How-To: Updating neuron following via quill

Background and objective

• The goal of this page is to explain how to set neuron following via quill, including some examples.
• It assumes that you have a working installation of quill and are familiar with the tool. For an introduction into quill, please see here. For instructions on how to install and use quill please see the readme on GitHub and the quill documentation.
• This article is particularly relevant if you have not updated your neuron after the disablement of default following for proposals on the governance topic conducted in Q1’22.

Command syntax to directly change following settings via quill

The syntax of the quill command to set the following is

quill --pem-file <PEM_FILE> neuron-manage <neuron id> --follow-topic <FOLLOW_TOPIC> --follow-neurons <follow neuron id>

where

• <PEM_FILE> is the path to the Privacy-Enhanced Mail (PEM) file created when quill was set up.
• <neuron id> is the id of your neuron.
• <FOLLOW_TOPIC> takes an argument from the following
  • 0 - All Topics Except Governance
  • 2 - ExchangeRate
  • 3 - NetworkEconomics
  • 4 - Governance
  • 5 - NodeAdmin
  • 6 - ParticipantManagement
  • 7 - SubnetManagement
  • 8 - NetworkCanisterManagement
  • 9 - KYC
  • 10 - NodeProviderRewards
• <follow neuron id> is the id of the neuron you wish to follow.

Examples

Assume that you have a set-up where your PEM file is called identity.pem and the id of your neuron is 11423144599838103945.

Example 1

• Set the following for the category “Governance” (topic type 4).
• Follow the ICP Maximalist Network with neuron id 4966884161088437903

Then the corresponding quill command is

quill --pem-file identity.pem neuron-manage 11423144599838103945 --follow-topic 4 --follow-neurons 4966884161088437903

Example 2

• Set the following for the category “All Topics Except Governance” (topic type 0)
• Follow the DFINITY foundation with neuron id 27

Then the corresponding quill command is

quill --pem-file identity.pem neuron-manage 11423144599838103945 --follow-topic 0 --follow-neurons 27

Command syntax enabling to change following settings via NNS dapp hotkey

As an alternative you can change the following setting from the NNS dapp. For this you need to add a NNS dapp hotkey to your neuron via quill. The syntax of the quill command

quill --pem-file <PEM_FILE> neuron-manage <neuron id> --add-hot-key <principal id>

where

• <PEM_FILE> is the path to the Privacy-Enhanced Mail (PEM) file created when quill was set up.
• <neuron id> is the id of your neuron.
• <principal id> is the principal id from your NNS dapp (e.g. visible in the neuron tab).

For instructions on how to set following within the NNS dapp see How-To:_Set_your_neuron_to_follow_another_neuron

Example

Assume that you have a set-up where your PEM file is called identity.pem and the id of your neuron is 11423144599838103945 and your principal id from the NNS dapp is bunnn-mqfrb-xfcvl-liejh-6lii7-z7kve-pcara-db6zw-krzky-xow52-abc. Then the corresponding quill command is

quill --pem-file identity.pem neuron-manage 11423144599838103945 --add-hot-key bunnn-mqfrb-xfcvl-liejh-6lii7-z7kve-pcara-db6zw-krzky-xow52-abc