Puart_control example

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Anonymous
Not applicable

Hello,

My customer is evaluating the BCM920737 and has the BCM92073X_LE_KIT

The customer is using the puart_control peripheral example software for the evaluation and is seeing the following results:

Customer comments: 

I downloaded the puart_control project in the eval board.

I started client app on the PC.

I press -> start -> device discovery and I can see the address of the Roving module, which I configured as advertising device.

The BCM92073X_LE_KIT cannot see my android phone, Samsung ... but I can see another android phone, LG. Both phones have BLE supporting OS - latest version is on both.

When device (BCM92073X_LE_KIT) sees LG phone it pairs with it without me saying/issuing a command to do that.

I have HTC and I can see on that phone your module (BCM92073X_LE_KIT) when in advertising mode but not the opposite (the BCM92073X_LE_KIT cannot see the phone when board is in device discovery mode ,scanning for nearby devices).

I'll continue to play to see why and how to do what I need for my project.

Please let me know your thoughts.


Thanks,

Belenie

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1 Solution

Understand here that there are two roles a BLE device can operate as, Central (Handset/TV/Computer) and Peripheral (Optimized for ultra-low power consumption, ex. Sensor)

It sounds like your customer wants their product to act as the Central, then have all of the phones which connect to it act as Peripherals.

If this is the case, then they may run into problems on the Android side as Peripheral mode is not supported on Android today based on my understanding (it is supported on iOS). Since the Samsung phone connects, it's possible that this unit is running something proprietary from Broadcom which allows peripheral mode on Android (these features exist on Android phones, but they are not standard).

What they should do (if they have a larger battery)  is both scan and advertise on their device.  The application running on Android should then figure out if its version of the OS supports advertisements and perform scanning otherwise.

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3 Replies
MichaelF_56
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This appears to be an Android/BLE compatibility issue correct?  Central vs. Peripheral support on the Phone, version of Android supported on the phone, BLE HW on the phone, etc.


It seems that the the Samsung phone is not seen, but the LG and HTC phones can be seen just fine, but only the Samsung phone can actually connect (HTC phone does not connect as a peripheral - maybe it only supports Central mode?).


Note here that BLE support was provided in Android 4.3 or higher, at least this is what is supported by the Android applications we supply on Google Play (Broadcom Corporation - Android Apps on Google Play).

You may want to have the customer try to download one of these Apps on Google Play from the phone that cannot be seen by the Broadcom development board.  This would confirm the phone's support of BLE.

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Anonymous
Not applicable

Thanks, I will have the customer try the Apps.

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Understand here that there are two roles a BLE device can operate as, Central (Handset/TV/Computer) and Peripheral (Optimized for ultra-low power consumption, ex. Sensor)

It sounds like your customer wants their product to act as the Central, then have all of the phones which connect to it act as Peripherals.

If this is the case, then they may run into problems on the Android side as Peripheral mode is not supported on Android today based on my understanding (it is supported on iOS). Since the Samsung phone connects, it's possible that this unit is running something proprietary from Broadcom which allows peripheral mode on Android (these features exist on Android phones, but they are not standard).

What they should do (if they have a larger battery)  is both scan and advertise on their device.  The application running on Android should then figure out if its version of the OS supports advertisements and perform scanning otherwise.

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