Abbie Gonzalez

Rough documentation for 2.6 preview released on 2025-02-26, last updated 2025-02-27.

While going through the Meshtastic Discord to understand 2.6, it made sense to take notes, and then share them.

Since 2.6 is a preview, and frequently changing, I'll try to keep this updated until there is official documentation. The headline may have said "Meshtastic 2.6 Preview: MUI and Next-Hop Routing are here!" but the intent seems more of a "not yet". I heard this would age like milk, but that's never true of documentation in context.

• Meshtastic MUI for T-Deck (version 2.6 preview)
  • Notes
    • How do you get it for the T-Deck?
    • It's installed, now what?
    • Getting Maps Working
    • Bluetooth
    • SD Card
  • Navigating the UI
  • Converations
  • Tabs
    • Home / Dashboard
    • Nodes
    • Group Channels
    • Active Chats
    • Maps
    • Settings
  • Changing Settings
    • Settings Section
      • User Name
      • Screen Calibration
      • Message Alert
    • Tools
      • Mesh Detector
      • Signal Scanner
      • Trace Route
      • Statistics
      • Packet Log
  • Changing Other Settings / Dashboard
    • Notifications and sound
    • Turn off LoRa radio
    • Turn off GPS
    • Turn off Wi-Fi
    • MQTT
    • Uptime
    • Heap / LVGL
  • Settings requiring the command line
    • Location

Notes

How do you get it for the T-Deck?

When you flash the firmware, do an erase & install, and also make sure MUI is selected.

• Instructions were sort of posted here: https://meshtastic.org/blog/meshtastic-2-6-preview/#flash-the-meshtastic-26-preview
• What on earth does that mean? It means the developers want you to visit https://flasher.meshtastic.org, and then using your keyboard press the keys: Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Enter
• If you don't have a keyboard at your disposal, or entering the code feels worse than entering a Windows 98 product key, you can download the firmware from github: https://github.com/meshtastic/meshtastic.github.io/tree/master/
  • Not everyone has a keyboard with arrow keys. Some people use tablets. Some people are missing the right arrow key. 🤷🏻
  • To their credit, you can enter the code very slowly.

It's installed, now what?

• If it says waiting to download while the progress shows 100%, you can reboot the device.
• Its a bit slow to boot.
• You'll be prompted to set your region. Set it and the device should reboot again. 🤞🏼

Getting Maps Working

• Maps requires tiles to be downloaded to an SD Card seperately in the /map/ directory.
• You can have seperate styles of maps, by placing them into a /maps/ directory instead. Long pressing the maps icon will bring up a drop down showing all the map styles you've installed.
• For instructions on downloading maps, see https://gist.github.com/droberin/b333a216d860361e329e74f59f4af4ba
• You can download low detailed overview maps here: https://github.com/meshtastic/device-ui/tree/master/maps
  • No script needed: Extract the zip files to the root of your SD Card.
  • These will not zoom past a certain level, and you will be presented with a blank area and file icons.
• The starting point of the map before grabbing a GPS fix is Big Ben in London. If you do not have GPS, this will be the assumed location for your device, regardless of fixed_position location (the correct position is still transmitted)
• Update: Fixed position cannot be read by MUI, so the location is set seperately. Pressing and holding the cross-hairs will set the position to the center of the view. Setting this will persist after reboot. https://github.com/meshtastic/firmware/issues/6166#issuecomment-2687681104

Bluetooth

• Bluetooth doesn't work because the UI uses the same API bluetooth uses. But if you need bluetooth, restart the device and press and hold the Meshtastic M logo. You'll know it's working because a circle starts forming. When the circle completes, it will reboot into bluetooth mode. You can then press and hold the bluetooth icon to reboot back into MUI.
• When selecting "Reboot/Shutdown" in Settings, you have the option to reboot into Bluetooth mode.
• Rebooting while in bluetooth mode will reboot back into bluetooth mode.
• Actual success in connecting at this point seems to be hit or miss.

SD Card

SD card has to be inserted before turning on the device to be recognized.

SD Card should be formatted as FAT or FAT32. I did not test ExFat (some have mentioned ExFat does not work).

MQTT

MQTT does not appear to be functional with the UI.

Navigating the UI

Navigation can be done using the scrollball, or tapping/swipping the touchscreen.

Using the scroll ball move between controls, highlighting the control in a subtle or visible way depending on your theme selection. Pressing the ball down will make a selection.

The scroll ball does not scroll conversations.

