Back to Home11/13/2025, 9:18:14 PM

OpenMANET Wi-Fi HaLow open-source project for Raspberry Pi–based MANET radios

hexmiles

146 points

41 comments

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17m

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01Story posted
11/13/2025, 9:18:14 PM
5d ago
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02First comment
11/13/2025, 9:35:36 PM
17m after posting
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37 comments in Day 1
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11/18/2025, 9:29:47 PM
12h ago
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Discussion (41 comments)

Showing 40 comments of 41

easygenes

5d ago

1 reply

This guy has been promoting and hacking hardware around this project heavily the last few months: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=550fh2n5rUs

coreyw

5d ago

1 reply

That guy is not contributing to the open source project.

victorbjorklund

5d ago

Which is why OP says ”around” the project? Never claimed he is a contributor to the code.

esafak

5d ago

2 replies

MANETs: back from the dead!? The problem is not the hardware, but the software; apparently, nobody can think of a killer application.

harporoeder

5d ago

2 replies

The killer application in this case is ATAK.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Team_Awareness_Kit

wakawaka28

5d ago

2 replies

Is ATAK even useful to civilians? Is it trustworthy?

gh02t

5d ago

1 reply

I use it for hiking, its great.

Yossarrian22

5d ago

2 replies

How do you use it for that?

gh02t

4d ago

Can design then export routes from any geospatial tool like CalTopo, AllTrails, or even WinTAK directly to your ATAK device. Then in ATAK you can use it basically as something like AllTrails on steroids, including offline map caching, route guidance, markers, tracking etc... even geotagged photos. This can be synced across multiple devices among friends using a TAK server. It can also be used for off grid communications and tracking between hikers via something like Meshtastic, which I use fairly regularly with my partner out camping well outside of cellular coverage.

ATAK is not necessarily the most intuitive UI, but it's crazy powerful for doing basically anything outdoors.

BertoldVdb

5d ago

It is an offline moving map with very fancy marker etc support. Seems a good choice for a hiking app?

adrianpike

5d ago

Yes and yes, we've used it for civilian Search & Rescue in tandem with CalTopo.

kylixz

5d ago

If anyone wants to help make MANETs better with TAK… check out opportunities on ditto.com where the team is building crdts and using them to help enable SAR. Say Turner sent you in your application if it looks interesting. Particularly the FDE role.

bb88

5d ago

4 replies

Meshtastic has been popular, but relies upon a terrible implementation of a mesh -- and it's vastly oversold on its capabilities.

I understand some hams run a meshtastic repeater primarily to convince meshtastic users to become hams.

nativeit

5d ago

3 replies

I feel like a HAM license is something of an inevitability of my future, although I don’t have any practical need for one. Catching satellite signals in my backyard is a lot of fun.

bb88

4d ago

The technician license is honestly "good enough" for a lot of people. Particularly now that the digital voice modes allow people to chat across countries through the internet. DMR/SystemFusion/MMDVM are things you might want to research.

bigfishrunning

5d ago

I felt the same way a few years ago, and got my license in 2023. I still don't know why, but I don't regret it either. There is a ton to play with in that space, if you're a tinkerer I absolutely encourage you to start studying the license materials. You never know where it'll take you.

bityard

5d ago

I think most hams (myself included) are the type of people whose favorite hobby is collecting more hobbies. Plus, ham radio pairs nicely with tons of other hobbies like electronics, kit building, hiking, solar power, space weather, and (as you say) satellites. I highly recommend it.

aeblyve

5d ago

2 replies

It's worth commenting to me that MeshCore performs much better than Meshtastic at scale and as an emplaced deployment. We have a very active network of about 60 nodes in the Boston area which feels similar to iMessage in deliverability and speed.

But yes, it can't realistically be compared to something like a "real" MANET system with $10k radios that can do something like 100mbps data rates. It is dramatically more accessible and deployable though.

swaits

4d ago

1 reply

MeshCore is a huge step in the right direction. Especially over Meshtastic which is very poorly designed.

However MeshCore makes one fundamental choice which is severely limiting. It uses a single LoRa discriminator and channel for all nodes. That said, LoRa limitations pretty much force this choice.

This, limits a typical network (3 repeaters) to about 500 messages/hour. The throughput scales inversely by how many repeaters you can hear.

The code does try to adjust down the TX power of a repeater in repeater-dense networks, which probably helps keep throughput consistent for a while.

For these things to work at scale they either need something other than LoRa (which is quite novel, but limited) or they need to figure out how to use LoRa in a way which allows for more channelization.

