.

Motion#

A proposal without money that the Circle Heart puts to a vote.

Node#

The witness that collects payments, orders them into blocks and proposes them. The other witnesses recompute every number themselves.

npub#

Another spelling of a Nostr public key. Not used here: only HEX.

Origin#

A keyless account from which a circle's start (1,000.00) and a newcomer's step come, and to which they return. It is negative by those amounts so that the sum stays zero.

OWN process#

A community process for handling a conflict, run in the Lana OWN applications, encrypted; only its outcome (for example an exclusion) is public. Any member can open one; a Heart member closes it. While one is open about you, no reference is issued.

ppm#

Parts per million. A gravity rate of 330 ppm a day is 0.033 % a day.

Plus#

A positive balance. Only a plus is subject to gravity.

Profile (KIND 0)#

A person's name and picture, replaceable by the person. The ledger never copies it.

Project#

A publicly described purpose with an amount. All community money goes to projects, decided by a vote. See how projects pass.

Quorum#

The least number q of witnesses (of n) that must sign a block for it to count. Three of four in the plan; one of one at the start of a pilot, labelled in public.

Rate quote#

A currency rate for a payment between circles (KIND 43919), valid for 10 minutes by default.

Reference#

A good-standing letter issued by a ledger when a member leaves (KIND 43921). A new circle admits a person from another circle only with it. See leaving.

Relay#

A Nostr server that stores signed events and serves them. It can hide or be late; it cannot forge.

Reserve#

A keyless account that holds the community's money and passes it to projects.

Root directory (Lana relays)#

The four relays listed in the Lana relay record KIND 38888. For Lana. Balance circles use their own directories.

Seal#

See daily seal.

Snapshot#

The full public state of a circle at a seal: every account line and every open item.

State root#

The root of a sparse Merkle tree over all state lines. It commits to the whole state.

Step (wave)#

See wave. In the apps the wave is also called the Step.

Step outward#

The amount a community adds beyond its borders; raising it is a project like any other.

tzdata#

The version of the time-zone database pinned at founding, used to compute mornings.

Wave#

How far below zero you may go: you can pay up to balance plus wave. It starts at 0 and grows by what you receive, up to the cap.

Witness#

A computer that recomputes every block of a circle itself and signs it only if everything matches. A payment counts when a majority has signed and three relays hold the block.

World account#

A keyless account through which payments between circles pass.