I’m just getting started with Freifunk (FF) and want to get some hardware set up. I’m looking for an openWRT router that also supports DECT.
As far as I know, openWRT doesn’t support DECT by default; are there any models that ship from the factory with DECT and openWRT anyway, or any model for which a patch exists?
I’d rather not run a home router, a Freifunk router, and a DECT base station all at the same time, since that all uses up power. I’d be grateful for any hardware tips
(If there are also any useful tips for outdoor APs with DECT functionality, I’d be happy to hear those too)
Great to see you’re new here. I’ve been around a bit longer, but I have to say I haven’t come across a DECT-capable Freifunk router yet. So I don’t want to discourage you too much, but I just haven’t heard of one. I’ll keep following this thread though, it interests me too ^^
I understand you don’t want to run a bunch of different devices, but you’ll probably need at least 2. Device 1: modem+router+DECT base station; Device 2: Freifunk WiFi and home network WiFi. That’s a tried-and-tested setup.
Point 1: depending on the community, „OpenWrt router“ isn’t enough — it would need to be a „Gluon router.“
Point 2: DECT hardware is, as a rule, similar to some WiFi chips in that it’s only supported by closed-source drivers; the user base is significantly smaller than in that case, and the number of developers accordingly as well.
Just look at Fritzboxes, for example — they widely include DECT technology, but for years — AFAIK — there hasn’t even been an attempt to make this hardware usable under OpenWrt. That might be because DECT would also need a connection to VoIP technology, for which similar requirements apply.
In short: I suspect you’ll have to search for a long time — and even if you do find something, you’ll still end up disappointed — this magical all-in-one solution hasn’t been invented yet, and the resources devoted to developing it are negligible.
So even if you strip out the Freifunk aspect entirely, meaning neither Gluon nor any other FF firmware, but plain OpenWRT:
FOSS driver support for the DECT chips commonly found in home gateways is basically nonexistent. And then there’s the problem with the voice stack. Asterisk is a monster that combines the complexity of a squid.conf with ACLs, paired with release cycles more like mailman or inn.
And the lighter-weight alternatives to it are few and far between, and it feels like all of those projects are dead by now.
It’s just not fun, because the target audience has barely made phone calls in years, at least not with that kind of equipment.
In the end, it makes the most sense to just put a small, used Fritzbox next to it „just for telephony“… until it stops getting security updates, and then get the next smallest possible used FB…
