Matt I feel your skills would be better utilized if you incorporated the upcoming meshtastic release, which includes secure peer to peer messaging, this would mean whatever you develop would already have an existing mesh to use in the wild and, at least on the t-deck, you would have your own vastly superior software for existing meshtastic users. If we could standardize, and not end up like the linux distro wars, this could be huge.
I agree with what you're saying, and ideally I'd like to have a "meshtastic compatible" mode that you can toggle off and on. I need to dig into the meshtastic design/code to figure out the level of effort there. My priority right now is getting this firmware available for download for a couple of Lilygo products and also a 1 watt version built on sparkfun micromod, because those are what i'm basing my own area's cluster on for now. T-Deck Plus will be the messaging device, t-beam will be a mobile base station and also a gps tracker, 1 watt sparkfun will be for stationary (and possibly drone-mounted) base stations. I think I'll have all that done and available for download by end of october. After that, I'll hopefully have some breathing room to reassess what's next. I'm also considering integration with more powerful radio hardware that require amateur radio license.
This is a project that has been on the radar for a long time, it's a shame that the kickstarter didn't work out, where can I follow up with a purchase, also does it have an extension for the voice text transfer feature
Hi, thanks for following the project. The aim of the kickstarter was to get better pricing for manufacturing at scale. Since the kickstarter goal was not triggered, I have pivoted (for now) and am porting the firmware to a few devices that are already (or soon will be) available for people to purchase from other sources, such as Lilygo, such as the T-deck shown in this video. In parallel , FCC approval is still pending for the exact devices demo'd in the kickstarter, and I have plenty of those in stock..i'm just not able to sell them without FCC approval yet. Since I'm still porting the firmware, it's not yet available for download, but the Lilygo hardware (assuming it's in stock) can be purchased from lilygo.cc and probably some other sources. If everything continues to go smoothly, I will also be doing a port to at least one Rak Wireless device and a sparkfun platform that integrates a 1 watt radio, which would make a great base station. Since some of these devices have GPS on board, I'm adding a deep integration of GPS, for devices that have it on board, which will allow for some very interesting features. People will be able to turn their location sharing off or on, so it's not required. Also, there is no fram onboard these various devices, but they do all have SD card readers, so I had to take quite a bit of time to make the firmware compatible with either SD cards OR fram ..that was challenging, but I've got it working. There is not a voice-to-text integration, but the Lilygo t-deck does have an integrated mic, which I might be able to make use of for sending short audio recordings or something along those lines. That is not on my to-do list yet though, as there's still plenty of work to do on these porting efforts. Once I have the t-deck/t-beam port complete (or mostly complete), I'll create a demo video and post it to this channel, along with a progress update.
@@mattcalhoun61 Thanks, you're doing a great job, hopefully this will come soon, can there be multiple languages in the software, and is it possible to have input methods for other countries built in? Chinese, Japanese, etc.
Is your plan still to have it be somewhat network agnostic? I thought I saw somewhere you had mentioned it could work via Wifi, Bluetooth, LoRa, et cetera. I've tested the Briar project a couple times over the years. It's really useful that it will direct connect via internet, wifi or Bluetooth, but it won't do LoRa. For the same reasons you've chosen LoRa, I end up using Meshtastic rather than Briar. I like your overall approach, and hope the project succeeds. Gotta admit there's zero chance I'm jumping in until/unless you get to the open source phase.
Yes the plan is still to work across multiple community methods. The first firmware release (hopefully within weeks) will focus on LoRa on LilyGo products. I'm integrating GPS as well, it's already on the devices I'm targeting. Probably 1 watt versions will come next, and WiFi after that.
Hi Matt, This is fantastic news and have a T-Beam Supreme that just arrived. Also have the T-Deck Plus awaiting delivery next week. 👍 Is the other dedicated hardware you were working on being shelved or is this just another way to increase the awareness & adoption?!? Looking forward to being able to test this firmware out once it’s made available. Lastly, the website still does not accept any input to enter an email for notification. Pressing on the white box just drops the page down a few inches and still won’t allow any text entry?!? I’ve tried it using all different browsers on my iPhone with the same results.
The adafruit -based devices, which are the ones shown in earlier videos, are currently undergoing FCC testing (6+ weeks). There is a manufacturer creating dedicated hardware I can't mention until it's further along. I am also looking at porting to a sparkfun platform that would not require any soldering and would bump up the power to 1 watt (about 10x , and still no amateur radio license required).
@@AndrewMcClenaghan4182 I think Australia is 915, 1watt max just like the US. So I think the answer is yes. I will also make them work with 868 centric frequencies, but I don't think that matters to you
Matt I feel your skills would be better utilized if you incorporated the upcoming meshtastic release, which includes secure peer to peer messaging, this would mean whatever you develop would already have an existing mesh to use in the wild and, at least on the t-deck, you would have your own vastly superior software for existing meshtastic users. If we could standardize, and not end up like the linux distro wars, this could be huge.
