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Regarding communication from Android devices - BLE connections may be difficult, but as I understand it, BLE broadcasting is a workable alternative. I'm by no

by jka 7y ago

Regarding communication from Android devices - BLE connections may be difficult, but as I understand it, BLE broadcasting is a workable alternative. I'm by no means an expert, and would refer to the TCN Coalition's current explanation of their approach to cross-platform device communication: https://github.com/TCNCoalition/TCN/blob/37add39f7ddb91fade91832bc16903dcb74a487f/README.md#tcn-sharing-with-bluetooth-low-energy https://github.com/TCNCoalition/TCN/blob/37add39f7ddb91fade9...

barbegal 7y ago
Thanks for the link. They assume that Android devices can scan in the background but my experience is that whilst this is theoretically achievable, the experience is unreliable in practice. See this guide which shows how to make things more reliable https://openpathsupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024285312 https://openpathsupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024... And they state that for iOS in background mode: > A nearby Android device acts as a bridge. It receives TCNs through “central” write operations and adds them to a rotating list to broadcast alongside its own TCN. Which doesn't sound that reliable or accurate.
IshKebab 7y ago
On Android the broadcasting bit is fine. But to effectively scan for advertisements you need to start a foreground service and actively scan for them continuously. That will keep the phone awake all the time and rinse your battery. It also don't really work very well because Android's Bluetooth stack is shockingly unreliable. iOS is much much better. You can scan for iBeacons (a restricted subset of advertisements) continuously in the background and it works extremely well. Their Bluetooth stack is a million times faster and more reliable than Android's. But I'm pretty sure there is no way to scan for, or broadcast non-iBeacon advertisements in the background. There are waaaay too many gotchas to do this reliably without OS support.

by jka 7y ago

barbegal 7y ago

Thanks for the link. They assume that Android devices can scan in the background but my experience is that whilst this is theoretically achievable, the experience is unreliable in practice. See this guide which shows how to make things more reliable https://openpathsupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024285312 https://openpathsupport.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360024... And they state that for iOS in background mode: > A nearby Android device acts as a bridge. It receives TCNs through “central” write operations and adds them to a rotating list to broadcast alongside its own TCN. Which doesn't sound that reliable or accurate.

IshKebab 7y ago

On Android the broadcasting bit is fine. But to effectively scan for advertisements you need to start a foreground service and actively scan for them continuously. That will keep the phone awake all the time and rinse your battery. It also don't really work very well because Android's Bluetooth stack is shockingly unreliable. iOS is much much better. You can scan for iBeacons (a restricted subset of advertisements) continuously in the background and it works extremely well. Their Bluetooth stack is a million times faster and more reliable than Android's. But I'm pretty sure there is no way to scan for, or broadcast non-iBeacon advertisements in the background. There are waaaay too many gotchas to do this reliably without OS support.