this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2025
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Meshtastic

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meshtastic is still incredibly small (lemmy.zip)
submitted 2 weeks ago by shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip to c/meshtastic@mander.xyz
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If you dont use the default LongFast meshtastic is really empty. I switched my node to MediumSlow, since it's like 86% faster than LongFast. I knew there would not be any in my area, so I subscribed to the msh/US MQTT topic and theres still nobody else. I'm going to leave it like that for a while and see if I hear anything during any kind of band openings or catch any other MQTT nodes trying out that topic. And yes, both uplink and downlink are enabled. I do know that there are some nodes in the Bay Area on msh/US/mqtt-bayme-sh, but I am not near their.

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[–] Cadende@hexbear.net 2 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

wait so you switched off of LongFast, the channel where all the organic community is because it's the default and has enough range to tackle decent distances, and are now posting about how empty it is as if MediumSlow is representative of meshtastic as a whole?

I can get hundreds of nodes in my city on LongFast, there's a robust community mesh, but if I switched to MediumSlow I'd also get zero peers, because nobody uses it rn. Non-standard channels are only useful if you get organized (my local mesh has talked about switching over to a different channel as a group), or are using it for personal use with your immediate crew and have your own router nodes if necessary

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

In urban areas, long fast is definitely going to get congested quite quickly.

[–] Cadende@hexbear.net 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

maybe, in the future, if meshtastic takes off/just doesn't die out. But if you're complaining about the community being too small then clearly your area isn't at that point yet, right?

My city is still not maxing out LongFast even with the very robust local infrastructure

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

What is the average channel utilization on your local routers? From what I understand, once it starts to get above 30%, you start to get dropped packets and stuff like that. The routers here report every 12 hours, so I go in and check the last week view and average out the channel utilization over all the reports from the last week.

[–] Cadende@hexbear.net 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

idk what you're using for last week view but it seems to be around 20% for big router nodes in the heart of the city here atm

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

To get the last week view, tap the router short name, tap more details, and then tap device metrics log, then tap 1w. It will give you the device metrics for the past week and then you can add all the channel utilization numbers together and divide by the number of reports you have. As I mentioned before, the routers in my area report every 12 hours and so over a week there are 14 logs so I have to add all the channel utilization numbers up and then divide by 14.

[–] Cadende@hexbear.net 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

on the mobile app? I don't have that

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 days ago

Oh, I see. I definitely don't know how to do it from the web interface.

[–] mp3@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

To be frank I want to jump into it, set up a relay node in my shed with a decent antenna, I just can't find the time to do it..

And there are so many options on how to build a node, I likely have choice paralysis/overload.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 7 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I don't have any suggestion for the node itself, but you should use a 3dbi antenna so that you keep a circular radiation pattern. If you use a high-gain antenna, it will cause you to not be able to talk with nodes that have a significant elevation change from you, such as airplane flights.

[–] mp3@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks for the info :)

[–] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Do you have a link with info on different antennas and pattern characteristics?

[–] pmk@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I started reading about Meshtastic yesterday, and got an urge to set up a node even if (according to some maps) no one is near me. But then I started wondering, if I could reach another node, what could I do with that connection? What is it used for? Is it more about technically being able to send messages without an ISP. Do people use this for any real application?

[–] Cadende@hexbear.net 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Do people use this for any real application?

as far as I can tell in the hobbyist circles near me, no or rarely (things like communicating while hiking or camping are discussed but mostly in the hypothetical it seeeeems like). It's treated like ham radio where I'm at, where it could theoretically be useful in an emergency but until there's a major disaster to test it it's just nerds pinging eachother just to see what they can do. amateur radio is actually useful though, not sure how meshtastic will fare.