I agree with what you're saying, and ideally I'd like to have a "meshtastic compatible" mode that you can toggle off and on. I need to dig into the meshtastic design/code to figure out the level of effort there. My priority right now is getting this firmware available for download for a couple of Lilygo products and also a 1 watt version built on sparkfun micromod, because those are what i'm basing my own area's cluster on for now. T-Deck Plus will be the messaging device, t-beam will be a mobile base station and also a gps tracker, 1 watt sparkfun will be for stationary (and possibly drone-mounted) base stations. I think I'll have all that done and available for download by end of october. After that, I'll hopefully have some breathing room to reassess what's next. I'm also considering integration with more powerful radio hardware that require amateur radio license.
This is a project that has been on the radar for a long time, it's a shame that the kickstarter didn't work out, where can I follow up with a purchase, also does it have an extension for the voice text transfer feature
Hi, thanks for following the project. The aim of the kickstarter was to get better pricing for manufacturing at scale. Since the kickstarter goal was not triggered, I have pivoted (for now) and am porting the firmware to a few devices that are already (or soon will be) available for people to purchase from other sources, such as Lilygo, such as the T-deck shown in this video. In parallel , FCC approval is still pending for the exact devices demo'd in the kickstarter, and I have plenty of those in stock..i'm just not able to sell them without FCC approval yet.
Since I'm still porting the firmware, it's not yet available for download, but the Lilygo hardware (assuming it's in stock) can be purchased from lilygo.cc and probably some other sources.
If everything continues to go smoothly, I will also be doing a port to at least one Rak Wireless device and a sparkfun platform that integrates a 1 watt radio, which would make a great base station.
Since some of these devices have GPS on board, I'm adding a deep integration of GPS, for devices that have it on board, which will allow for some very interesting features. People will be able to turn their location sharing off or on, so it's not required. Also, there is no fram onboard these various devices, but they do all have SD card readers, so I had to take quite a bit of time to make the firmware compatible with either SD cards OR fram ..that was challenging, but I've got it working.
There is not a voice-to-text integration, but the Lilygo t-deck does have an integrated mic, which I might be able to make use of for sending short audio recordings or something along those lines. That is not on my to-do list yet though, as there's still plenty of work to do on these porting efforts.
Once I have the t-deck/t-beam port complete (or mostly complete), I'll create a demo video and post it to this channel, along with a progress update.
@@mattcalhoun61 Thanks, you're doing a great job, hopefully this will come soon, can there be multiple languages in the software, and is it possible to have input methods for other countries built in? Chinese, Japanese, etc.
Looks great !
Is your plan still to have it be somewhat network agnostic? I thought I saw somewhere you had mentioned it could work via Wifi, Bluetooth, LoRa, et cetera.
I've tested the Briar project a couple times over the years. It's really useful that it will direct connect via internet, wifi or Bluetooth, but it won't do LoRa.
For the same reasons you've chosen LoRa, I end up using Meshtastic rather than Briar.
I like your overall approach, and hope the project succeeds. Gotta admit there's zero chance I'm jumping in until/unless you get to the open source phase.
Yes the plan is still to work across multiple community methods. The first firmware release (hopefully within weeks) will focus on LoRa on LilyGo products. I'm integrating GPS as well, it's already on the devices I'm targeting. Probably 1 watt versions will come next, and WiFi after that.
Hi Matt,
This is fantastic news and have a T-Beam Supreme that just arrived. Also have the T-Deck Plus awaiting delivery next week. 👍
Is the other dedicated hardware you were working on being shelved or is this just another way to increase the awareness & adoption?!?
Looking forward to being able to test this firmware out once it’s made available.
Lastly, the website still does not accept any input to enter an email for notification. Pressing on the white box just drops the page down a few inches and still won’t allow any text entry?!?
I’ve tried it using all different browsers on my iPhone with the same results.
The adafruit -based devices, which are the ones shown in earlier videos, are currently undergoing FCC testing (6+ weeks). There is a manufacturer creating dedicated hardware I can't mention until it's further along. I am also looking at porting to a sparkfun platform that would not require any soldering and would bump up the power to 1 watt (about 10x , and still no amateur radio license required).
@@mattcalhoun61 That is awesome! Will these work in the Australian bands?
@@AndrewMcClenaghan4182 I think Australia is 915, 1watt max just like the US. So I think the answer is yes. I will also make them work with 868 centric frequencies, but I don't think that matters to you
@@mattcalhoun61 awesome!