Bluetooth Developer Studio vs nRFgo Studio

[Punit]

I am just beginning to develop with BLE.I came across the nRFgo Studio through Nordic and BDS through the bluetooth SIG.

1]What are similarities/differences between the two?

2]Which of the above is more mainstream and how do they make BLE development easier if one doesn't want to go too much in detail with writing code?

I am ok with coding as well, but open to trying tools if they make development faster and error free.

[Michael Dietz]

nRFgo Studio is used to flash your nRF5x series device with your SoftDevice/Application .hex files.

Bluetooth Developer Studio is a tool to help you create your BLE profiles, services and characteristics.

You would use BDS to intuitively create the GATT hierarchy of your BLE profile. Then you would use this generated code in your project. After you compile the code you would upload that code to your device with nRFGo studio.

Edit: nRFgo Studio is used by a lot of people who are getting started with developing on nRF5x devices. Ideally you would flash the device from your IDE or using nrfjprog (the more powerful command line equivalent of nRFgo Studio) to be more efficient. But nRFgo Studio is GUI based and a bit easier to use for beginners.

BDS is not mainstream. It is pretty new and I don't know how well supported/tested it is with our device/SDK. I'd recommend just sticking with Nordic's InfoCenter, SDK and devzone for now. Once you are comfortable with all this and have done some development then take a quick look at BDS and see if it makes your life easier.

[Wojtek]

[OT] None of them is too mainstream, both can be used by hipsters [EOT]

[Bill Siever]

From my point of view, one of the greatest potential strengths of BDS is having a standard way to document custom services/characteristics/etc. and also having a standard file format to exchange this documentation. That being said, the last time I used it I found it a bit clunky.

BDS may be a great tool for rapid prototyping if/when the ability to export prototype code is robust enough, but to really use it effectively with Nordic devices you'll still have to know many of the low level details of the API (that you'll learn by following Michael's suggestions).

[Punit]

I am not able to see options for nrf51 dk/nrf51822 in the go Studio.Also,is the nRFgo Studio not used to create Custom Services/characteristics,as your post suggests?Maybe because i m a newbie, but i feel that the HELP of go Studio is not very user friendly,can u suggest any further readings to grasp it better?Nordic already supplies plugins for BDS, still u say that it is not well supported with your SDK, WHY?

[Bill Siever]

nRF Go Studio can be used to create services for the older nRF8001 chip, but I don't think it can be used to create services for the nRF51 series (I'm not an expert on nRF Go Studio --- hopefully a Nordicer can confirm).

I only have limited experience with BDS. I tried using it with the first release of Nordic's plugin and an early (I believe beta) version of BDS. At the time there were some stability and usability issues. My initial impression was that it had a lot of promise, but I didn't feel it was ready for full-time use, which is understandable given that they were early releases. I haven't had time to evaluate more recent release. Perhaps someone with more recent experience with BDS can give an up-to-date review.