1. How safe is the encryption? Do two nodes upon initialization exchange public keys and then stored on the individual devices indefinitely? What happens if one of the nodes needs to factory reset and generate new keys. Will it let the other side know that the keys have been manipulated and require for a renegotiation to happen?

Can’t answer the “how safe” part without a security audit, but the UI will show a red padlock in the node list (or something like that) if the public key for a node changes. To renegotiate, just “forget” the node and they’ll re-sync.

See also: https://meshtastic.org/docs/overview/encryption/

2. Is the concept of a multiple node chat/group chat possible?

Each channel has a “group” chat that’s accessible to every node that has the channel key. The messages in the channel chat are encrypted with the channel pre-shared key (unlike direct messages which in recent firmwares use the public/private keypairs for each node)

3. voice chat;

The official voice chat support is only available on certain hardware where the LoRa radio operates in the 2.4 GHz band. This is because the sub-GHz band doesn’t have enough bandwidth for it (even with Codec2 compression). I don’t have any hardware that can support that, so no experience with it or if it’s capable of replacing GMRS radios. I’m also unclear on what kind of range LoRa would get in th 2.4 GHz band. I believe the voice chat is still experimental as well.

Ah, maybe that’s the 100 node limit I was thinking of. I’m still relatively new to this myself.

I do have my private channels named (with the exception of a single secondary channel called LongFast to be able to interact with the “default”/public mesh), but you can only have 7 (or is it 8?) channels per device; that’s a hard limit of the firmware/protocol.

From what I’ve read, I think there’s also an upper limit of around a hundred nodes per mesh.

Would I personally? No. If you’re posting the pre-shared key publicly, then might as well just use the default one.

I definitely wouldn’t force people to join a Discord channel, that’s for sure.

Forget exactly which community mesh page I was looking at, but basically you create an account on their website, the admin verifies you’re not spam, and then a section becomes available to you that has the mesh channel config info. The community mesh page would also get listed on the Meshtastic Local Groups list.

So I would setup a website for it, create a registration/membership system, and put the channel info in the “Members Only” section of the site.

Edit: Ah, yeah: Dayton Mesh

Configuring your Meshtastic Device for the Dayton Mesh

In order to access the Dayton Mesh channel information, you may become a member by Creating an Account. Once you are signed in, a new link will appear called Channel Settings. There is no cost, and we do not collect personal information aside from your email . The reason we have decided to go this route for membership is twofold. Primarily, this allows us to protect channel information from scraping while still having all information in one location. Secondarily, we may add user-centric features in the future such as self-reported node locations, member-only event information, user-submitted blog posts about builds, etc. As such, having a membership system from the beginning allows us to more easily implement such features in the future. We use Amazon Cognito for user management.

I’m still setting up my mesh, so just me and a friend at the moment lol.

Once I get everything planned, the goal is to start a community mesh project for this area.

Each channel also has a pre-shared key (even the default LongFast one). Most community groups only share their channel info once you’ve joined or otherwise been vetted; they typically don’t post those details for everyone to see.

If you keep the default longFast as your primary channel, be aware that your location is shared over the primary channel, so you’re sharing it with everyone.

On my mesh, my primary channel uses a custom name and PSK so that only members can use it / see my location.

Because I also wanted to be able to relay for and interact with the “public” / default channel, I created a secondary channel named LongFast. For that to work, I had to also modify my LoRa settings to use the default frequency slot for my region (20, in my case, which is 906.875 MHz).

Lol, yeah. Though the exhaust heat from the refrigerator does warm the house (good in winter, not good in the summer).

Definitely have had the thought about a thermostat controlled vent that would utilize outdoor air when the temperature permits. Might be one of those ideas that’s nice but impractical.

Yep. And with the ice keeping it cool, the compressor would run less and thus less waste heat (which is useful in the winter). Not sure how much that adds to the overall heat in the house, but it definitely contributes.

Ah yeah, $30/yr doesn’t seem like a lot from a strictly money-saving perspective. I guess if electricity here was more expensive (it’s getting there lol) or if I was on a tighter power budget (e.g. offgrid PV + battery), it might be worth it. Maybe I’ll just save that trick for when the power’s out.

Thanks. That does sound way more useful then I was thinking.

It’s actually a cat toy, and I got a two-pack of them from Amazon for like $10. Both are solar charged, and I keep one at home for the dogs and the other with me to use as a pen light. I have no idea what the blacklight mode is for, but it’s a feature.

