Store and Forward Plugin -- Alpha now live!

1

Howdy,

The first usable version Store and Forward plugin is done! Yippie!

With this plugin, a client can request to be sent a history of messages it may have missed. The Store & Forward plugin is available in device code as of 1.2.47.

Would you like a sneak peak, help by testing it out and provide feedback? Go to the channel #storeforward on our Discord. The Store and Forward plugin requires a tbeam setup as a router and any other device can be used as a client.

The plugin is far from done and also far from bug free, but it’s totally usable.

Plugin doc:

8 Likes
2

The S&F plugin could be really handy for me, but I’d like to know what is stopping it being used on the WisBlock series if one were to add either the flash or EEPROM module? Is it just lack of development time?

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That and lack of hardware … :slight_smile:

4

You mean the devs don’t have it or it’s lacking something it needs?

5

I’m the one working on that plugin. Most of my modern development tools right now are for the esp8266/esp32. I have some equipment for the nrf based devices, but really have not explored them.

Happy to try out the rak or really anything else but I can’t promise any timelines.

Now, I speak for just myself here. If any one else wants to contribute to SF, I’ll happily show them the ropes and they’ll likely do better than I am doing now :slight_smile:

6

I’m unfamiliar with the programming environment for either of these so for the time being I’m at the mercy of the devs :innocent:

One day I’ll find some spare time and take a look, I’m sure it’s not all that different than my other IDEs

7

The IDE is a free version of Visual Studio. It’s actually really slick.

8

Will the Store and Fwd send messages via MQTT if/when wifi becomes available? I’m thinking about using a usb lte/wifi dongle and power cycle it with a 555/timer relay to save power.

9

That’s an interesting idea. To make S&F replay it’s history, you have to ask it to (@mc-hamster can elaborate more here). I think you could definitely set something up that works like this:

  1. cell modem powers up, creates a wifi hotspot
  2. nearby node connects to wifi, then mqtt
  3. node publishes “online” to your mqtt broker
  4. A script listening for the “online” message sends the command to replay the S&F log
  5. messages arrive at your mqtt broker like normal
  6. profit and all that
10

I don’t see why not, but we have not tried. Let us know :slight_smile:

11

Was Store and Forward released as part of the Meshtastic firmware at some point? Or is still no compatible hardware available? What would one need to get it up and running on devices running on 2.x firmware?

12

It has been rolled out. It worked when I last used it but I have not looked at it in a while. There have been several updates to it and I’m told it’s functional. Works with any esp32 with external ram (eg: tbeam).

1 Like
14

Just found, that Store and Forward ist mentioned in the official docs. For some reason I was not able to find it using Google.

1 Like
15

Those docs are for the old version and is not what is in the firmware currently.

16

Where can I find information about the version currently included in the firmware? Especially how to configure and use it.

17

It needs to be implemented in a client to work, the firmware code and a couple of discord discussions is the current documentation.

18

So this does not work with a Heltech V3? Is it a HW limitation that it simply cannot be implemented?

Really like the feature but don’t want to buy a different board just to get it :wink:

19

S&F requires more memory than provided by most devices. Some include an external “PSRAM” chip that gives the memory that we map into.

20

Would think were talking about a few kilobytes, but I guess memory is really limited on these boards.

21

We need something in the low MB range for S&F.