Hmm, you are right, it is possible that the initial activation is more difficult if you are not in NL.

I found a forum post of someome having problems with a KPN sim card, but for LycaMobile I still don’t know: https://community.kpn.com/prepaid-16/sim-card-activation-doesn-t-work-in-germany-591780

I wil be going to Germany in a few days so I will bring one of those SIM cards and check what happens when I try to activate it, I’ll report back.

I looked up LycaMobile in Germany and was surprised to find you have an entire ‘Prepaid SIM’ wiki, ha! https://www.prepaid-wiki.de/tarife/Lyca_Mobile

Germany is not too far from NL. I think you can just order a Dutch SIM card. If all you want is for it to be active, I don’t think it would be a problem as you would not actually use roaming services. Just top up via code every 5.5 months or so by dialing 101CODE#

I have not tested this myself so there may be some special rules I am not aware of, but I have often kept phone numbers abroad for years - just not Germany specifically

In NL, one option is to get one of these: https://top06.nl/products/lyca-mobile-simkaart-5-euro-beltegoed

It is also possible to buy one of these with cash from many shops.

This one lasts 6 months each. You can buy several of these and replace every 6 months if you don’t mind changing the phone number, or top-up €5 every ~6 months. You can buy the 5 euro top-up code in person from many shops, using cash, or online in a website like this one: https://kaartdirect.nl/beltegoed/lycamobile

Once again, thanks a lot for your hard work!

Good thing that not all my posts will show up as edited now 😄 And community-specific search is very handy!

Yeah, as others mentioned, you can get cheaper data plans depending on the monthly data you need.

However, one of the interesting properties is that, unlike with phones, there is no restriction on the number of pagers that can listen to your assigned RIC. You can use one subscription to communicate with as many pagers as you would like, and each individual pager can be programmed using text filters such that one can implement their own sub-address system.

I suspect so too. I contribute to the local network with a few nodes :) In a controlled, coordinated setting it works well, but continuous reliability and coverage are still challenging.

Thank you for reading! Happy you find it valuable.

I think that the Dutch make some good/interesting infrastructure choices.

LoRA is sort of a slower version of wifi and as such, you should assume Meshtastic is monitored, at least for traffic metadata. The actual messages are encrypted though.

LoRa is great in that it gives us direct control and ownership over the infrastructure. One can participate in the network without their identity being known. But, yes, traffic metadata specifying the sender and recipient identifiers are plain text and can be easily logged.

Default configurations will have your device broadcasting often to contact new neighbors and will re-broadcast incoming messages. Since the device is quite active, and the chirped signal signal so characteristic when seeing via an SDR, someone who is actively tracking a Meshtastic device can do so very effectively.

Still, the fact that you own fully the device and have total control over it opens up a lot of possibilities. To give one example: if the mesh around here were strong, I could make use of a device configured for Rx only as a meshtastic pager. I might set up my Raspberry pi to inject a message from a randomized sender via MQTT in response to an XMPP message. Then, I would not use any radio transmitter at all.

For regular peer-to-peer chatting, yes, the default properties are very leaky, but we can change some of what we don’t like.

There is actually still such a thing as a satellite pager, a receive-only device that can get pages that cover regions as big as small countries. They stopped making the receivers quite a while back, but some are still around and the subscriptions are still available, though expensive. This info is itself some years old so maybe they are all gone by now.

That is very interesting. When I looked into satellite devices I only found two way devices, like the GARMIN inReach. I figured that it made sense that satellite comms would be 2-way because broadcasting all over the world seems rather extreme.

I have searched for these now and found the Iridium 9501 from Motorola. It is pricey, ~$680 for the device and either $90 (150 messages) or $150 (unlimited) per month for the subscription. In the description it says that you do need to program three ‘Message Delivery Areas’ as the messages are not broadcast globally, but I think this is acceptable.

Thanks for pointing that out. $90/month is pricey… But it is cool enough that I would seriously consider it if I would travel a lot for work.

