Beacon and GATT: NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM

[Henk Pragt]

HI guys,

I am running a beacon based on the ble_app_beacon example. This works fine.

Next, I made a connectable GAP/GATT application to read and make some settings. This is based on the ble_app_hrs example, and also works fine.

Finally, I wanted to combine these two: run the beacon until a button is pressed, and then start GAP/GATT. However, if any beacon has been transmitted before the initialization of the GAP/GATT it fails: ble_advertising_init returns error code 4 = NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM. If no beacon has been sent before, initialization succeeds and the device starts fast advertising.

I traced the code as far as the sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure() call in ble_advertising.c, but this is a SD call and canniot be debugged.

I tried increasing stack size and heap, but to no avail. Is there a way to check what is causing the NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM error?

Are there any examples of the combination Beacon and Connectable device?

Thanks for your help,

Henk

[Simon]

Here is a similar case that might help you solve the problem.

Regarding you question, according to the S132 SoftDevice v6.0.0 API, if sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure(..) returns NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM, the following is mentioned: "Not enough memory to configure a new advertising handle. Update an existing advertising handle instead".

Try using same handle as used when configuring the advertising set for the beacon advertiser.

Best regards Simon

[Henk Pragt]

Hi Simon,

thanks for your reply. It looks like exactly the info I needed. I will try this next week. I only hope that it does not mean there is practically no RAM left for my application, if one additional advertising structure causes an out-of-memory.

Henk

[Simon]

I am glad to help. Please ask if you have any more questions.

Cheers, Simon

[Henk Pragt]

Hi Simon,

still no luck with this problem.

I struggle with the different calls to ble_advertising_init. The beacon  example uses "ble_gap_adv_params_t" and calls sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure() to initialize the advertizing. The HRS example uses macro BLE_ADVERTISING_DEF to declare a "ble_advertising_t" structure that incorporates the  "ble_gap_adv_params_t" and calls ble_advertising_init().

I tried to have both functions use the same data structure, but whatever I try the call to ble_advertising_init() returns either a NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM or a NRF_ERROR_INVALID_PARAM.

Do you know of any complete and runnable example code that shows how to do this? The example you mentioned does not show how to declare the various structures.

thanks for you help,

Henk

[Simon]

After some trial and error I was able to successfully merge the Heart Rate Example with the Beacon Transmitter Sample Example using SDK v15.2.0. However, initially I got the same error as you (NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM), and the reason was because the two examples uses different levels of API.

Let me explain more in depth. The Beacon example uses the GAP Module (ble_gap.h) directly, while Heart Rate (HR) example uses the advertising module Advertising Module (which uses the GAP Module). Thus, the Beacon example uses the SV call sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure(..) directly from main, while the HR example calls ble_advertising_init(..)→sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure(..) from main. 

When switching from beacon advertising to connectable advertising, the following line inside ble_advertising_init(..) will be called:

if (!p_advertising->initialized)
{
    p_advertising->adv_handle = BLE_GAP_ADV_SET_HANDLE_NOT_SET;
}

Since the beacon example didn't use the advertising module, p_advertising->initialized is never set to true. Then the handle will be set to BLE_GAP_ADV_SET_HANDLE_NOT_SET, and when calling sd_ble_gap_adv_set_configure(..), the same handle will not be used, resulting in the error NRF_ERROR_NO_MEM.

I solved this by running m_advertising.initialized = true; before starting the connectable advertising.

Here is the working code (SDK v15.2.0):

ble_app_hrs_with_beacon.zip

Best regards, Simon