How resilient is something like Meshtastic? My understanding is that anyone can configure their device poorly so that it can become overly chatty, congesting the network. Even in ideal an ideal scenario with properly configured nodes, could this actually survive if it saw more than hobbiest adoption?
I think it’s really cool and i like having this idea of a backup communication system, but if has serious range limitations and is likely to be overwhelmed in a no-cell scenario is it even worth it, or is it just fun to play around with?
By default it implements rough limits that you cannot exceed to make sure that you do not not transmit too much noise. Additionally, you can always establish private channels for your nodes and / or not retransmit at all.
Meshtastic isn’t intended for mission-critical uses or as an internet substitute. It is intended for very basic text based communication (e.g. between your friends) or remote IoT devices.
The congestion argument also applies to all radio based communication, there are always people transmitting with high gain, noisy outputs or spam.
Yeah, I understand the limitations of the frequency and the compromises mesh networks have to make. I wouldn’t expect it to be an internet substitute. My point is, and I do apologise because I cannot remember the source, I recall hearing about a convention or a protest or some larger gathering where people tried to use Meshtastic and it cratered due to load.
If that above case actually did happen and I’m not mis-remembering, then it doesn’t bode well for adoption by the non-tech savvy. You get into this odd area where you have tech and RF hobbiests that think this is cool beans, but they don’t make up enough people for a robust network. However the more people you bring on that don’t understand radio settings the more succeptible you are to poor performance. Then if it ever does it mass adoption it is likely oitside the abilities of the tech and scale just isn’t possible. You need this sweet spot.
With ham or something else you can have a few people in more remote locations because of superior range, but with low powered RF like Meshtastic you really want portable devices for people on the ground. All this is to say I love the idea of being able to give something like this to a loved one going to a protest or something, but I’m just not sure if it’s more than a toy yet.
I’m not sure what they could do to keep this open while ensuring stability unless they start to add dynamic settings to tje protocol. Something that detects if there’s too much congestion, or if signals are too strong to automatically switch from LongFast to something more applicable to a the dense group you’re in. Then manual settings get hidden behind an advanced menu? But that would be entirely on tje firmware to control.
Anyway, I’m rambling and trying to solution without actually owning one, so I could be way off. I just really like the idea of short range personal communication and want this to be more than a tinker tech.
How resilient is something like Meshtastic? My understanding is that anyone can configure their device poorly so that it can become overly chatty, congesting the network. Even in ideal an ideal scenario with properly configured nodes, could this actually survive if it saw more than hobbiest adoption?
I think it’s really cool and i like having this idea of a backup communication system, but if has serious range limitations and is likely to be overwhelmed in a no-cell scenario is it even worth it, or is it just fun to play around with?
By default it implements rough limits that you cannot exceed to make sure that you do not not transmit too much noise. Additionally, you can always establish private channels for your nodes and / or not retransmit at all.
Meshtastic isn’t intended for mission-critical uses or as an internet substitute. It is intended for very basic text based communication (e.g. between your friends) or remote IoT devices.
The congestion argument also applies to all radio based communication, there are always people transmitting with high gain, noisy outputs or spam.
Yeah, I understand the limitations of the frequency and the compromises mesh networks have to make. I wouldn’t expect it to be an internet substitute. My point is, and I do apologise because I cannot remember the source, I recall hearing about a convention or a protest or some larger gathering where people tried to use Meshtastic and it cratered due to load.
If that above case actually did happen and I’m not mis-remembering, then it doesn’t bode well for adoption by the non-tech savvy. You get into this odd area where you have tech and RF hobbiests that think this is cool beans, but they don’t make up enough people for a robust network. However the more people you bring on that don’t understand radio settings the more succeptible you are to poor performance. Then if it ever does it mass adoption it is likely oitside the abilities of the tech and scale just isn’t possible. You need this sweet spot.
With ham or something else you can have a few people in more remote locations because of superior range, but with low powered RF like Meshtastic you really want portable devices for people on the ground. All this is to say I love the idea of being able to give something like this to a loved one going to a protest or something, but I’m just not sure if it’s more than a toy yet.
I’m not sure what they could do to keep this open while ensuring stability unless they start to add dynamic settings to tje protocol. Something that detects if there’s too much congestion, or if signals are too strong to automatically switch from LongFast to something more applicable to a the dense group you’re in. Then manual settings get hidden behind an advanced menu? But that would be entirely on tje firmware to control.
Anyway, I’m rambling and trying to solution without actually owning one, so I could be way off. I just really like the idea of short range personal communication and want this to be more than a tinker tech.