It seems like there are more practical uses for people in certain circumstances outside of the city though. I've seen homesteads and farms pop up as little remote clusters on some of the online maps, and people talk about having a home base station on a tower or the roof and then they can communicate with eachother from out in the fields (tends to be pretty flat so the range is better). Still hard to know how well used it is in those scenarios

Personally I like the idea and would actually use it for local chit-chat with friends family and fellow nerds, but the reliability of message delivery even when you're both connected to the mesh pretty well, seemed poor. I heard the newest firmware releases were supposed to improve message routing (not just using flood routing for all messages all the time) but I haven't tried them yet. Even with how big the mesh near me is, all the meta chat seems to be happening on discord not on the mesh itself

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

It's basically a local chat program. Think of it like signal or text messaging, but that only happens locally in your area, unless you enable MQTT, which connects it to the internet. But in my opinion, at least that kind of defeats the purpose, especially if you can reach other nodes locally. You could enable MQTT to add yourself to MeshMap.net if you wish. But that's an opt-in process. And so, if you're looking at MeshMap.net, you may see nobody in your area when there actually are people using it.

[–] greybeard@lemmy.one 1 points 2 weeks ago

When I got a node, I learned there are actually quite a few more people in my area than meshmap suggests, because there is a state based MQTT server that most people in this area use. It also means I'm still chatting somewhat locally, but hitting a much wider net than a purely local radio could.

[–] pmk@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I see! Thank you, that's hopeful then. Is it designed to be very local area, or is that just the way it is now? Could it one day be used in a more general way beyond chat?

[–] AlchemicalAgent@mander.xyz 1 points 2 weeks ago

That really depends on the nodes you have around you. If everyone is sitting in their houses with small Keychain nodes your mesh will never reach more than a few miles. But if you add a few key nodes in high places with good antenna then each hop of the mesh can easily reach 10+ miles. Even with the default 3-hop limit I've hit a town 60 miles away from me.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

People have made BBS's with it, like from the 1990s, and there are some very limited games you can play over the mesh, such as Mesh Tac Toe. Look up TC2 BBS and Specfive.

[–] Voyajer@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

Most don't upload their location to any of the node maps,l

[–] Picasso@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Am I wrong to think that while meshtastic is still in its infancy there are other applications aside from just chatting? For example there is the whole element where you can have devices send useful information to a script that is outside of the internet. For example location data, events, weather even things like ATAK.

Don't get me wrong it's great to chat with people but this isn't meant to replace something like the internet

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago

Yeah, that's definitely something you can do. Although I have not personally done so.

[–] MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I would use the default if you want to connect to other random nodes.

Changing it makes sense for private meshes, not for joining the public though.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Well, eventually some people are going to have to change, especially those in suburban or urban areas will probably need to go into at least medium or short range modes just due to the density of nodes. I live in a small city (~50k pops) and was just checking around to see if anybody else was in one of the faster modes. But at least as of yet, I don't see anybody. So for now, long fast is fine, but there will come a day when it no longer will be.

[–] MangoPenguin@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah I don't think meshtastic is the right choice for dense areas, even on faster methods it will quickly get overloaded.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 weeks ago

From what I understand, you can have several hundred nodes easily on the fast modes. That is definitely a quick overload compared to your traditional cell phone network. But there are not that many people with Meshtastic and not that many events where the super fast modes are even required. Even in large metropolitan areas, I'm only seeing upwards of 30 or 40 people on MeshMap, and obviously that's not showing everybody because that's opt-in, but that would still be well within the range of the fast modes.

[–] dzajew@piefed.social 3 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Depends where you are, I guess. Where I live, we use MediumFast, though first I had to find this information, in order to switch from LongFast. Maybe there are some meshtastic groups in your area? (like in Matrix/Reddit/Facebook groups)

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 weeks ago

I know for a fact there's quite a few nodes on long fast around here. But I don't know if nodes are on any other presets or not.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 3 points 2 weeks ago

I used MeshMap.net to figure out what people were using in my area. Although for now it's still long fast.

[–] vext01@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

There's no one on long fast where I live

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

How high is your node?

[–] vext01@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I live on a hill, mostly above the city.

I've tried 3db and 5db antennas. Also walking around the city.

Verified my nodes work and can talk to each other.

Occasionally get an unknown node from a passing train or a message from a flight.

I think there's just no users here tbh. South east England.

[–] shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip -1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I think a lot of the UK has gone over to meshcore but at least personally I wouldn't use it because the app is not open source and I refuse to use anything that's not open source if I can at all avoid it. https://meshcore.co.uk/

Also, keep your antenna game down. That 3DBI is fine. And even the 5DBI is okay. But much higher than that. And you'll start to see problems with elevation changes. Not wanting to let your nodes communicate.