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<spanid="using-main"></span><h1>Using Reticulum on Your System<aclass="headerlink"href="#using-reticulum-on-your-system"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h1>
<p>Reticulum is not installed as a driver or kernel module, as one might expect
of a networking stack. Instead, Reticulum is distributed as a Python module,
containing the networking core, and a set of utility and daemon programs.</p>
<p>This means that no special privileges are required to install or use it. It
is also very light-weight, and easy to transfer to, and install on new systems.</p>
<p>When you have Reticulum installed, any program or application that uses Reticulum
will automatically load and initialise Reticulum when it starts, if it is not
already running.</p>
<p>In many cases, this approach is sufficient. When any program needs to use
Reticulum, it is loaded, initialised, interfaces are brought up, and the
program can now communicate over any Reticulum networks available. If another
program starts up and also wants access to the same Reticulum network, the already
running instance is simply shared. This works for any number of programs running
concurrently, and is very easy to use, but depending on your use case, there
are other options.</p>
<sectionid="configuration-data">
<h2>Configuration & Data<aclass="headerlink"href="#configuration-data"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h2>
<p>Reticulum stores all information that it needs to function in a single file-system
directory. When Reticulum is started, it will look for a valid configuration
<p>If no existing configuration directory is found, the directory <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">~/.reticulum</span></code>
is created, and the default configuration will be automatically created here.
You can move it to one of the other locations if you wish.</p>
<p>It is also possible to use completely arbitrary configuration directories by
specifying the relevant command-line parameters when running Reticulum-based
programs. You can also run multiple separate Reticulum instances on the same
physical system, either in isolation from each other, or connected together.</p>
<p>In most cases, a single physical system will only need to run one Reticulum
instance. This can either be launched at boot, as a system service, or simply
be brought up when a program needs it. In either case, any number of programs
running on the same system will automatically share the same Reticulum instance,
if the configuration allows for it, which it does by default.</p>
<p>The entire configuration of Reticulum is found in the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">~/.reticulum/config</span></code>
file. When Reticulum is first started on a new system, a basic, but fully functional
configuration file is created. The default configuration looks like this:</p>
<divclass="highlight-default notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span><spanclass="c1"># This is the default Reticulum config file.</span>
<spanclass="c1"># You should probably edit it to include any additional,</span>
<spanclass="c1"># interfaces and settings you might need.</span>
<spanclass="c1"># Only the most basic options are included in this default</span>
<spanclass="c1"># configuration. To see a more verbose, and much longer,</span>
<spanclass="c1"># configuration example, you can run the command:</span>
<p>If Reticulum infrastructure already exists locally, you probably don’t need to
change anything, and you may already be connected to a wider network. If not,
you will probably need to add relevant <em>interfaces</em> to the configuration, in
order to communicate with other systems. It is a good idea to read the comments
and explanations in the above default config. It will teach you the basic
concepts you need to understand to configure your network. Once you have done that,
take a look at the <aclass="reference internal"href="interfaces.html#interfaces-main"><spanclass="std std-ref">Interfaces</span></a> chapter of this manual.</p>
</section>
<sectionid="included-utility-programs">
<h2>Included Utility Programs<aclass="headerlink"href="#included-utility-programs"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h2>
<p>Reticulum includes a range of useful utilities, both for managing your Reticulum
networks, and for carrying out common tasks over Reticulum networks, such as
transferring files to remote systems, and executing commands and programs remotely.</p>
<p>If you often use Reticulum from several different programs, or simply want
Reticulum to stay available all the time, for example if you are hosting
a transport node, you might want to run Reticulum as a separate service that
other programs, applications and services can utilise.</p>
<sectionid="the-rnsd-utility">
<h3>The rnsd Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rnsd-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>It is very easy to run Reticulum as a service. Simply run the included <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> command.
