MeshSense FAQ

MeshSense is a simple, open-source application that monitors, maps and graphically displays all the vital stats of your area's Meshtastic network including connected nodes, signal reports, trace routes and more! MeshSense directly connects to your Meshtastic node via Bluetooth or WiFi and continuously provides all the information you need to assess the health of your network.

Yes, you will find the source code for MeshSense on GitHub here:

https://github.com/Affirmatech/MeshSense

We don't have a detailed manual for MeshSense at this time. Most folks find the program very intuitive, so with a little experimentation, along with insights from the answers to the common questions that follow, you will likely become very comfortable using MeshSense quickly. With just a few experimental clicks you'll be at home with MeshSense much more quickly than reading a manual.

MeshSense will run on Windows (X64), Linux (X64) and Mac arm64.

You can install MeshSense from here

Yes! Check out our demo node, 70 feet in a tree, displaying all the current activity, signal reports, locations, hops, trace routes and more! This particular node is at the very edge of Bluetooth range to the PC receiving it indoors and sometimes drops, so if the map is not currently displaying, give it a few moments and it should reconnect automatically.

You can connect MeshSense to your node via Bluetooth or WiFi (if your node model supports WiFi).

With Bluetooth, your node will display in the list of Bluetooth devices at the left. Depending on your system, you may first have to add your node to your list of recognized devices in your operating system before it appears, or you have the ability to connect. Click on the device and then click Connect. See Bluetooth Tips for more information.

Using WiFi, after adding your node to your local network, enter its IP address in the Device IP field and click Connect. The TLS option may be required depending on your node, but if your node doesn't require it, we recommend leaving it disabled, as it adds overhead to your connection.

At the bottom left, select the channel or node you wish to message from the drop down list. Then type your message and press Enter or click Send.

Yes, you can enable or disable the audio alert when messages are received from the Settings form.

Packets are saved until they have scrolled beyond the log size limit. The default limit is 500, which you can adjust from the Settings menu (upper right gear button on main form). If you have an active Mesh network, you will find the log scrolls quickly.

When MeshSense recieves packets from a node, a traceroute request will be automatically sent when all of the following are true:

• Are automatic traceroute requests enabled?
• Is traceroute data missing or has the hop count changed?
• Has enough time passed since the last traceroute request to this node? (15 min default)

Traceroute data is not currently saved and will be cleared when closing the program. MeshSense does not request traceroute data for every node in the node list -- it only evaluates whether or not to send a traceroute when it recieves a packet from that node. This includes cached packets on the device when initially connecting.

Automatic traceroute requests can be completely disabled or rate limited from within Settings.

To access the Settings menu, click gear ⚙ button at the upper right.

Yes, and the great news it is very easy and inexpensive! Click here for the information our local Amateur Radio club members are using to quickly get started and join in the fun of our local Meshtastic network!

Thank you, we are very grateful! Your contribution enables us to devote time and energy towards projects like MeshSense and we deeply appreciate your donation and support! Our donation link is here!