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Ratspeak for Cardputer Adv

Ratspeak Handheld includes Cardputer Adv alongside T-Deck Plus, T-Pager and ThinkNode M9. This page describes Ratspeak Handheld 2.2.4 beta.

Hardware​

Use the M5Stack Cardputer Adv with a Cap LoRa-1262 for LoRa. The Cap supplies the SX1262 radio; the handheld alone has no LoRa transceiver. Match the antenna and operating band to the radio hardware.

The Cardputer Adv has an ESP32-S3, 240×135 display, compact keyboard, battery and microSD slot. An SD card is optional for normal messaging. Its interface uses compact pages; full message content remains available through the reader.

Install and modes​

The unified full package is cardputer-full.zip. It includes the launcher, Standalone messenger and RNode radio mode. Single-mode ZIPs install one mode; cardputer-standalone.bin and cardputer-rnode.bin are application images for a compatible launcher or matching slot, not complete factory installations.

Use a package from the selected Ratspeak Handheld release or a local build with DEVICE=cardputer. Select Cardputer on the web flasher, or upload a complete ZIP through Build your own. Check that the selected firmware is Ratspeak Handheld 2.2.4.

Back up internal flash and the SD card first. Factory packages are not data-preserving updates. See Flashing firmware for the 8 MB backup size, download mode and installation limits.

In the full launcher, select Standalone for on-device LXMF messaging over LoRa or Wi-Fi, or RNode to use the device as a radio for a host client over USB serial or BLE. Standalone does not provide BLE messaging. RNode radio settings are managed by its host client.

Controls​

  • Fn+arrows moves through lists; left/right changes tabs where the current screen does not consume it. Tab / Shift+Tab also changes tabs outside chat.
  • Enter opens or confirms. Backspace goes back outside text entry; in an editor it deletes text first, then a fresh tap on an empty field goes back. Fn+Backspace is forward Delete.
  • Ctrl+H opens Help; Ctrl+M opens Messages, Ctrl+N starts a new message, and Ctrl+S opens Settings.
  • In a chat, Tab selects a displayed message and Enter opens its full text. Fn+arrows scrolls; Backspace returns to chat. R refreshes while reading or selecting a message.

The Messages footer uses first / previous / next / last arrows. Move down past the last conversation to focus the footer, choose an enabled arrow with left/right and press Enter. Fn+Left/Right changes pages directly; adding Shift jumps to either end. Unavailable arrows stay visible and disabled.

Screen dimming or blanking does not power off the Cardputer. Use the side power switch for hardware power-off, and wait for pending saves or maintenance first.

Radio and storage​

Settings → Radio offers the shared presets and custom frequency, spreading factor, bandwidth, coding rate, TX power and preamble. Match the radio tuple with your peers. Cardputer exposes these fields directly; it does not use the Deck/Pager developer-unlock screen.

The handheld guide explains message phases, save errors, paged history, SD-copy scope and reset recovery. The compact editor retains a draft across a pending send; it does not promise a separate saved draft for every conversation.

Legacy rsCardputer​

Earlier firmware and its instructions remain in ratspeak/rsCardputer. Current unified packages use the cardputer- prefix; older releases used rscardputer-. Do not mix legacy and unified partition layouts.

License​

Unified Standalone firmware and the launcher are AGPL-3.0-or-later. Bundled RNode firmware retains GPLv3. See the third-party notices.