Skip to content

🔧 Node Management & Remote Admin

← Handbook home · 🇩🇪 Deutsche Version

Node overview

  • All nodes in the mesh with SNR, battery, distance, hop count
  • Tile view (Fancy View) – optionally enabled in Settings → Appearance: replaces the table with a responsive tile surface (column count grows/shrinks with the window width)
    • Per tile: ShortName badge in node color, 🔑/🔓 PKI status, full name, "X min ago", ⭐ favorite star, 📡 infrastructure and ☁ MQTT icons
    • Power (externally powered or battery + voltage), distance + altitude, hops, RSSI/SNR with color gradient, environment telemetry (🌡/💧/🌬), hardware model · device role · node ID
    • Own node always on top, virtualized scrolling even with 1000+ nodes
  • SNR/RSSI only for direct reception – signal values are shown only when we hear the node directly (0 hops, no MQTT); for relayed nodes the column shows the hop count instead
  • Advanced filters – by "last seen" (5 min to 60 days), hide MQTT nodes, favorites only, SNR coloring on/off; sort dropdown in tile mode
  • Request information – right-click submenu (list, tile, map) requests data from a node like the Android app: user info, position, device/environment/air-quality/power/host metrics, signal quality/mesh stats, PAX counter
  • Node info window – right-click a node (list, tile, map or message) → "ℹ️ Node Info": hardware model, role, PKI status, battery, signal, first/last seen and position. Your own device's firmware version lives under Settings → Device info; a remote node's is shown in the remote admin window:

Meshhessen Client – node info window with role, battery, signal, first/last seen * PKI key indicator – 🔑 column shows whether a node's public key is known * Node colors – color-code nodes individually (map + lists) * Node notes – free-text annotations per node * Pin nodes – pin nodes to the top of the list (independent of sorting) * Favorites – mark nodes as favorites (★ icon, right-click menu); synced with the device (set_favorite_node / remove_favorite_node); favorites shown at the top of the list

Node overview as a table – with avatar, signal LEDs, filters and sorting: Meshhessen Client – node overview as a table with avatar, SNR, RSSI, battery and signal LEDs

Node overview as tile view (Fancy View) – with telemetry, power and signal quality per tile: Meshhessen Client – node tile view (Fancy View) with telemetry, battery and signal quality per node

Remote administration

Full remote admin UI for favorite nodes — also works across relay and MQTT paths:

Meshhessen Client – remote administration of a Meshtastic node: LoRa configuration over the air

How to administer a remote node (step by step)

  1. Prerequisites: your public key must be registered as an admin key on the target node (its security tab, admin keys 1–3) — or you share an admin channel. The target also needs to know your node's public key (PKI).
  2. Mark the target node as a favorite (★ in the right-click menu) — the remote-admin selection dialog only lists favorites
  3. Open "🛠️ Remote Administration" (right-click in the tile view, or Settings → Remote administration) and pick the favorite in the dialog — the client negotiates a session key and loads the configuration (either everything at once or per tab on demand). After the first valid access the target automatically marks your admin node as a favorite, so your key cannot be evicted from its node database
  4. Change settings → "Save" writes them back over the air; the target reboots if required
  5. Typical failures: timeout without a response → admin key missing on the target or the node is currently unreachable (try a traceroute); PKI error → the target's public key is missing locally (receive the node directly once or pull it via "📥 Request information → User info"). Rejections are reported with a concrete reason instead of failing silently.
  6. Across multiple hops every answer takes a few seconds — the timeout is adjustable (default 30 s; 5–300 s live in the window); individual tabs can be retried via "↻ Reload Tab"

Favorites on the remote device can be set/removed remotely, too: Meshhessen Client – set a favorite node remotely on the remote Meshtastic device

Feature overview:

  • All configuration tabs: Owner, Device, Position, LoRa, Bluetooth, Network, Display, Channels, Security, Control
  • Security tab: public key (read-only, Base64), admin keys 1–3 (Base64), flags (admin channel, managed mode, serial, debug log)
  • Manage favorites remotely: set or remove favorites on the remote device
  • Session-key handshake, configurable timeout, per-channel retry + reload
  • Lazy loading: choose on open whether everything loads immediately or page by page; "↻ Reload Tab" button per tab

Node configuration (local)

Full device configuration directly from the client, all modules in one window:

  • Device & LoRa: region, modem preset, TX power, hop limit, device role, rebroadcast mode
  • Position: GPS mode, smart broadcast, fixed position with coordinate input; "Pick from Map" opens a dedicated map picker window; "Own Map Pin" copies the position set via right-click
  • Network: Wi-Fi SSID/PSK, DHCP/static IP, Ethernet, NTP server, syslog
  • Display: screen timeout, carousel, compass, 12h clock, metric/imperial, display mode, OLED type
  • MQTT: server, credentials, TLS, JSON mode, root topic, proxy mode, map reporting with precision level (bits 10–19), MQTT proxy client
  • Telemetry: device, environment, air quality and power metric intervals
  • Bluetooth: enable, pairing mode, fixed PIN; change BT PIN directly from the client
  • Security: show public key (read-only), show/change private key, admin keys, managed mode
  • Channels: all 8 channels – role, name, uplink, downlink, position precision (bits 10–19, ~23 km to ~45 m)
  • Additional modules: neighbor info, store & forward, external notification, canned messages, range test, serial