Bluetooth

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Bluetooth is a standard for Personal Area Networking (PAN) based on IEEE802.15.4 and typically running in the 2.4GHz ISM radio frequency spectrum.

Contents

Bluetooth with Linux

Bluetooth support in Linux is divided into the kernel space code, which includes support for most of the protocols as well as all the Bluetooth interface (radio) devices, and the userspace utilities.

The main project supporting Bluetooth on Linux is the bluez project.

Bluetooth support in the Linux Kernel

Bluetooth support has been in the Linux kernel since some of the 2.4 kernels starting in around 2003 or so.

Most Bluetooth radios connect using USB, including:

  • Allcom Corp. Bluetooth V2.0 Dongle based on Broadcom Corp. BCM2035 Bluetooth dongle (idVendor: 0x0a5c, idProduct: 0x200a)

USB Bluetooth dongles use USB DeviceClass: Wireless, DeviceSubClass: Radio Frequency and DeviceProtocol: Bluetooth.

Bluetooth support in Linux Userspace

The main Bluetooth userspace project is bluez. In Debian, this can be installed with:

apt-get install bluez

Most GUI based distributions include a GNOME or KDE app for configuring Bluetooth devices.

Bluetooth on the Linux command line

From the command line, things are a little more complicated.

  • hciconfig - to find local BT interface(s)
  • hcitool scan - to find remote discoverable BT devices
  • l2ping - to "ping" a remote BT device by MAC address

More tips:

RFCOMM

RFCOMM is a Bluetooth profile for an asynchronous serial link, which runs over the lower-level L2CAP protocol.

Setting up an RFCOMM connection in Ubuntu requires editing the /etc/bluetooth/rfcomm.conf file.

Broadcom BCM20702 chipset support

see Plugable USB Bluetooth Adapter: Solving HFP/HSP and A2DP Profile Issues on Linux for instructions on acquiring the Broadcom firmware to enable these BT 4.0 USB dongles to work.

Bluetooth Low Energy

aka BLE and also known as Bluetooth Smart

Brilliant Trackit

Uses iTrackEasy app on Android (and iPhone) and reports all your location and other identity data to servers in China.

Android Development

External links

see also

External Links