Crow is the upgraded Raven!!! Crow has add fetures. Crow is a decentralized mesh messaging platform for AREDN© APRS™, Meshtastic, MeshCore compatbility. Each of the backends bridge messages from other message platform to AREDN.
Send mesages, share a file, have group chats with your APRS stations. Dose your AREDN node have a USB port? Use it for file storage.
Documentation can be found in the Crow GitHub wiki.
- Download the APK (current AREDN) or IPK (older opkg firmware) from GitHub Releases.
- Start with the Getting Started guide.
- For a USB-attached MeshCore Companion, follow USB MeshCore setup, including the required drivers, exclusive serial-port ownership, and channel-slot mapping.
- The fresh-install setup test recreates an operator's settings through the UI and commands without restoring a saved configuration over the fresh installation.
- See the BB5 fresh-install findings for verified 0.0.3-r0 setup results, fixes shipped in 0.0.3-r1/r2, and remaining workarounds.
The AREDN channel does not require a LoRa radio. Channel settings are in the chat UI; backend connections and advanced settings currently require SSH configuration, not a separate backend-settings screen.
Crow is derived from the Raven Mesh Messaging Platform, originally developed by Tim Wilkinson with contributions preserved in this repository's Git history. Crow was conceived, invented, and directed by Mathison and was developed through human-directed, AI-assisted engineering using Bob/OpenAI Codex with GPT-5.5 and GPT-5.6, Google Gemini, and Anthropic Claude 4.6.
See CREDITS.md for the full project provenance.
The name APRS™ (Automatic Packet Reporting System) is a registered trademark originally held by its creator, the late Bob Bruninga (WB4APR).