Until then, the “one transmission at a time on the air” in these very low baud networks is severely limiting.

mystraline

4d ago

1 reply

> Until then, the “one transmission at a time on the air” in these very low baud networks is severely limiting.

Semtech announced recently that their new chips will be able to decode all spread factors on a specific bandwidth and center.

That being said, that would allow new LoRa nodes being capable of listening on effectively 8 different channels (that dont conflict) and transmitting on 1.

swaits

4d ago

Oh that sounds quite nice, thanks for sharing!

kragen

5d ago

Real MANET systems are not defined by their bit rates, but by their ability to take advantages of whatever opportunities for radio communication exist in a given situation.

ianburrell

5d ago

LoRa has tiny bandwidth. Enough for text messaging if not too many people use it.

HaLow has lots more bandwidth, 433Mbps max, which allows for proper networking. It can bridge to other networks. But the practical range is only 1km. Also, the radios are expensive while LoRa is cheap.

delabel

4d ago

Having used Mestastic recently but ignorant of the details, what are some of issues with its mesh implementation?

speransky

5d ago

1 reply

I use MorseMicro in 802.11s mode successfully, just openwrt stuff, any reason to try this project ?

jrexilius

5d ago

2 replies

Last time I played with Moremicro they didn't work with real 802.11s and had some hokey proprietary hierarchal tree topology that required a main basestation gateway. ad-hoc, peer-to-peer was broken. They finally fixed their driver?

wryun

5d ago

The tree mesh thing you're thinking of is actually just EasyMesh (it's a standard!). We're using prplmesh.

But yes, 11s Mesh also works. Let us know on the forum (https://community.morsemicro.com/) or via github (https://github.com/MorseMicro/) if you're having issues. Err, I work for Morse in case that wasn't clear.

speransky

5d ago

I believe yes, give them other try, my scenarios with one connected station and mesh on drone platforms works out of the box

grendelt

5d ago

1 reply

> This technology is especially useful in the civilian space for search and rescue, disaster response, airsoft events, and any disconnected communications scenario.

Airsoft?! Huh?

kragen

5d ago

Radio communication is a critical advantage in actual infantry fights, so it makes sense that it would be useful for cosplay infantry fights.

bcrl

5d ago

1 reply

MANET is one of the protocols I was involved in implementing for a certain network protocol suite back around 2012. Mesh routing protocols only work for the most limited of use cases. They don't know about the capacity of the underlying wireless network and basically fall apart when things are congested or there are radios with poor reception. QoS is implemented far better in modern cell phone networks, and if the routing protocol doesn't take QoS into account, it's gonna suck.

digdugdirk

4d ago

1 reply

Interesting! If someone with a math background (but not a CS background) wanted to dig deep into learning about mesh networking protocol theory - do you have any recommendations for learning resources or places to get started?

I've long imagined that a content centric mesh network approach would be a better starting point than what we've built up currently, but it seems like such a deep and mysterious subject and I have no idea where to even begin to get started.

0x457

12h ago

It highly depends on where you plan to run your mesh on. Meshes that one run on wired networks (be it copper or fiber) are vastly different from meshes that work on radio waves. Even more different when it comes to this radio spectrum.

If you're talking about fast and low latency connection then look into existing meshes, almost every popular mesh has some sort of paper describing how it works.

hexmiles

5d ago

1 reply

All modules seem to be us-only. Is there a modules usable in eu frequency?

pantalaimon

5d ago

The airtime restrictions make it pretty much useless in the EU

topazas

5d ago

In Europe still struggle.

jonathantf2

4d ago

I played with HaLow for a while but the only stuff I could get here in the UK was some undocumented crap from AliExpress, anything more robust looking only seems to work in the US. A shame because it’d solve a infrastructure challenge I have to juggle each year

ge96

4d ago

I wonder if you could air drop these at some location, it wouldn't last long but way to deploy the nodes.

mk_stjames

4d ago

Ever since 802.11ah devices started appearing I've thought it would be perfect for partnering inside wireless IP cameras... and hell, make them mesh together with something like this so each one configured on your network extends the range of the others in it's area. Streaming 720P H265 is easily doable at the speeds the networks achieve for a few cameras, and the range would be perfect for perimeter monitoring most properties ala farms & industrial parks.

This device however - an entire Raspberry Pi + hat for a router to do..? ... seems like a solution in search of a problem to solve.

EvanAnderson

5d ago

In case anybody is like me and didn't know what Wi-Fi HaLow is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11ah

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