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77 lines
5.4 KiB
Markdown
77 lines
5.4 KiB
Markdown
# What is Meshtastic?
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Meshtastic is a project that lets you use
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inexpensive GPS mesh radios as an extensible, super long battery life mesh GPS communicator. These radios are great for hiking, skiing, paragliding -
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essentially any hobby where you don't have reliable internet access. Each member of your private mesh can always see the location and distance of all other
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members and any text messages sent to your group chat.
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The radios automatically create a mesh to forward packets as needed, so everyone in the group can receive messages from even the furthest member. The radios
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will optionally work with your phone, but no phone is required.
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### Uses
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* Outdoor sports where cellular coverage is limited. (Hiking, Skiing, Boating, Paragliding, Gliders etc..)
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* Applications where closed source GPS communicators just won't cut it (it is easy to add features for glider pilots etc...)
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* Secure long-range communication within groups without depending on cellular providers
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* Finding your lost kids ;-)
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[![Youtube video demo](desk-video-screenshot.png)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlNbMbVZlHI "Meshtastic early demo")
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### Features
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(Not all of these features are fully implemented yet - see below)
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* Very long battery life (should be about 8 days with the beta software)
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* Built in GPS and LORA radio, but we manage the radio automatically for you
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* Long range - a few miles per node but each node will forward packets as needed
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* Shows direction and distance to all members of your channel
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* Open and extensible codebase supporting multiple hardware vendors - no lock in to one vendor
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* Communication API for bluetooth devices (such as our Android app) to use the mesh
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* Eventually (within a couple of months) we should have a modified version of Signal that works with this project.
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Typical time between recharging the radios should be about eight days.
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This project is currently pre-alpha, but if you have questions please join our chat [![Join the chat at https://gitter.im/Meshtastic/community](https://badges.gitter.im/Meshtastic/community.svg)](https://gitter.im/Meshtastic/community?utm_source=badge&utm_medium=badge&utm_campaign=pr-badge&utm_content=badge).
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This software is 100% open source and developed by a group of hobbyist experimenters. No warranty is provided, if you'd like to improve it - we'd love your help. Please post in the [chat](https://gitter.im/Meshtastic/community).
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# Update 1
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* 02/20/2020 - Our first alpha release of the radio software is ready for early users. If you'd like to try it, we'd love your feedback. Click [here](https://github.com/geeksville/Meshtastic-esp32/blob/master/README.md) for instructions.
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## Meshtastic Android app
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Soon our (optional) companion Android application will be released here:
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[![Download at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.geeksville.mesh](https://play.google.com/intl/en_us/badges/static/images/badges/en_badge_web_generic.png)](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.geeksville.mesh&referrer=utm_source%3Dhomepage%26anid%3Dadmob)
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If you would like to join our super bleeding-edge alpha test group for this app, we'd love to have you. Three steps:
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1. Join [this Google group](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/meshtastic-alpha-testers) with the account you use in Google Play.
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2. Go to this [URL](https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.geeksville.mesh) to opt-in to the alpha test.
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3. If you encounter any problems or have questions, post in our gitter chat and we'll help.
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If you'd like to help with development, the source code for the Android app is [here](https://github.com/geeksville/Meshtastic-Android).
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## Supported hardware
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We currently support two brands of radios. The [TTGO T-Beam](https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000119152086.html) and the [Heltec LoRa 32](https://heltec.org/project/wifi-lora-32/). Most users should buy the T-Beam and a 18650 battery (total cost less than $35). Make
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sure to buy the frequency range which is legal for your country. For the USA, you should buy the 915MHz version. Getting a version that include a screen
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is optional, but highly recommended.
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We don't yet distribute prebuilt binaries. But soon (by Feb 22) we will have a file that you can easily install on your radio via USB. Once our software is installed, all future software updates happen over bluetooth from your phone.
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For a nice TTGO 3D printable case see this [design](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3773717) by [bsiege](https://www.thingiverse.com/bsiege).
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For a nice Heltec 3D printable case see this [design](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3125854) by [ornotermes](https://www.thingiverse.com/ornotermes).
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# Disclaimers
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This project is still pretty young but moving at a pretty good pace. Not all features are fully implemented in the current alpha builds.
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Most of these problems should be solved by the beta release:
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* Encryption is turned off for now
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* A number of software work items have to be completed before battery life matches our measurements, currently battery life is about two days
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* The current Android GUI is pretty ugly still
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* The Android API needs to be documented better
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* The Bluetooth API needs to be documented better
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* The mesh protocol is turned off for now, currently we only send packets one hop distant
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* No one has written an iOS app yet ;-)
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For more details see the [device software TODO](https://github.com/geeksville/Meshtastic-esp32/blob/master/TODO.md) or the [Android app TODO](https://github.com/geeksville/Meshtastic-Android/blob/master/TODO.md).
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