In times of emergency, such as natural disasters or conflicts, existing communication infrastructures are highly susceptible to failure. There is an urgent need to establish a backup communication system swiftly. Two primary approaches can be adopted:
- The standard solution involves government intervention to rapidly rebuild the communication infrastructure, allowing the restoration of traditional communication methods within a limited scope.
- An alternative is to utilize emerging network technologies, combining short-range and long-range communications with the capabilities of mesh networks to create a temporary network independent of traditional infrastructure.
Compared to the first approach, the second offers greater flexibility and resilience. It embodies the spirit of citizen science and mass participation, representing a more forward-looking solution. Inspired by the urgency and significance highlighted by conflicts such as the Ukraine-Russia war and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, this project aims to enable this technology and empower citizens to own and engage with it. Preparation in peacetime is crucial for readiness in emergencies.
Originating from Taiwan, amidst escalating geopolitical tensions and cross-strait relations, this project emphasizes the selection of source chips for hardware development, avoiding products that pose a national threat, and striving for lightweight, low-power, low-cost, and high-cost-performance hardware solutions.
The project encompasses several dimensions:
- Hardware Development: We focus on developing open-source hardware based on source chips that meet the specific needs of this project.
- Application Scenarios: Different application scenarios are provided, along with the development of various training scripts.
- Meshtastic Messenger: off-grid messenger via Meshtastic
- Tactical Networking: situation awareness app via tactical networking
- You can find more articles in the documents folder.
- Knowledge of network technologies and mesh networks.
- Experience with hardware development and open-source projects.
- Understanding the geopolitical context (especially regarding Taiwan) is beneficial.
We welcome contributions from the community. Please read our CONTRIBUTING.md file for details on how to submit pull requests, the process for submitting bugs, and other ways you can contribute to the project.
cclljj
Sean
Black_block
Jia-Huang Weng
This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE.md file for details.
We extend our deepest gratitude to the open-source community for its continuous inspiration and support, which has been instrumental in developing and refining this project. This project has been proudly hosted and supported by the Institute of Information Science, Academia Sinica, whose resources and guidance have been invaluable.
Special thanks are due to the many volunteers and contributors who dedicated their time and expertise to the project. Their commitment and collaborative spirit have enhanced the project's capabilities and fostered a vibrant and innovative community around it.
- Project Lead: Fu-Hsiang Sean Ching (sean3381212@gmail.com) & Ling-Jyh Chen (cclljj@google.com)
- Project URL: https://github.com/IISNRL/TWC_Mesh
- Join us on Discord: https://discord.gg/aQgGKASCeR