Ukranian controls Home Assistant over LoRa radio when their power grid goes down(old.reddit.com)
old.reddit.com
Ukranian controls Home Assistant over LoRa radio when their power grid goes down
https://old.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/1r8ftc0/i_control_my_home_assistant_over_lora_radio_when/
10 comments
This is the hacker way. Well done to the strong and hearty Ukrainians making solutions for complicated times!
Hey! I have a similar setup. Mostly done as a thought experiment, luckily I don't have to deal with a war.
Instead of using the Python interface directly, I used MQTT as the gateway.
I disliked all the existing MQTT servers (who writes network-facing software in C++!?!?), so I adapted the Mochi server a bit to add support for automatic Let's Encrypt certs: https://github.com/Cyberax/lenc-mochi
One problem is that LoRa is low-bandwidth, so I had to pick and choose what I transmit. I ended up defining a schema that bit-packs all the important (for me) sensor state in just 32 bytes.
As another thought experiment, I'm going to connect it to a pair of InReach satellite transceivers over Bluetooth :)
Instead of using the Python interface directly, I used MQTT as the gateway.
I disliked all the existing MQTT servers (who writes network-facing software in C++!?!?), so I adapted the Mochi server a bit to add support for automatic Let's Encrypt certs: https://github.com/Cyberax/lenc-mochi
One problem is that LoRa is low-bandwidth, so I had to pick and choose what I transmit. I ended up defining a schema that bit-packs all the important (for me) sensor state in just 32 bytes.
As another thought experiment, I'm going to connect it to a pair of InReach satellite transceivers over Bluetooth :)
Maybe he could offer this "as a service" using LoRaWAN and a cheap Mikrotik basestation? As a backend Chirpstack can be used.
Wish the spectrum was a bit more unified globally. Would love to move my IoT off 2.4ghz.
433mhz has restrictions in the UK, so 868mhz is the alternative...but a esp32 that support that is quadruple the price of 2.4ghz and has an unwieldy antenna
433mhz has restrictions in the UK, so 868mhz is the alternative...but a esp32 that support that is quadruple the price of 2.4ghz and has an unwieldy antenna
You send the LoRa packages over a separate modem, no? The ESP is just for bluetooth connectivity.
Very neat setup! I've been using Meshtastic and Home Assistant but never thought to mix the two.
> ~1-3 km urban range with stock T-Echo antenna
pretty impressive
pretty impressive
The current record for ground-to-ground link on meshtastic is a staggering 331km, pretty insane https://meshtastic.org/docs/overview/range-tests/ Prev record was 254km. High elevation is your friend haha
oh man... this is really truly inspiring!
The true hacker spirit. practically cyberpunk.
T-echo is pretty good but it drains battery even when "off", so I don't consider it a good option for long-term use. I've had a solar-powered RAK4631 in my window for about a year now, continuous uptime. Pretty cool tech for sure.
IIRC (and I might be mis-remembering this) Meshtastic forwards packets even if it can't decrypt them (as long as it's on the same channel), so anyone could contribute to the coverage by putting a node up at a high elevation. Once someone did this in my area it was amazing how many nodes I could contact.