Flash your LTAK device

Before you start

Flashing in the browser uses Web Serial, which only some setups support. Check these first.

Flash it

1. Plug the device into your computer with a USB-C data cable. The small light on the board should come on.
2. Choose the firmware for the kind of device you are making (see Which firmware below). The flasher detects the chip automatically, but you still pick the role.
3. Click the button and, in the little window that appears, choose the serial port that shows up (often named "USB JTAG/serial" or "USB Single Serial"). Then confirm.
4. Wait. It erases and writes the firmware, which takes one to three minutes. Do not unplug it. When it says done, the device restarts on its own.
5. Finish setup: the device makes a Wi-Fi network named LTAK-…. On a phone, join it and the setup page opens. Set the member or station details, then write the login password inside the battery door.

Which firmware

There are three roles. The flasher detects the ESP32-S3 chip; you choose the role, which selects the matching firmware.

After flashing

To re-flash or change a device's role later, just come back to this page and flash again. It overwrites whatever was there.

Troubleshooting

What is needed to make this live

1. Build the firmware. Compile the LTAK builds from the fork with PlatformIO (see firmware/FIRMWARE_PLAN.md): LTAK_Xiao_S3_companion_usb, LTAK_Xiao_S3_repeater, and the pocket-node build once its main.cpp is written. Each produces a factory .bin.
2. Merge each build into one binary at offset 0 so ESP Web Tools can write it in a single step. PlatformIO's merge-bin.py (already in the fork) does this, or esptool.py merge_bin.
3. Add a manifest per role. A small JSON file tells the installer which binary to write. Put the binaries and manifests in a firmware/ folder next to this page, and host the whole site over HTTPS.

Example firmware/manifest-pocket.json (the ESP Web Tools format — the installer auto-detects the ESP32-S3 and writes the one matching build):

{
  "name": "LTAK Pocket Node",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "new_install_prompt_erase": true,
  "builds": [
    {
      "chipFamily": "ESP32-S3",
      "parts": [
        { "path": "ltak-pocket-0.1.0.bin", "offset": 0 }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

And the one line in this page's <head> that loads the installer (uncomment it once the firmware is ready; it is left out of this draft on purpose):

<script type="module"
  src="https://unpkg.com/esp-web-tools@10/dist/web/install-button.js?module"></script>

Safety and security notes

• Each device gets its own identity. The pocket-node setup, done after flashing, generates the device's signing key on the device and never shares the private key. Do not clone one flashed device's saved config to another.
• The firmware is the same for everyone; the identity is not. Flashing only loads the program. Who the device belongs to, its keys, and its channel settings are written during setup, by the provisioning step, not baked into the public binary.
• Verify what you host. Only put firmware you built yourself (or checked) in the firmware/ folder. A web flasher writes whatever the manifest points to.
• This is a setup tool, not an emergency tool. It needs a computer and internet. All of LTAK's disaster features work offline once a device is flashed.