POCSAG pagers still exist in the US too, though again, they are quite expensive compared to cell phones. Their main attraction is supposed to be higher reliability, so e.g. doctors can get paged even with the mobile phone network is out. I don’t know if that advantage still exists. In the more distant past there was something called ARDIS which I think is gone now. That was quite a robust signal, so you could get paged even in sub-basements of buildings and places where mobile phones didn’t work. Repair technicians who worked in those places often carried them.

I think that the advantage might still exist, especially in buildings with thick walls and underground floors. While looking into pagers I found discussions about them being phased out in many hospitals and replaced with ‘EPIC secure chat’ and with sharing private cellphone numbers.

In the Netherlands there is also the P2000 system, which is considered to be very reliable. That network makes use of FLEX to send messages to emergency services. It is possible to easily capture those too using SDR, or to see a live dump of these messages in sites like this one: https://p2000-online.net/alleregiosf.html

I’ve followed this stuff slightly as it’s interesting for the reasons you say, but I’d have to say it’s not really cost effective for most of us. POCSAG in particular only works in relatively localized areas like single countries. I know a guy who would want something like it, but only if it worked pretty much everywhere, since he travels a lot.

Yea, I can see that. So, that guy might like the satellite pager, but probably will not like the price tag.

Thanks for your reply!

I do like Meshtastic a lot and I am still trying to get the most out of it. But there are too many gaps around here. In the city there are more nodes, but also a lot of buildings. Outside of the city there is more line of sight but few nodes.

Yes, at least in the Netherlands. I was also surprised to discover this.

This scanner is for 2-factor authentication in the case that one does not want to use a phone app. When you try to log in, or pay online, the browser displays a unique QR code that the scanner is able to decode.

You would enter your pin into the scanner, scan the code, and the scanner displays a number. You then type that decoded number into a field under the QR code and your are let through.

It can be ordered for free here in the NL: https://www.ing.nl/particulier/digitaal-bankieren/mijn-ing/scanner

So, with this scanner as a 2FA method, the app is not needed. One can pay offline with a card, online with a scanner, and check account balances through any browser using the scanner to log in.

Ahh, no no. We can pay with card with no need for an app. This code reader thing can be used for 2FA when making an online payment or logging into the banking site, so one does not need to use a phone app.

In the Netherlands, at least with ING, you can request standalone code reader and pay through any browser, like this:

You guys are fantastic! I hope you are enjoying or did enjoy your vacation. Thank you for your hard work!

OK, fine… I’ll be honest…

I have had good experiences with it. I have not had problems with apps. Most of my apps I get via Obtaininum. As for the UI, I think it is fine.

I don’t think Google will be able to lock my Pixel’s bootloader, and, if they do, well it is already running the OS. So it shouldn’t be a problem for a while. If at some time GrapheneOS stops being supported I will find something else. I don’t need a guarantee of permanence to find it useful today.

The hodufy works for a phone. I just wanted to experiment to learn. I don’t use any of them often - I keep my phone in airplane mode and without a sim card and only use it with WiFi.

My first faraday bag was a ‘HODUFY’ pouch. It works fine.

After that, I bought the Nickle/Copper fabric from China and tested making pouches using cyanoacrylate glue and velcro strips. I found a supplier now that sells 10 m x 1.1 m fabric for $65 + shipping.

If you are in a hurry and you only want the cellphone pouch, you can buy a cheaper pouch online and test that you cannot call it nor connect via Bluetooth when it is inside the pouch. Working with the fabric directly lets you make custom pouches by cutting, folding, and gluing.

Here are some photos of a HODUFY and the DIY pouch. In the third photo you can see that the material inside the pouch is a similar type of Nickel/Copper fabric.

To make the pouch, a single piece is cut into a rectangle and folded in half, leaving three open sides. Two of the three open sides are folded over twice and glued shut. The remaining side is the opening, which makes use of velcro strips to close. This opening also needs to be folded when closing, like this:

The key point here is that you do not pierce the fabric, and you make sure that the edges are sealed shut properly by folding.

Sorry, I went to sleep. Glad you were able to sort it out 😄

😁 👍