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Introduction to App Inventor Bluetooth LE “Low Energy” –
Part 0

October 3, 2016 Edward M 6
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Bluetooth is a standard for low power communications, over very short
distances, at modest data rates. Originally, Bluetooth was intended for
applications such as short range cordless phones, wireless headphones, remote
control units and other types of devices.

That original version is known as Bluetooth Classic. I wrote a popular tutorial on using
Bluetooth Classic in MIT App Inventor apps for Android. Please refer to that tutorial to learn more
about the history of Bluetooth and how to write MIT App Inventor apps to use
classic Bluetooth with an Arduino board. (Above links were broken until 11
October 2016, since fixed.)

Bluetooth LE Support and The Internet of Things

In 2016, MIT introduced support for Bluetooth Low Energy or Bluetooth LE or
just BLE. Bluetooth LE is a version of Bluetooth designed for devices that send
data occasionally and where battery life must be measured in weeks to months or
longer.

Bluetooth LE is one of several wireless communications standards used for
Internet of Things (IoT) connected devices. IoT
refers to adding computing and communications to a wide variety of devices,
sensors and control systems that were previously mostly “dumb” and not
connected to much else.

To understand IoT, consider some example scenarios. A security system uses
sensors on doors, windows, and to detect motion.  Today’s sensors might
include their own controller and network communication to share information with
other sensors and other parts of the security system. May be the security motion
sensor could be used to automatically turn on a light, whose switch is connected
to the network. Perhaps you can check the status of sensors from an app on your
smart phone, or change secure settings remotely.

The idea is lots of “things” can now have intelligent controllers and be
networked and exchange data to create new kinds of use scenarios and
applications.

One of the largest markets for IoT is in industrial manufacturing. Entire
production lines can be outfitted with sensors to detect faults or quality
problems before they become a crisis. Machines in the field (such as tractors or
jet engines) collect data on their own use and operation, and this is used to
identify faults before failure so that maintenance can be performed.

Whatever the IoT future is, it will be large and everywhere.

Bluetooth LE and Android Phones

Some older phones may not work with Bluetooth Classic due to changes in the
Bluetooth spec over the years. I have some older phones that I sometimes use for
testing which only supported Bluetooth version 2.1. Most all phones today
support Bluetooth 4.x and Bluetooth Classic.

Bluetooth LE support was first introduced to Android devices in Android 4.3
for devices having compatible hardware. Additional Bluetooth LE
features were added to subsequent Android releases – but some features may
only work in the Nexus 5X, Nexus 6 series of phones, and some other very new
phones.

I am working on creating Bluetooth LE example code. My first attempt has been
with an nRF8001 Bluetooth LE module. I can
get this module to connect and receive data from my Nexus 5 phone but have so
far been unsuccessful in sending data from the nRF8001 to the App Inventor app
running on my phone. I will continue to work on this but I have also ordered
some other  Bluetooth LE components in hopes that the problem is
hardware or hardware configuration related. Besides, I want to eventually get
code working for multiple Bluetooth LE devices.

In my test set up, I am using an Arduino board wired to the nRF8001 module. I
have an application written for Arduino to support connecting over Bluetooth LE,
and receiving and transmitting data over Bluetooth LE.

On my Nexus 5, I am using an App Inventor app that relies on the Bluetooth LE
component that is now available as an extension (added in) to App Inventor. I’ll
have more on that in a future post.

For  now, I just wanted to let you know that I am working getting
Bluetooth LE running with App Inventor – making progress but its not all working
correctly  yet! I do not have a time schedule for when tutorials will
appear – I just wanted to let you know that I am working on this.

I’ve called this post “Part 0”. Will go to “Part 1” when I have this
working!

Related Posts:

Part 3: Bluetooth communications with 2
Arduino…

Bluetooth and The Internet of Things #Bluetooth
#Iot…

Part 1: Storing and accessing user
interface…

Part 2: Storing and accessing user
interface…

MIT App Inventor for iOS Enters Beta
Testing

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6 thoughts on “Introduction to App Inventor
Bluetooth LE “Low Energy” – Part 0”

نبيل نشأت مرسي says:

October 3, 2016 at 6:53
pm

نبيل
نشأت مرسي liked this on Facebook.

Sjaak Bosman says:

October 3, 2016 at 6:53
pm

Sjaak
Bosman liked this on Facebook.

Peter Borley says:

October 4, 2016 at 1:07
am

Peter
Borley liked this on Facebook.

Pingback: Does your device support Bluetooth LE? Here is how
to find out. | App Inventor 2 – Learn to Code!

Giuseppe
Cavallo says:

February 11, 2017 at 9:42
am

Hi Edward,
thank you for your work. Do you have any advancement in your
job?
Best,

Edward
M says:

February 14, 2017 at 8:47
pm

Giuseppe – not sure I understand your question? I am doing freelance work
with others, involving an aviation industry project. Cannot say what it is
until the product is released, though. Ed

Comments are closed.

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