[lukeasch21]

I would absolutely encourage everyone reading this to check out Reticulum [1] if you haven't already. I believe the base project might be in need of new maintainers(?) at the moment and the main dev has some very strong takes, but it is a very well-thought out approach to distributed networking at the protocol layer. The existing implementations out there include a desktop app which can function over the internet (IP) or a USB connection to some existing LoRA boards. I recently purchased a LilyGo T-Echo [2] and have had a great experience flashing the open-source firmware and using it connected to a desktop over USB or connected over Bluetooth to the fantastic new companion app Columba [3]. This app seriously makes Reticulum feel like a first class citizen when it comes to parity support for messaging. You can even send files/images (with limitations of course)! And since it works at the network level, you can make your own apps to run over Reticulum as well.

[1] https://reticulum.network/ [2] https://lilygo.cc/products/t-echo-lilygo [3] https://github.com/torlando-tech/columba

[405nm]

don’t forget that although it already works fine on lora, it’s a protocol that’s transport channel agnostic, and is gonna do great with other transports (halow, optical, wifi, whatever) when people finally start realizing that lora is never going to be able to keep up with bandwidth/speed requirements of anything much beyond simple text messaging.

although, i’ve already done real time voice calls over 1 hop of reticulum lora on and it works pretty ok.

edit - community wiki with getting started instructions is here:

https://reticulum.miraheze.org/wiki/Welcome

[Levitating]

> simple text messaging

Also great for position tracking, sensor data or motion detection etc.

[rho138]

This for days. Cheap sensors that anyone can churn out for days and deploy to anywhere for weeks to years. No longer do I have to know if the garden beds need to be watered.

[komali2]

For that specific use case, if you already have a component out there, couldn't you instead have it trigger water at some % water saturation?

[montyanne]

I spent an entire month trying to build something with Reticulum, but there just isn’t great tooling for dealing with the protocol. Makes for a pretty infuriating devex if you’re just trying to build your app.

Neat concept but so many footguns that (imo) it’s not really sustainable to try bootstrapping.

Specifically, I had tried to port the stack to Rust no-std to use on nrf52 LoRA devices to use/abuse the existing MeshCore network to deliver reticulum packets. Turned out to be a nightmare just trying to figure out if my packets were even correctly formed.

[fragmede]

Why is Reticulum and MeshCore the issue here and not rust?

[LaserBeam1000]

I've never seen a working Reticulum network in the wild.

Only very very small testbeds.

[forkerenok]

There are tons of entry points available now [0], and I get thousands of announcements every day.

https://rmap.world/

It's so much fun with little pages, message boards and random people hitting you up for a chat. I brought up my own transport node and propagation node too to contribute to the mesh.

[fooqux]

I'd love to get a node working just for fun. But it also seems like a waste since I'm extremely rural. The closest node is 200+ miles away. The chances of seeing any other device but my own connect to it seem slim.

Is there still a reason to do this?

[405nm]

because the protocol is transport agnostic, there are a lot of interfaces to the public reticulum net that you can access over TCP, I2P, or yggdrasil.

https://github.com/markqvist/Reticulum/wiki/Community-Node-L...

takes away some of the fun of imagining the SHTF-all-corporate-infrastructure-is-gone scenario i guess but i think that for realistic mesh networking applications it’s cool to build out many infrastructure types and enjoy the fact that the mesh will reconfigure itself realtime across a variety of scenarios.

[cheschire]

It works over TCP too. No need for radio hijinx.

So you basically eliminate futzing around with the hard parts until you understand the reticulum network itself.

Basically work your way down the OSI model instead of working your way up it.

[randerson]

Perhaps there are others in your neighborhood in the same position, who would only get into it if there were other nodes. So be the first, get your friends into it, and maybe more nodes will follow. It's only $30 or so for a device.

They have a decent range (15 miles or more) so depending on how rural you are, you might be able to create a line of repeaters back to a major population center.