When <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> is running, it will keep all configured interfaces open, handle transport if
it is enabled, and allow any other programs to immediately utilise the
Reticulum network it is configured for.</p>
<p>You can even run multiple instances of rnsd with different configurations on
--config CONFIG path to alternative Reticulum config directory
-v, --verbose
-q, --quiet
--version show program's version number and exit
</pre></div>
</div>
<p>You can easily add <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> as an always-on service by <aclass="reference internal"href="#using-systemd"><spanclass="std std-ref">configuring a service</span></a>.</p>
</section>
<sectionid="the-rnstatus-utility">
<h3>The rnstatus Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rnstatus-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>Using the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnstatus</span></code> utility, you can view the status of configured Reticulum
interfaces, similar to the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">ifconfig</span></code> program.</p>
<divclass="highlight-text notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span># Run rnstatus
--config CONFIG path to alternative Reticulum config directory
--version show program's version number and exit
-a, --all show all interfaces
-v, --verbose
</pre></div>
</div>
</section>
<sectionid="the-rnpath-utility">
<h3>The rnpath Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rnpath-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>With the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnpath</span></code> utility, you can look up and view paths for
destinations on the Reticulum network.</p>
<divclass="highlight-text notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span># Run rnpath
rnpath c89b4da064bf66d280f0e4d8abfd9806
# Example output
Path found, destination <c89b4da064bf66d280f0e4d8abfd9806> is 4 hops away via <f53a1c4278e0726bb73fcc623d6ce763> on TCPInterface[Testnet/dublin.connect.reticulum.network:4965]
full_name full destination name in dotted notation
destination_hash hexadecimal hash of the destination
optional arguments:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--config CONFIG path to alternative Reticulum config directory
--version show program's version number and exit
-v, --verbose
</pre></div>
</div>
</section>
<sectionid="the-rncp-utility">
<h3>The rncp Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rncp-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>The <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rncp</span></code> utility is a simple file transfer tool. Using it, you can transfer
files through Reticulum.</p>
<divclass="highlight-text notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span># Run rncp on the receiving system, specifying which identities
# are allowed to send files
rncp --receive -a 1726dbad538775b5bf9b0ea25a4079c8 -a c50cc4e4f7838b6c31f60ab9032cbc62
# From another system, copy a file to the receiving system
--config path path to alternative Reticulum config directory
-v, --verbose increase verbosity
-q, --quiet decrease verbosity
-p, --print-identity print identity and destination info and exit
-r, --receive wait for incoming files
-b, --no-announce don't announce at program start
-a allowed_hash accept from this identity
-n, --no-auth accept files from anyone
-w seconds sender timeout before giving up
--version show program's version number and exit
-v, --verbose
</pre></div>
</div>
</section>
<sectionid="the-rnx-utility">
<h3>The rnx Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rnx-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>The <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnx</span></code> utility is a basic remote command execution program. It allows you to
execute commands on remote systems over Reticulum, and to view returned command
output.</p>
<divclass="highlight-text notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span># Run rnx on the listening system, specifying which identities
# are allowed to execute commands
rnx --listen -a 941bed5e228775e5a8079fc38b1ccf3f -a 1b03013c25f1c2ca068a4f080b844a10
--config path path to alternative Reticulum config directory
-v, --verbose increase verbosity
-q, --quiet decrease verbosity
-p, --print-identity print identity and destination info and exit
-l, --listen listen for incoming commands
-i identity path to identity to use
-x, --interactive enter interactive mode
-b, --no-announce don't announce at program start
-a allowed_hash accept from this identity
-n, --noauth accept files from anyone
-N, --noid don't identify to listener
-d, --detailed show detailed result output
-m mirror exit code of remote command
-w seconds connect and request timeout before giving up
-W seconds max result download time
--stdin STDIN pass input to stdin
--stdout STDOUT max size in bytes of returned stdout
--stderr STDERR max size in bytes of returned stderr
--version show program's version number and exit
</pre></div>
</div>
</section>
<sectionid="the-rnodeconf-utility">
<h3>The rnodeconf Utility<aclass="headerlink"href="#the-rnodeconf-utility"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>The <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnodeconf</span></code> utility allows you to inspect and configure existing <aclass="reference internal"href="hardware.html#rnode-main"><spanclass="std std-ref">RNodes</span></a>, and
to create and provision new <aclass="reference internal"href="hardware.html#rnode-main"><spanclass="std std-ref">RNodes</span></a> from any supported hardware devices.</p>
RNode Configuration and firmware utility. This program allows you to change various settings and startup modes of RNode. It can also install, flash and update the firmware on supported devices.
