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acarteron edited this page May 20, 2026 · 3 revisions

Receiver Guide

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How to build a compatible Voicetastic reassembler — protocol-level checklist plus reference-implementation pointers.

Inbound dispatch

You'll be receiving Meshtastic Data packets. Filter:

if data.portnum != PRIVATE_APP as i32 { return; }   // 256
if detect_version(&data.payload) != Some(0x03) { return; }

The first-byte version check lets future protocol revisions co-exist on the same port without breaking older clients.

Setup

use voicetastic_core::voice::{AssemblerConfig, VoiceAssembler};
use std::time::Duration;

let asm = VoiceAssembler::new(AssemblerConfig {
    message_timeout: Duration::from_secs(30),
    partial_play_on_timeout: true,
    ..AssemblerConfig::default()
});
Field Default Meaning
message_timeout 30 s Hard timeout per in-progress message.
partial_play_on_timeout true Emit incomplete messages on timeout (vs. discard).

Per-frame ingest

match asm.accept(&from_id, to, channel, &payload) {
    AssemblyEvent::Pending      => {}                         // accumulating
    AssemblyEvent::Duplicate    => {}                         // already had this chunk
    AssemblyEvent::Complete(m)  => handle_voice(*m).await?,   // done!
    AssemblyEvent::Nack(info)   => route_to_sender(info),     // we're hearing the other end's NACK
    AssemblyEvent::Rejected(e)  => warn!(?e, "bad frame"),
}

from_id MUST be the canonical lowercase !hex8 form (voicetastic_core::ids::node_num_to_id).

Periodic tick

You MUST drive tick() periodically to handle timeouts and emit NACKs:

let mut tick = tokio::time::interval(Duration::from_millis(250));
loop {
    tokio::select! {
        _ = tick.tick() => {
            let out = asm.tick();
            for completed in out.finalized {
                handle_voice(completed).await?;
            }
            for nack in out.nacks {
                let to_node = node_id_to_num(&nack.from)?;
                svc.send_data(
                    PRIVATE_APP as i32,
                    nack.frame,
                    nack.channel,
                    Some(to_node),
                    /* want_ack */ false,
                ).await?;
            }
        }
        // ... your inbound recv loop here
    }
}

Recommended cadence: 100–250 ms. Below that you spin needlessly; above that you delay NACK emission past the spec's NACK_WINDOW_MS = 3000.

Broadcast messages emit no NACK. The assembler silently suppresses NACK frames when the in-progress entry's destination is the broadcast address — multiple receivers would otherwise pile retransmits onto the sender with no clear target. Broadcast still gets FEC + timeout-based partial finalize. See Reliability — Broadcast suppression.

Resource bounds

The assembler enforces all of these for you:

Bound Default What happens at the limit
MAX_IN_PROGRESS_GLOBAL 64 Oldest started_at entry evicted + blacklisted.
MAX_IN_PROGRESS_PER_SENDER 4 New messages from that sender rejected with PerSenderCap.
MAX_MESSAGE_BYTES 55 845 Structurally bounded (u8 × MAX_BODY_SIZE).
BLACKLIST_TTL 60 s After a message completes/times out, late frames for it are silently dropped.
BLACKLIST_MAX 100 Oldest entries evicted FIFO.
NACK_MAX_ROUNDS 400 After 400 consecutive NACK rounds with no new chunks, finalize-or-discard. Resets on every accepted shard.
NACK_WINDOW_MS 3000 Quiet period after the last seen chunk before emitting a NACK.
MAX_VALIDATION_STRIKES (impl) 3 After 3 post-template mismatches, the entry is evicted + blacklisted.

Rejection rules (silent drops)

The assembler returns AssemblyEvent::Rejected(VoiceError::*) for:

  • version != 0x03 (V2 or future protocol version)
  • Any reserved bit of type_flags set (0x2F mask)
  • packet_type == 3 (reserved)
  • total_data == 0
  • chunk_index >= total_data (DATA) or >= parity_count (PARITY)
  • parity_count > 128
  • Unknown codec
  • Codec / total_data / stream_seq mismatch versus the established template
  • DATA / PARITY body length mismatch versus the established chunk_size
  • Header SHA-256 integrity tag mismatch
  • (from, message_id) is on the recently-completed blacklist
  • New message_id while the sender is at MAX_IN_PROGRESS_PER_SENDER

See Error Catalogue for one-line descriptions of each variant.

Handling completed messages

async fn handle_voice(msg: VoiceMessage) {
    if !msg.is_complete {
        // Partial — playback may stutter. recovered_via_fec tells you
        // how many chunks the FEC layer saved.
    }
    if msg.received_data == 0 {
        // Pure-zero playback. Skip unless you really want a silent file.
        return;
    }
    // The audio is raw codec frames. For AMR-NB you'd write:
    //   #!AMR\n  ‖  msg.audio
    // before handing to a player.
}

The fields you'll usually inspect:

Field Meaning
is_complete All total_data chunks present (after FEC).
received_data How many DATA chunks landed (incl. FEC reconstructions).
recovered_via_fec How many were reconstructed by Reed-Solomon.
audio Raw codec bytes, no container header.

Common pitfalls

  • Forgetting tick(). Without it, NACKs are never emitted and partially-lost messages stall until message_timeout.
  • Passing the wrong from. Use voicetastic_core::ids::node_num_to_id(packet.from) so the assembler receives the canonical lowercase !hex8 form.
  • Accepting frames from non-PRIVATE_APP ports. Other apps share the same Meshtastic radio; filter by portnum == 256 and the version byte.
  • Wrapping the audio in a container header at the wrong layer. The protocol carries raw codec frames. Wrap to #!AMR\n (or whatever) only when writing to disk for an external player.

→ Continue to Constants and Limits.

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