Using a phone as the BLE Host

[Alex Lynchosky]

So far I have made a successful program that utilizes BLE to send and receive radio signals in Kiel. But I have only been testing this program by using the provided Master Control Panel host. I have done a bit of research on Androids, and which models can support BLE, but I've found no definitive evidence one way or another if BLE is a firmware or a hardware upgrade.

So my question is this:

Which phones will work with the Nordic chip through BLE, or could work with a software update? And do you know of any good SDKs or APIs to facilitate my next step of testing?

Thanks in advance!

[Carles]

Hi there,

Right now your best bet is to use an recent iOS device, since those come with BLE built-in and standard APIs that work well. If you want to go the Android route, you can either wait until the next Android version is released (4.3) which will integrate platform-wide standard BLE APIs, or else use one of the phones that come bundled with manufacturer-specific BLE APIs.

There is plenty of information on the internet about this, since pretty much everyone working with BLE is faced with the same challenge.

Carles

[Ole Morten]

Carles is right that iOS and OS X currently is the best supported BLE platform, but later Samsung Android phones do have a public API as well, which should be usable. Please have a look at this page. As you can see, it should work with all Samsung Galaxy devices running Android 4.2 or later. This is currently the only usable public API that I know of on Android.

As for phones that could work with a software update, that should be more or less any phone released the last few years. Google have indicated that BLE support will come natively in next Android, so hopefully (almost) any phone that gets this version should be usable with BLE devices.

[Alex Lynchosky]

Yeah this is pretty much what I gathered from my searches as well. This is unfortunate, since none of these options let me start progressing immediately. I was hoping there was something I missed. Thank you for the response!

[Marc Nicholas]

Just to muddy the waters here, do bear in mind that Android device manufacturers control what devices get what upgrades. Don't assume that any Android device will be easily upgradeable to Android 4.3/Developer API 18.

One of the reasons we're using Nexus 4s for testing is that we can run stock, straight-from-Google Android on them...especially when 4.3 hits the streets.

-m

[Ole Morten]

That is absolutely true, and I tried to convey that in my initial answer, but I see that it may have been a little unclear. Nexus devices should as you say be a safe bet to be sure to get updates as soon as possible. Anyway, thanks for clearing up! :)