I'm creating an app in which a key piece is transferring data when two people press a button on the app on their respective devices and then press their phones together (Yes, Bump on Android does this. That isn't the point). I know I could use NFC on Android to get this done. However, I wouldn't be able to do this on iOS because iOS doesn't support NFC. Earlier today I read about and discovered iBeacon, which is apparently some Bluetooth 4.0 implementation that works with both iPhones and Android devices. I've read about retail use-cases of iBeacon, where stores could set up beacons and when users walk by or are close enough, it'll trigger an action. Is the use-case of mimicking NFC for my purposes to be able to do reach iPhone users plausible? Should I be using another solution? Is this not the purpose of iBeacon and it wouldn't work?
From my experience with iBeacon on Android, you can indeed use it to replace NFC, as there are 3 'ranges' (immediate, near and far). iBeacon is based off BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) and very light on power consumption as the name would suggest.
If you are trying to trigger actions on devices in a certain vicinity, i'd say using iBeacon is the most plausable method.
Android doesn't natively support 'iBeacon' as Apple created it, but it is based off Blueooth 4.0, a library has been created to mimick the iOS implementation of iBeacon
Android iBeacon Library
One thing to note, is that when using iBeacons, you cannot transmit data. Only two numbers (a major, and minor) and a UUID used solely for identification purposes.
The main problem with using iBeacons for this is that iBeacons are transmit only devices designed only to alert phones to their presence. The technology cannot exchange data.
You could do something like you describe with low-level programming with Bluetooth LE technologies, but iBeacons alone cannot do the job.
Related
I would like to create an application where near phones/devices can send data between each other.
it should look like that all devices except one turn on some listening function. One device create game and add each of devices from list to game.
I know how to accomplish this task with use of intermediary server. But I would like to achieve this in a different way without server. For example I can create app which find near ibeacons and displays them in a list, and get data from them. Is it possible to make to way communication by bluetooth between phones with bluetooth?
Maybe other technologies? I do not want to use NFC, because range is to short.
Another limitation is that, this solution should be an cordova/phonegap plugin?
Edit:
I need to communicate between users devices. For example I want to make app where two users standing near each other chat together. Messages should be send between phones, without server.
It sounds like iBeacons is the perfect solution for what you're attempting to achieve. It doesn't require NFC or a server–only devices that have Bluetooth 4.0 LE (Low Energy).
If you're unhappy with iBeacons, I recommend the Multipeer Connectivity framework that also became available in iOS7:
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/MultipeerConnectivity/Reference/MultipeerConnectivityFramework/
Here's a good tutorial on AppCoda:
http://www.appcoda.com/intro-multipeer-connectivity-framework-ios-programming/
Another benefit to using the Multipeer Connectivity framework as opposed to iBeacons, is that it doesn't require Bluetooth 4.0 LE, which isn't available on iPad 2 and iPhone 4 devices.
I want to know how iBeacon works actually. I found the sample code of AirLocate, but couldn't figure out how it works. iBeacon is works on BLE, so it may be possible for do data communication with other BLE supported devices via bluetooth?
As it possible to make data transfer between iOS - android device via bluetooth using BLE or beacon?
iOS had already announced iBeacon technology, but didn't find out any technical specification document regarding this. I also want to know how it works on android?
Can some one please describe about this technology and is it possible to make data-communication via bluetooth between iOS-iOS device, and iOS-Android Device?
No, you cannot communicate between devices using iBeacons because an iBeacons are transmit only. Mobile devices, both iOS and Android can both hear iBeacons, but they cannot talk back.
iBeacons work by transmitting a 3-part identifier and a transmitter power reference value every second (or more often.) That's it. They do nothing more. SDKs in iOS and Android listen for these signals and report them to your app, but the rest is up to the app developer.
What you suggest may be possible with a custom Bluetooth LE beacon, but it would need to be significantly more complex than an iBeacon, and you would have to build your own.
Here are a couple of links to give you more info:
How iBeacons work on Android from Radius Networks
iBeacon overview by Dave Addey
Full disclosure: I work for Radius Networks.
I'm working on a BLE proximity sensing feature based on Android and need some information.
Currently I see there are no BLE beacons manufacturers for android. I found 2 so far for iPhone.
1) http://www.estimote.com
2) http://www.gimbal.com
Estimote claims that their devices are generic but mainly they are publicized for iBeacons. So I'm not sure whether I should order them for a feature on Android.
Secondly gimbal explicitly mentions that their devices won't be enabled for android for proximity sensing.
So if any of you know where can I order BLE beacons compatible with Android please let me know.
Another thing, for prototype testing I was wondering whether I could use a Android BLE capable tablet or smartphone as a beacon to emit BLE signals?
Till now the documentation for android only suggests how to detect a beacon, But I'm not sure whether an Android device can be used as a beacon.
Any insights?
There is a BLE Beacon manufacturer for Android: Radius Networks
You can detect any standard iBeacon on Android using our Android iBeacon Library.
You can try it out yourself with our free iBeacon Locate app, which is based on this library. My company also sells both software and hardware iBeacons that I guarantee work with Android. But again, any standard iBeacon will work, too. Don't take my word for it -- just download our free app and use it to see one of our iBeacons. (We even have a free virtual machine you can use!)
It is currently not possible to make an iBeacon out of a stock Android device because the Bluetooth LE APIs, introduced in Android 4.3, do not support the peripheral mode needed to transmit advertisements like an iBeacon.
EDIT: It is now possible to make rooted Android 4.4.3 devices transmit as an iBeacon. See here.