positional arguments:
port serial port where RNode is attached
options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-i, --info Show device info
-a, --autoinstall Automatic installation on various supported devices
-u, --update Update firmware to the latest version
-U, --force-update Update to specified firmware even if version matches or is older than installed version
--fw-version version Use a specific firmware version for update or autoinstall
--nocheck Don't check for firmware updates online
-e, --extract Extract firmware from connected RNode for later use
-E, --use-extracted Use the extracted firmware for autoinstallation or update
-p, --bluetooth-pair Put device into bluetooth pairing mode
--freq Hz Frequency in Hz for TNC mode
--bw Hz Bandwidth in Hz for TNC mode
--txp dBm TX power in dBm for TNC mode
--sf factor Spreading factor for TNC mode (7 - 12)
--cr rate Coding rate for TNC mode (5 - 8)
--eeprom-backup Backup EEPROM to file
--eeprom-dump Dump EEPROM to console
--eeprom-wipe Unlock and wipe EEPROM
--version Print program version and exit
</pre></div>
</div>
<p>For more information on how to create your own RNodes, please read the <aclass="reference internal"href="hardware.html#rnode-creating"><spanclass="std std-ref">Creating RNodes</span></a>
section of this manual.</p>
</section>
</section>
<sectionid="improving-system-configuration">
<h2>Improving System Configuration<aclass="headerlink"href="#improving-system-configuration"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h2>
<p>If you are setting up a system for permanent use with Reticulum, there is a
few system configuration changes that can make this easier to administrate.
These changes will be detailed here.</p>
<sectionid="fixed-serial-port-names">
<h3>Fixed Serial Port Names<aclass="headerlink"href="#fixed-serial-port-names"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>On a Reticulum instance with several serial port based interfaces, it can be
beneficial to use the fixed device names for the serial ports, instead
of the dynamically allocated shorthands such as <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">/dev/ttyUSB0</span></code>. Under most
Debian-based distributions, including Ubuntu and Raspberry Pi OS, these nodes
can be found under <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">/dev/serial/by-id</span></code>.</p>
<p>You can use such a device path directly in place of the numbered shorthands.
Here is an example of a packet radio TNC configured as such:</p>
<divclass="highlight-text notranslate"><divclass="highlight"><pre><span></span>[[Packet Radio KISS Interface]]
type = KISSInterface
interface_enabled = True
outgoing = true
port = /dev/serial/by-id/usb-FTDI_FT230X_Basic_UART_43891CKM-if00-port0
speed = 115200
databits = 8
parity = none
stopbits = 1
preamble = 150
txtail = 10
persistence = 200
slottime = 20
</pre></div>
</div>
<p>Using this methodology avoids potential naming mix-ups where physical devices
might be plugged and unplugged in different orders, or when device name
assignment varies from one boot to another.</p>
</section>
<sectionid="reticulum-as-a-system-service">
<spanid="using-systemd"></span><h3>Reticulum as a System Service<aclass="headerlink"href="#reticulum-as-a-system-service"title="Permalink to this heading">#</a></h3>
<p>Instead of starting Reticulum manually, you can install <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> as a system
service and have it start automatically at boot.</p>
<p>If you installed Reticulum with <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">pip</span></code>, the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> program will most likely
be located in a user-local installation path only, which means <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">systemd</span></code> will not
be able to execute it. In this case, you can simply symlink the <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> program
<p>You can then create the service file <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">/etc/systemd/system/rnsd.service</span></code> with the
<p>Be sure to replace <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">USERNAMEHERE</span></code> with the user you want to run <codeclass="docutils literal notranslate"><spanclass="pre">rnsd</span></code> as.</p>