Converations

Conversations show up with borders in different colors to likely mean acknowledged, acknowledged by a node, or likely not delivered. This is Green, black and red.

Tabs

Home / Dashboard

Shows as scrollable dashboard with information and some settings.

Tap and hold the home icon to resync.

On devices without GPS, the location displayed on the dashboard is the location from the fixed_position coordinates.

Nodes

An icon that looks like a wifi router. It lists nodes near you, and does not appear to list MQTT nodes.

Tap and hold the nodes tab to change options to filter which nodes are shown.

Tapping a node will show its coordinates in bright green. In light mode it's hard to see.

Tap and hold an individual node to open a direct message chat with the node.

Group Channels

An icon with two people on it. The public channel will be listed as LongFast. Any channels you have set up will appear here too. You are not able to change their settings, or add channels here. It will need to be done through the Meshtastic clients in bluetooth mode, or over Wifi or Serial.

There is no press and hold feature for it.

Active Chats

Lists active chats. If you press and hold a chat, a DEL button will appear on the right. You can use this to remove the chat, erasing it's message history. This does not delete the channel.

Maps

If you have GPS, it will show your coordinates and location on a map. You need to download and install map tiles seperately.

Tapping the Maps tab will toggle the zoom and pan controls on the right.

Tapping and holding the maps tab will present you with 2 sliders. The top slider adjusts darkness of background (areas where a tile does not show: higher is white), and the lower adjusts opacity of the map (lower is more see through).

Tapping the crosshairs will bring you back to your current location. In devices without GPS, this is your home location, and can be set by navigating to where you are, and then tapping and holding the crosshair. This setting persists after reboots, and is seperate from fixed_position.

If you have maps installed to /maps instead of /map/ you'll also see a drop down of installed map styles you can choose from.

The map does not show MQTT nodes.

Settings

Tapping and holding the settings tab will turn off or lock the device.

Changing Settings

Most settings will reboot the device. Also has a Tools section.

Settings Section

User Name

Use this to set both the Short Name and Long Name. This dialog cannot be closed once open, and you will need to reboot if you open it. (was fixed later in the day)

Screen Calibration

Starts a screen calibration process that cannot be exited from once started. Either calibrate the screen or reboot.

Message Alert

Allows you to enable message alert, and select a ringtone. These are not previewed on selecting, and you will need to receive a message to hear it.

Tools

Mesh Detector

Will present a radar like interface used to detect mesh networks. You must press and hold start to start scanning.

Signal Scanner

Shows the SNR and RSSI for a node. You can select a node on the bottom, and press and hold Start to scan. Once you do this, on the home screen you will a calculated signal percentage and raw values.

Trace Route

Tap to select a target node, and tap Start to trace route. You do not need to tap and hold this Start button.

Shows a route to a node as a list of nodes.

Statistics

Packet Log

Changing Other Settings / Dashboard

Settings are not all in settings. Many are on the home screen/dashboard, which is scrollable. Scroll up and down to find settings and information.

Notifications and sound

Scroll down to the bell icon. Each time you tap it, it will cycle between Banner, Banner & Sound, and Sound only

Turn off LoRa radio

Tap and hold the radio tower icon (should say LoRa, with your frequency). This will turn it off. Press and hold to turn it on again.

Turn off GPS

If you have GPS, you can turn it of and on by scrolling to the GPS icon, and tapping and holding. Device will reboot when this changes.

If you do not have GPS and you change this, you may have to set no device over serial or in a client for the correct status.

Turn off Wi-Fi

Scroll down to the wifi icon. Tap and hold to turn off WiFi. Tap and hold the icon again to enable it. Changing WiFi status reboots the device.

MQTT

MQTT Status can be seen by scrolling down to the RSS looking icon that shows your channel. Tapping and holding the icon will disable/enable MQTT and reboot the device. When enabled the icon is in color or white/bright grey. When disabled it is grey or dimmed. Is that accessible? Nope.

Uptime

Tap the clock icon to cycle between time and device uptime.

Heap / LVGL

Tap the icon to enable system stats

Settings requiring the command line

Assumes you have installed and know how to use the Meshtastic Python CLI

Location

If your T-Deck does not have a built in gps, you can set a fixed location for it using set position.fixed_position

Example: meshtastic --port --set position.fixed_position true --setlat 41.88 --setlon -70.87

Use Negative values for West/South, and Positive values for North/East.

This setting is not used for the home location in the maps tab. You can set that in the maps tab.

Other notes

Using the web client, under MQTT settings, TLS cannot be enabled.