I tried simple BLE scan app on Android, but the callback for LeDevices always returned null for UUID[]. Also, finding based on know UUID didnot work.
To add to David's reply. I have tried Radius Networks SDK, pretty clean. I like it.
Also, Estimotes has released their Android SDK today(1/7), which is good. The sample App shows notification, Distance, Major-Minor. I tested with 3 Estimotes & also with iPhone's app (making the iPhone as iBeacon). It works well, give it a try.
Note that you have to modify the code
change the ESTIMOTE_PROXIMITY_UUID value to the UUID that you are watching for.
Hope it helps.
I'm looking for a way to detect iBeacon (iOS 7.0 feature) from an Android device. I read the Android documentation, where it seem that the iBeacon is some kind of GATT server which sends its position. While the Android documentation says that I should not poll that data, but for the detection this would be nessesary.
I google a lot but this topic is quite new (I even created a new tag ibeacon) so I would be happy if I get some links to ressources from the iOS world which descripes the implementation. Also if there are some Android libs which I did not find yet would be nice.
EDIT: The library below has been moved here:
https://github.com/AltBeacon/android-beacon-library
I have ported the iOS7 iBeacon SDKs to Android, and was able to see standard iBeacons and estimate their range. The code is available here:
https://github.com/RadiusNetworks/android-ibeacon-service
For this to work, you need Android 4.3 which introduced the Low Energy Bluetooth APIs. You also need a device with a low energy bluetooth chipset.
If you don't want to use the full library above, you can roll your own. iBeacons simply transmit a BLE advertisement once per second that start with a known sequence of bytes. You simply have to tell Android to do a BLE scan, get each advertisement, and look for one that starts with the known iBeacon byte sequence. You can then parse out the iBeacon fields. Here is the code the shows how this is done:
https://github.com/RadiusNetworks/android-ibeacon-service/blob/master/src/com/radiusnetworks/ibeacon/IBeacon.java#L177-L231
The only catch here is to detect beacon even the app is not running. Unlike iOS7, it is not natively support. In iOS7, when you on your BT, it will automatically notify you when you enter the region of registered iBeacon.
I had implemented iBeacon in Android 4.3 API using IntentService plus AlarmManager. To do a scan every 30 sec( to save your battery power, it shall be longer). It works well for user. Only when the matching uuid/major/minor is found, then it will trigger notifications. Otherwise, it will sleep and wake up for scanning again.
i think this is the solution for your question.
I didn't quite get what you mean, could you provide links to the documentation which said that you should not poll the data?
But it seems to me that the iBeacon is working as a server, which is kind of funny to me. Isn't it meant to find other devices, not the phone itself?
https://developer.bluetooth.org/gatt/characteristics/Pages/CharacteristicViewer.aspx?u=org.bluetooth.characteristic.position_quality.xml
This is the characteristics it uses though. To me it sounds like that the devices you are looking for are the "beacons" and the phone itself is just a listener. So you would not poll the EHPE and EVPE data but you should actually listen to it's changes or "broadcasts".
I'm kind of new to this myself also and couldn't find any really specific documentation.
Though, be advised, in the link I provided there is download link in the top corner which will provide you the full documentation in PDF format. There you will probably find more answers.
I have been searching for a while now and decided to post a question here to see if someone had already traveled down this specific road.
I am developing a bluetooth enabled device, using the Bluegiga BLE112 chip. They announce this chip to be easily used with iOS devices (and this was our main reason for choosing it)
The device will need to communicate with an App, that we need to be developed for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and Blackberry. Due to this need, I've decided to use Rhomobile, as it seems to be the only one that supports developing BT apps for iOS without having to develop further plugins.
I only need to send small messages (like commands, small strings) and sometimes a bigger file to the device's internal memory.
On Rhomobile's BT documentation, they state that for iOS it is only possible to comunicate between iOS devices ( i'm thinking that they say this because of the MiFi limitations imposed by Apple, but that using Bluegigas chip are not a problem...)
My question is:
Since Bluegiga's documentation has examples of devices communicating with iOS using their chip, i should be able to develop using Rhomobile and not suffer from the limitation stated above. I wanted to be as sure as possible before making my company spend money ordering the chips and development board and what not..
Has anyone tried this, is my thinking missing something?
Thank you all for your time.
Daniel
Good Question, I think I can understand the reason for your confusion.
The main reason is many people/products/frameworks does not clearly mention if they are talking about Bluetooth Classic or Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE).
These are both 2 different things and even thougfh they are called "Bluetooth" one cannot talk to the other.
(Some devices can be both Classic and Bluetooth Low Energy, which allows it to connect to either types)
Ok now comming to your Question :
THE bluegiga dongle is BLE
The Rhomobile is refering to the Bluetooth Classic version of the API.
On iOS the BLE APIs are open to applications, but Classic is limited on iOS , one way for Apps to use Classic Bluetooth on iOS is via the Gamekit APIs but that is possible only when talking with iOS devices, so it wont connect to another Android or Win device that is also Classic.
Needless to say with BLE APIs you cannot connect to calssic anyways.
The bluegiga examples are BLE examples, and apple also has good documentation and examples / samples on how to use BLE so yes it is easy to build a device and app using BLE on iOS.
There is nothing special abut any particular chip yo ucan use any BLE chip - there are many vendors today.
BUT Android (and I guess Windows as well) does not yet have BLE APIs for applications to use :( (Bit I think is is comming soon :))
So I hope this clears things up a bit.