How do I implement this BLE and BLE Mesh configuration?

[Meg]

Hello,

I wondering if I use the nrf5_SDK_for_Mesh_v4.2.0_src light switch example and modify it to suit my needs.

Q1. I want set up a proxy node using nRF52832 so that it is able to communicate using BLE with iOS Devices and also communicate through BLE Mesh. How do I modify the existing code to set this up?

Q2. If a proxy is successfully set up, does this mean that one phone is able to connect to the proxy node through nRF Mesh while another phone is able to see is on the bluetooth page?

Q3. Do I require both a server and client proxy node based on this link?

Thank you very much for your time

[tesc]

Hi,

The GATT proxy feature in Bluetooth mesh lets the smartphone participate fully in the Bluetooth mesh network, by using communication over BLE. So that means the green oval marked as "BLE MESH" in your drawing can be extended to also surround the smartphone.  The green arrows then represent Bluetooth mesh communication using the ADV bearer, and the blue arrow represent Bluetooth mesh communication using the GATT bearer.

In the nRF Mesh app, you can import or export network settings, manually set app keys, network key, etc., and add other provisioners (so that each provisioner controls a given part of the address space.) With that, you should be able to test this with the nRF Mesh app.

Regards,
Terje

[Meg]

Thanks for the reply.

You mentioned that "The green arrows then represent Bluetooth mesh communication using the ADV bearer, and the blue arrow represent Bluetooth mesh communication using the GATT bearer." 

However, after I successfully provision the proxy node via the Raspberry Pi, I am unable to find the proxy node via my phone on Bluetooth. Does this mean that the proxy node is not set up properly?

[tesc]

Hi,

If you use the light switch example then GATT proxy should be enabled by default.

There are some hurdles and limitations to what you can do with the nRF Mesh app. I did some testing, using our provisioner example for provisioning a light switch client into a network. Connecting to that light switch client over GATT bearer works fine. I added network key and application keys manually in the settings tab of the nRF Mesh app.

However the nRF Mesh app does not have prior knowledge of what devices are already provisioned into the network. Therefore the app will not list those existing nodes, and so you cannot out-of-the-box use the nRF Mesh app to configure those devices. For that you need to import network data into the nRF Mesh app using the "import" feature (available from the settings tab). For that you need to use the same json format as is used for exporting (also available from the settings tab).

The same holds for group addresses and subscriptions. In order to use the nRF Mesh app to send generic on/off messages to a group address, for instance, you must import network settings with information about nodes with generic on/off models that are subscribed to that group address.

In order to familiarize yourself with the import/export format, you can use the nRF Mesh app as provisioner, do some configuration on some nodes, and export. Then you can switch out the contents of the json file with values from your network.

Regards,
Terje