Partyline: A group voice application for Reticulum, built on LXST

by Adi Gunawan 26 October 2026 5 min read 53x views

Partyline: A group voice application for Reticulum, built on LXST

A collection sound use for Reticulum, built on LXST, inspired by Mumble

Encrypted, realtime collection sound and audio complete any Reticulum transport capable of >6 kilobits per second
An uncomplicated to presenter lightweight server and protocol. Spin up a Partyline server in under 30 seconds.
Per area admission and conduit control. open, identified users only, authorize lists of character hashes, or a password. Servers can additionally necessitate a password or an authorize list
Dial-in: rnphone and another LXST clients specified as Sideband and MeshChatX can call the server and district in a area too, whenever enabled
Rooms all alongside its own LXST codec configurable by the server. Opus for accelerated links, Codec2 downward to 700 bps for dilatory ones.
GUI and terminal client alongside multiple tongue support

Requires Python 3.11 or newer

For a scheme broad shove to conversation key, add the optional extra:

pip instal "partyline[hotkeys]"

The graphical client uses Tk, which pip cannot install. On most OS/Distros it may already be installed by your system. If not:

On Debian or Ubuntu run sudo apt instal python3-tk, on Fedora sudo dnf instal python3-tkinter.

Requires Python 3.11 or newer, Reticulum, and LXST

git copy https://github.com/RFnexus/partyline cd partyline pip instal .

Or instal via rngit with:

git copy rns://4cf8a0651c4d73cacd0f93ac1d95e80a/public/partyline

For a scheme broad shove to conversation key, instal the optional additional with:

This installs three commands: partyline, partyline-server and partyline-client.

Start the GUI client:

Connect opens the server browser. Add a server by it's hash or use the server browser to discover discovered servers from announces. Double click a area to associate it. Settings has the audio devices, transmit mode, shove to conversation key, and UI appearance options

partyline-client HASH --name Bob --room Lobby

Commands are: /join, /say, /poke, /who, /mute, /deaf

Type /ptt to toggle shove to talk

Or as an operator: /kick, /ban, /smute, /op and /move

Start a server:

partyline-server --name "My server" --profile opus-high

The server prints its destination hash for clients and alongside dial in enabled the figure rnphone users call if configured for rooms. For rooms, admission lists, operators, a server password and dial in, copy server_example.json and commencement with:

partyline-server --config server.json

Available --profile codecs for rooms:

opus-high - Opus voice, 16 kbps
opus-med - Opus voice, 8 kbps
opus-low - Opus voice, 6 kbps
c2-3200 - Codec2, 3200 bps
c2-2400 - Codec2, 2400 bps
c2-1200 - Codec2, 1200 bps
c2-700 - Codec2, 700 bps
music-low - Opus music, 14 kbps
music-med - Opus music, 28 kbps
music-high - Opus music, 56 kbps

See server_example.json for a complete catalog of options. opus-high-med-low and the Codec2 modes are meant for voice, and music-high-med-low is meant for streaming music or broadcasting to a room. As a rule, use the highest bitrate your nexus can carry

Install as a systemd unit

To instal as a systemd component discover the server command alongside which partyline-server afterward create /etc/systemd/system/partyline.service:

[Unit] Description=Partyline sound server After=network-online.target Wants=network-online.target [Service] Type=simple User=partyline ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/partyline-server --config /home/partyline/server.json Restart=on-failure [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target

Then:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload sudo systemctl allow --now partyline

Music/Broadcasting Rooms & Bots

Server operators can additionally configure broadcast-only rooms for elevated norm music and audio using LXST's Opus CELT profiles. The options are music-high, music-med, and music-low. Music rooms are a particular category of area anywhere lone the listed identities can dispatch audio. Add their character hash, seperated by commas, in music

{"name": "Broadcast", "profile": "music-med", "music": ["0123456789abcdef0123456789abcdef"], "description": "Music/broadcast room. Only listed identities may talk. Uses LXSTs Opus CELT profile"}

An example Music Bot can be established under bots/music_bot.py. When Partyline is installed alongside pip, run it alongside python3 -m partyline.bots.music_bot

Push to conversation (slow link) Rooms

PTT, or slow-mode rooms, are rooms designed to activity complete slower links akin LoRa, naked copper cable bitbashing, and packet radio. Anything alongside additional than a dependable ~3.5 kbps throughput can use a PTT room. They can co-exist alongside regular rooms in a Partyline server, allowing the two accelerated and dilatory clients to communicate complete voice.

Unlike regular rooms there is a bit of latency. PTT rooms group outgoing audio to inhabit the link's MTU, sending fewer, fuller packets alternatively of one example per packet, and provision all listener a larger obtain jitter buffer to gentle out the bursty arrival you get complete broadcast mediums akin LoRa.

Mark any area shove to conversation alongside "ptt": true. Optionally set "ptt_jitter_ms" to alter the buffer depth. It's recommended to use PTT rooms alongside the codec2 profiles.

{"name": "LoRa 1200", "profile": "c2-1200", "ptt": true, "description": "Slow-link shove to talk"} {"name": "Packet Radio Net 700", "profile": "c2-700", "ptt": true, "ptt_jitter_ms": 9000}

Kimi K3 (https://www.kimi.com/en) third gathering hosted API was used for the following tasks: