Hardware bring-up: the go/no-go test

Everything in Dolphone runs against fake-mm. Whether it can be a phone on real hardware comes down to five gates. Run them on an RK3576 board from Flipper’s supported list (or any arm64 Debian 13 machine) with a Quectel RM520N-GL in an M.2 Key-B to USB adapter and a SIM with VoLTE. Until a Flipper One exists, that board running Flipper OS is the target.

GO when G1-G3 pass on at least one modem. NO-GO when G2 fails on every candidate: publish what was measured and stop.

On another machine (a Raspberry Pi, a uConsole, a PinePhone, a Librem 5, a laptop), the same gates are how its device profile goes from “untested” to “tested”: run them, note what passed, and send the profile’s file back with its status and notes updated (see DEVICES.md). phonectl device says which profile is in use, and why.

Before G0: prepare the board

Install Dolphone’s package on the board first: several gates use phonectl and the modem commands it brings, and the package also installs the polkit rule that lets your session use the modem, and dolphone-modem-access.

# A release's .deb, or one built on any arm64 Debian 13 machine. Without
# flipctl-slint's tools there, leave the panel bundles out:
SKIP_BUNDLES=1 scripts/package-deb.sh
sudo apt install ./target/deb/dolphone_*_arm64.deb    # answer yes: AT commands

Log in again so phoned starts with your session (systemctl --user status phoned). scripts/dev-setup.sh is for a machine without a modem: it refuses to run where it finds one, since it swaps ModemManager for the fake.

G0: the modem is there

sudo apt install modemmanager libqmi-utils
mmcli -L
mmcli -m any                       # model, firmware, state, signal
mmcli -m any --command='AT+QGMR' 2>/dev/null || sudo qmicli -p -d /dev/cdc-wdm0 --dms-get-revision

Write down the firmware revision: Quectel asks for it.

mmcli --command and Dolphone’s AT commands (the modem setup, the Flipper One’s AT+QPCMV=1,2 at every start, call forwarding codes) need ModemManager in debug mode, the only mode in which it passes AT commands from a client. Installing the package asks whether to turn it on (yes by default on a Flipper One, where call audio needs it). To change it later:

sudo dolphone-modem-access on      # or off, or status; dpkg-reconfigure dolphone asks again

Phone Settings > Modem offers Turn on too, with a password prompt.

What it costs: --debug also sets ModemManager’s log level to DEBUG. ModemManager hides numbers and message text from its QMI and MBIM log lines unless started with --log-personal-info (since 1.20), but not from AT traffic, so with an AT modem the journal can hold them. Removing the package turns it off again.

Or a spare AT port, with debug mode left off. The RM520N-GL (USB 2c7c:0801) has two AT ports: interface 2, which ModemManager makes its primary port, and interface 3, the “modem” port, which takes AT commands too and which ModemManager uses only as its secondary (Quectel’s UMTS/LTE/5G Linux USB Driver User Guide V3.1, Table 1; ModemManager’s 77-mm-quectel-port-types.rules). Dolphone can tell ModemManager to ignore interface 3 (the ID_MM_PORT_IGNORE udev tag) and send its commands there itself. Nobody has tried it on a real RM520N yet, so check it here:

ls -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/*/ttyUSB*           # which ttyUSB is which interface (…:1.3 is 3)
sudo dolphone-modem-access port on             # then log in again if you just joined dolphone
udevadm info -q property -n /dev/ttyUSB3 | grep ID_MM_PORT_IGNORE   # =1
mmcli -m any | grep -A4 " ports:"              # ttyUSB3 no longer listed; ttyUSB2 still (at)
ls -l /dev/ttyUSB3                             # crw-rw---- root dolphone
phonectl modem setup                           # "at commands ... on phoned's own port /dev/ttyUSB3"

Record: whether ModemManager still finds the modem, places and receives calls (G1) with the port gone, and still sees RING and new texts. Which port the modem sends those unsolicited messages to (AT+QURCCFG="urcport") is not in any RM520N manual found; if ModemManager misses them, answer AT+QURCCFG="urcport" on interface 3 and note it. If the interface numbers differ (another USB composition from AT+QCFG="usbcfg"), the rule and the profile’s [at_port] need the right one (DEVICES.md).

G1: calls

mmcli -m any --voice-create-call="number=0491570156"     # a number you own
mmcli -o <call> --start
mmcli -m any --voice-list-calls                          # watch ringing-out, active
mmcli -o <call> --hangup
# Incoming: ring the SIM from another phone, then
mmcli -m any --voice-list-calls
mmcli -o <call> --accept

If calls fail to set up: mmcli -m any | grep -i "carrier config" should name your carrier’s VoLTE profile (Quectel calls it MBN). AT+QMBNCFG="List" shows the profiles the firmware has.

Dolphone checks the setup a Quectel modem needs for calls and can make it:

phonectl modem setup           # USB audio, VoLTE, carrier profile: ok or change
phonectl modem setup apply     # waits for a press on the device; the modem restarts

None of the three is in the public RM5x0N AT manual (V1.0), so treat a “change” on real firmware as something to confirm, and report what it answered. Phone Settings > Modem shows the same check, with Set up when there is something to do.

G2: call audio (the deciding one)

The RM520N-GL has no PCM pins (they are reserved on the GL variant; only the -EU variant has them), so call audio has to come over USB as a sound card.

1. Turn on UAC: phonectl modem setup apply, or by hand as Quectel’s LTE Standard UAC Application Note describes: query AT+QCFG="usbcfg", send the same values back with the last one set to 1, and restart (AT+CFUN=1,1). A firmware that lists only six functions cannot do it by AT command; ask Quectel for the RM520N-GL note and a firmware that can, with your revision.
2. Send voice to USB: AT+QPCMV=1,2. The modem forgets it at every restart; the Flipper One profile’s modem_at has phoned send it each time the modem appears.
3. Check a new card appears:

   aplay -l; arecord -l             # a Quectel card
   pw-dump | grep -i quectel        # its PipeWire nodes
   

4. Make a call (G1) and route it by hand:

   pw-loopback --capture=<quectel source> --playback=<speaker or headset sink> &
   pw-loopback --capture=<microphone> --playback=<quectel sink> &
   

   Both people should hear each other. The note gives the format as 8 kHz, mono, 16-bit; PipeWire converts.
5. Then let phoned do it: stop the two loopbacks, call again, and check pgrep -a pw-loopback shows the two phoned starts (names dolphone-downlink and dolphone-uplink). To find the Quectel card’s node names for the step above, wpctl status or pw-cli ls Node.

If the card appears but carries silence, try the other UAC mode the note lists, check AT+QAUDMOD, and capture pw-top during the call. Record what you tried.

Call forwarding and caller ID

ModemManager has no API for these, so the dialer sends them as the standard AT commands (3GPP TS 27.007), through the same debug-mode passthrough:

Barring codes (*33*…#) are refused: they need the network’s barring password. On real hardware, after setting a forward, ring the SIM from another phone and check where the call goes.

G3: texts

mmcli -m any --messaging-create-sms="number=0491570156,text='Dolphone test'"
mmcli -s <sms> --send
mmcli -m any --messaging-list-sms        # after texting the SIM from another phone

On Australian 4G-only networks texts travel over IMS too: if G1 needed a carrier profile, G3 does as well.

Picture messages and group texts come over mobile data (MMS), so they need a data connection and mmsd-tng:

sudo apt install mmsd-tng                # it finds most carriers' MMS settings itself
# Send the SIM a picture from another phone, then:
phonectl threads                         # the text, with [Picture]
phonectl mms 0491570156 --file test.jpg "Dolphone MMS test"

If nothing arrives, check ~/.mms/modemmanager/mms against your carrier’s MMSC, proxy and APN, and journalctl --user -u mmsd-tng. Record what you changed.

Then: Dolphone on real hardware

Install the package (see install; scripts/package-deb.sh builds it on the board), which brings the polkit rule that lets phoned use Voice and Messaging from your session, and log in again:

phonectl status                          # your operator, signal, number
journalctl --user -u phoned -f           # what phoned makes of the modem

scripts/dev-setup.sh is for a machine without a modem: it refuses to mask ModemManager where it finds one.

On the Flipper One, ls /sys/class/leds shows the LEDs’ real names: if they are not the flipper-one:* names in the profile’s ring_leds, note them (and the udev rule’s match).

Report back

Open an issue titled Hardware test: <modem> on <board> with: modem and firmware, carrier and country, which gates passed, the commands that worked, and for G2 the card names and what you heard. A NO-GO report is as useful as a GO.