This is the same thing under a different listing, but it’s just a single one: https://www.amazon.com/Pointer-Indoor-Projection-Playpen-Recharge/dp/B09TN6P3QK/

I’ve only got one older power bank that goes all glitchy like that with my 6W panel, and I really don’t know why either. The output from the panel is regulated, so it should be happy with it, but it just flickers, makes a high pitched whine, and never seems to charge. Best guess is it’s not able to cope with anything less than a minimum charging current that the panel can’t provide. Thankfully it’s only that one that is temperamental, and it’s also my oldest / lowest capacity one.

Here’s some things I found in my research before I bought that one. Maybe you’ll find them helpful since you’re looking at it from the same angle I was.

Modern dumb phones have come a ways since the mid 00’s. The few dumb phones I was looking at also support hotspot. That was the big thing that pushed me to try this since I frequently rely on my phone being a hotspot for work, and I assumed dumb phones couldn’t do that. Seems like that’s a fairly common feature on them these days.

A lot of them run KaiOS (which is kind-of FirefoxOS in the same way that Android is a Linux distro). They have decent web browsers (Firefox, obv) as well as apps, including TOTP. The only reason I “need” the bank app versus the online banking through the web browser is occasionally needing to do a few things that only the app can do (scan to deposit checks, etc). I was willing to go without the bank app, though.

I was originally looking at the Nokia 2780. The only reason I went with this one instead of a true dumb/feature phone is that I knew I could use this one as a SIP handset, if nothing else, after my 30 day challenge was up. It was also about $15 cheaper than the Nokia, so that pretty much sealed it. I could probably get by with a regular dumb phone, but this one is kind of the perfect middle ground for me.

I know it sounds like some tone-deaf parent saying it, but putting the phone down and going and doing literally anything else really has been the breath of fresh air I didn’t realize I needed. I’ve also been doing a lot of reading lately, too. The Kobo was a fairly recent “treat yo’ self” addition because when I did read my ebooks, I did it from my phone.

Several reasons, but digital detoxing was one of the goals.

1. Out of curiosity, I wanted to see if I could go 30 days in the modern world with a dumb phone. This one was actually cheaper than the other dumb phone I was looking at but was more capable (I also liked that I could re-purpose it after the experiment was over). I just disabled a lot of its functionality for the 30 day challenge to dumb it down to just what a modern dumb phone can do. Challenge was successful, but afterward, for quality of life, I re-enabled the app store, browser, and allowed myself some basic apps (bank, TOTP, email, Matrix, etc).

2. I’m beyond bored with the “tall skinny rectangle” form factor and wanted to try something different. I’m old enough that T9/tap typing is still in my muscle memory, so that was a surprisingly easy transition. Only took me about a day to get back into the full swing of it.

3. I spent too much time doom scrolling. During the 30 day challenge, I cut out most of that by way of not having it available. Afterward, the small screen and weird form factor kind of helped reinforce that. I do have a Lemmy client on there, lol, and have posted from it.

After using it for 30 days, I found that I just didn’t really miss my tall skinny rectangle all that much and decided to stick with it (after un-dumbing it). I still keep my actual smartphone in my bag if I need it, but it’s mostly just a mini wifi tablet that sees occasional use.

Cat S22 Flip. Low-end smartphone running Android in a dumb phone form factor. Bought it for a 30 day challenge / digital detox and ended up loving it and kept using it as my daily driver.

I realize it’s not for everyone, but I absolutely love this thing. My old smartphone has been demoted to wifi tablet when I need it, but it mostly lives in my bag.

Never really occurred to me to charge a USB power bank with it during the day though

Lol. I used to just charge things directly, but I found it was less fuss to just charge a big power bank and then charge the rest of my stuff from that later. There’s some efficiency loss with that method, but I don’t have to spend my relaxation time worrying about resource management and swapping devices around.

It depends on your use case, but this one is on my wish list. (Amazon link) The small ones that are the size of regular power banks will take a week or more to fully charge and should be avoided as junk. I’d also recommend avoiding any that have integrated batteries (more below).

The one I have is discontinued, but it’s the iClever 12W solar with integrated 8000 mAh battery. It’s not the best design with the integrated battery that sits out in the sun all day. It will often overheat and stop charging until it cools down, so I have to check on it periodically. Luckily, with what I’m charging with it, I only ever run it down to about 60-70% most days, and it will charge back up before it gets too hot out in the sun. I’ve used it since 2020, and it’s still going strong (I try not to deplete it below 40% which I think helps keep the battery happy).

Those are good for backpacking/travel as well as around the house.

It’s a lot less portable, but for camping, I’ve got a 12v 50 watt panel that I hooked a 12v 45 watt USB-C power delivery adapter into. That will give me 5-20 volts DC at up to 45 watts. I mostly top off my big power bank from that, but it has also charged my laptop easily.