It really seems like I ought to be able to connect a few devices locally via Bluetooth or teathering, and be able to have an open voice chat between those devices without an internet connection, and without push-to-talk.
Anyone aware of something like this that works? I’ve tried a few candidates, but I haven’t had much luck getting something to work.
For extra context on why I want this: I lead a sport kite team, and as the leader, I give vocal commands to tell the rest of the team what to do, and keep us coordinated. We usually use walkie talkies for this, but the one-way communication, the limited non-PTT support, and potential international regulation problems make this workable but not ideal.
You could host a mumble server on a LAN
Ohh, I’d never heard of Mumble. Just did a quick look, and I could see how I could rig something together with a raspberry pi and some peripherals to make this work. It’s certainly worth investigating.
Thank you for the suggestion!
The two things that immediately came to my mind were briar and Berty. I just tested both out for your use case and neither of them have voice messages. But they do have text messages and meshing.
Yea, I’ve looked at those too. If they just had voice chat, they could be a winner
how far away does bluetooth even work? i mean could you not just use signal or session or some onlime option?
Bluetooth can get a couple hundred feet of range, which would be plenty.
I don’t want to rely on an online option, because this is often used on the coast or internationally where cell service may be unreliable or non-existent.
