nRF52832 to mobile phone via BLE

[Sai Kiran]

Hi

Can anyone tell me which example in SDK to use to send data(a simple text message) from nRF52832 board to an Android Phone. I have nRF Connect and nRF Tools applications installed on the phone.

Thanks in advance.

[Sai Kiran]

Just to give more details, let's say we have 2 nRF52832 Development Kits. We can program one device as a client and another as a server and send the data between the two devices. Correct me, if I have understood in the wrong way. So, we are basically replacing one of the DKs with a mobile phone with nRF apps. So, in this scenario, which example do we use? I do not understand why should we use UART? Can we not simply send a normal text message that I can manually put in code?

[Hung Bui]

Hi Sai, 

The UART example is just an example of sending proprietary data over BLE. You don't need to use UART you can send anything you want with the example. 
Another example you can have a look is the blinky example. In that example we send only 1 byte. But you can modify it to send more data. 

You can download nrfBLinky app from google Play/App Store and source code is available on Github. 

[Sai Kiran]

I am confused between programming the softdevice and programming the board. What is the difference between them? I am using Segger Embedded Studio on Linux OS. Can you suggest how to program the softdevice and also the board?

[Hung Bui]

Please follow the getting started tutorials.

[Sai Kiran]

I have flashed the ble_app_blinky and also programmed softdevice. I still do not see any connection in nrf Connect app.

[Hung Bui]

Which hardware board are you using ? Have you tried to test with any other example ? For example the blinky \examples\peripheral\blinky  (not the ble_app_blinky). 

Have you tried to flash the pre-compiled hex as instructed in the getting started guide ? 

[Sai Kiran]

I am using nRF52832 board. I have tried blinky example and it's working. I have tried ble_app_uart also. The LED keeps blinking when I download the code. But the board is not detected in NRF Connect Mobile App.

[Hung Bui]

Please provide the hex files you used (softdevice and . Also please take a photo of the board you are using ? Do you have the 32kHz crystal on the board ? If you don't you need to configure the NRF_SDH_CLOCK_LF_SRC in sdk_config to NRF_CLOCK_LF_SRC_RC.

Which SDK version you are using ? 

[Sai Kiran]

Hi.

I am using 15.3.0 version of SDK. I am just using the nrf_app_blinky example. I have not changed anything in that. So, hex file that I am using is the same as the hex file in the SDK. I am using s132 softdevice and Segger Embedded Studio v4.10.

As far as I know, there's 32kHz crystal on the board. I tried making the change you suggested regarding NRF_CLOCK_LF_SRC_RC. When I do that, the LED1 does not glow, which means that the configuration is wrong. And hence, I switched back to the previous configuration.

Here's the pic of the board-

[Hung Bui]

It seems that the board has been reworked especially the components around the chip. C3 is also missing. 

I would suggest you to test using another board. 

You can also step into the code to debug and check where it assert. You can follow the debug guide here.

[Sai Kiran]

Yeah, got it. I have connected the custom board to DK and it is working. However, I have some issue while observing the log output using Putty. Previously, using Putty, I was able to observe the Log values. Now, when I use the custom board, I am not able to observe the Log Output.

[Hung Bui]

It's because you don't have the connection of the UART pin to the Segger chip on the DK. If you connect the UART pins of your nRF52 on the custom board to correspondent pins on the DK (TXD to P0.06, RXD to P0.08, RTS to P0.05 and CTS to P0.07) it should work.