[fooqux]

Lol, I'm rural enough that the concept of "neighborhood" has no meaning here. I'd have to have a neighbor first. And friends all live further away than 15 miles.

Your point still stands though.

[brewtide]

I literally just put the meshtastic antenna on the roof today, in an old services box. Been in the window for months, had a few weird perfect weather moments show a few nodes and a ping. Put it on the roof, hours ago, nothing yet.

Someone has to start up the area! (I live in nowhere maine).

[komali2]

Set it up, and when family visit, give them little LORA pucks to strap onto their belts when they go out on the property. Boom little property wide messaging network. Send out a text when dinner's ready!

[bb88]

I ended up getting a ham radio license and now I get to use technology that actually works (even if it's a little more janky than meshtastic/reticulum).

My friend is across town and I should be able to hit him with the line of sight meshtastic repeater from my house, but I've never been able to.

OTOH, we can hear each other clear on any of the ham bands.

[DrewADesign]

For hobby usage, ham is fantastic. For decentralized communication for the general public, which seems to be Meshcore/Meshtastic’s goal, it’s a nonstarter. There’s just too big a barrier to entry.

[bb88]

And unfortunately Meshtastic fails miserably at that. Meshcore is better, but maybe not anymore. I'm not even sure Lora is the best technology for this either since you'd really want something that can listen to more than 1 channel at a time.

Lora seems to be a great technology for remote sensors within a 1km of each other that can transmit occasional data. But once that single channel fills up, the channel stops working.

[komali2]

I vaguely remember reading an article where someone had somehow transmitted digital signals over HAM, could feasibly be a transport for a reticulum network, right?

[firesteelrain]

Digital is heavily used in ham radio. For example, FT8.

[jubilanti]

> There are tons

I'm sorry but are you serious? That map shows 224 nodes in the world, fewer than 30 in the entire Western hemisphere. And only 24 in the world are using LoRa? Meshcore has 38,000 nodes, Meshtastic 10,000. Those two projects can actually be said to have "tons" of nodes.

It hurts your credibility. I trusted you, spent time trying to debug the map, thinking that something was wrong on my end... why am I only seeing 224 when there should be "tons", is there a filter, are these just super nodes....

So I looked into it because of what you said, but you raised expectations so much that I feel nothing but disappointment.

[forkerenok]

Fair enough and apologies. Justified or not, I took the comment I was replying to out of context of the current (MeshCore, LoRa) topic.

I was referring to the TCP/IP, I2P and yggdrasil endpoints. And regardless, "tons" was an unnecessary exaggeration.

[NamlchakKhandro]

too late. you're burned. time to buy a new passport.

[405nm]

that map on rmap.world is only showing nodes that run dicoverable=yes in their configurations or something like that.

based upon the announce stream coming through my local node, i am seeing around 14k unique identities advertising over 21k unique application endpoints (destinations) over the course of the past month or so that i’ve been tracking it.

[x2tyfi]

It seems odd that such a tiny proportion would run `discoverable=yes`. Any idea why that is? It makes me question the numbers.

[adammarples]

Which frequency do you get? Does it matter?

[jonah]

It matters legally.

Different countries allow unlicensed use on different frequencies. Look up which is correct for your location.

[adammarples]

Sadly there seems to be only one or two people in the uk on the reticulum network, I looked on rmap. Given these things have a range of maybe 8km I don't think that for all intents and purposes that it really exists yet.

[amatecha]

LoRa can reach hundreds of km's, just depends on positioning. Current verified Meshtastic ground-to-ground distance record is 331km (205mi) which is pretty nuts. Between two mountain peaks, of course. :) https://meshtastic.org/docs/overview/range-tests/

[anthk]

I wish nomadnet got rewritten in Go.

[NooneAtAll3]

be the change you want to see in the world :)

at the very least, try it. maybe it's simpler than you think

[forkerenok]

There's a maturing implementation of the whole stack in go, so this is not far off.

[anthk]

For Reticulum itself, yes, but sadly not for Nomadnet.