I am trying to find a way to connect a Flutter app to a BLE beacon physical button whose purpose is to, when pressed, send an email through the app. So, I want the app to be permanently connected to the button and listen to its inputs, whether it's in foreground, background or terminated state. Even after a system reboot, I want it to always connect automatically and listen. What would be the best approach to do so, as I've seen that Android and iOS behave differently towards BLE devices as well as background processes.
I tried using packages like 'flutter_blue' or 'workmanager'. However, isolates created by workmanager can only run every at least 15 minutes on iOS. I am new to working with BLE devices as well as background processes in Flutter.
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I'm currently working on an ionic capacitor app that needs to connect automatically with a ble device.
I'm using the ble ionic native plugin:
https://ionicframework.com/docs/native/ble
https://github.com/don/cordova-plugin-ble-central
The goal is sending and receiving bluetooth info and commands to the ble device, which is a car alarm central that controls a few actions like lock and unlock the doors accordingly to the RSSI values on from the device.
So, I'm using the autoconnect function to auto-connect with the device as soon the device is close to range and all works perfectly in Android and iOS. The only issue is that everytime the device reachs the ble range and the ble plugin try connecting, the system prompts the user to accept pairing with the device again.
I need it to work without that pairing prompting everytime. I tried to pairing the device previous to initialize the app but it didn't worked as well. So is it a way to make this autoconnection work without prompting the pairing acceptance everytime it is disconnected?
The issue occurs on Android versions 9 and 10 and iOS.
I've changed my ble hardware interface to ask for a PIN code. I guessed the connection could be considered secure by the OS and prevent prompting the user to pair again. Didn't work as well.
Every connection started by the plugin seems like bounding and connecting as if it was the first time connecting to the device. Even connecting to a known device is prompt the user to input the PIN, which if not provided the OS forgets the device.
Any toughts? Anyone? Thank you!
I want to build an application for the Android TV platform. Part of this app is a service/daemon, which must start when the device boots, and must always run when the Android TV is powered on, even in stand-by.
Why do I want this service/daemon to run at all times? Part of my project is an application for portable devices (such as a smartphones and/or tablets), which will send commands via TCP to the Android TV app. Based on the kind of TCP message, the app will perform an action (power device on/off, push my app to the foreground etc.).
I have tried different code examples, but Android TV Oreo just kills this service after a while. I think these code examples were made before the Android Oreo restrictions.
An application like Kodi for the Android TV, has a web service that is always running in the background. Even on Oreo. but I can't figure it out how they have done that. Does anyone have some tips for me?
Edit: Yatse Remote Starter does what I want for Kodi, what I want to do with my app. It starts on boot, runs even in stand-by. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=tv.yatse.android.remotestarter&hl=en. Still I would like to know how, so I can do it myself as well. Thanks in advance!
Many android apps and services are running simultaneously. To lower the chance of problems which cause poor user experience, Android 8.0 apps has two ways to limit what an app can do:
Background Service Limitations: While an app is idle, there are limits
to its use of background services. This does not apply to foreground
services, which are more noticeable to the user.
Broadcast Limitations: With limited exceptions, apps cannot use their
manifest to register for implicit broadcasts. They can still register
for these broadcasts at runtime, and they can use the manifest to
register for explicit broadcasts targeted specifically at their app.
Therefore, you need to create a ForegroundService in order to continue processing of your app. You can check this SO post regarding this issue.
I want to write a tracking application, which reacts/record when users get in a car and phone automatically pair with Bluetooth hands free. I need also Id of the hands free device.
On Android it is easy, using Broadcast Receiver your app listen to broadcasts that device had been paired with phone. It is working even after phone had been restarted and App did not run after restart.
Is it possible on iOS(7+) ?
You can do it by reading the "Performing Long-Term Actions in the Background" part of this docs
Essentially, using state restoration, the system takes note of what your app was doing when it was killed.
If the app is searching for a bluetooth device and is killed by the system, the system will take care of continuing this research and wake up the app again when the bt device has ben found.
Note that this will work only if the app is killed by the system, not by the user (using the multitask bar). This behavior has changed since iOS 7.
Alternatively, If your BT hardware can be programmed to send advertisements using the ibeacon protocol, your app can be "awakened" by the corelocation/ibeacon api. After that prompt then maybe the corebluetooth pairing code could be initiated.
I want to develop an application which sends a Message from iPhone to other iPhone over the internet, I want to receive the Message from other iPhone even if my iPhone is running in the background.
I have seen the WiTap application, but socket will get disconnect when application is closed or if there is screen lock.
So is that possible to develop the application so that I can receive the message even if my app running in the background forever?
From my little Knowledge, You can't do it through WiFi.
When a screen lock happened, device will automatically OFF the wifi connection for increasing battery life.Thats why socket connection getting disconnected.
In iOS, apps can’t do a lot in the background. Apps are only allowed to do limited set of activities so battery life is conserved.
But what if something interesting happens and you wish to let the user know about this, even if they’re not currently using your app.
For example, maybe the user received a new chat. Since the app isn’t currently running, it cannot check for these events.
Luckily, Apple has provided a solution to this. Instead of your app continuously checking for events or doing work in the background, you can write a server-side component to do this instead.
You can do it using Apple Push Notification Service.
It uses push technology through a constantly open IP connection to forward notifications from the servers of third party applications to the Apple devices; such notifications may include badges, sounds or custom text alerts. In iOS 5, Notification Center enhanced the user experience of push and local notifications.
More details are here
Note: details and screen shots are taken from raywenderlich website/blog.
Situation: My iPhone communicates to an external device through Wi-Fi. The app has also the ability to set up a schedule. This means that on a specific time the device should turn on and do some stuff. Now for this to happen there should be a timer on the external device or the iPhone should send a command to the device on a specific time.
Question: Is it possible to send a command to the external device while the app is in the background? Or does the app have to be in the foreground? Is it possible when the external device is an accesory? Cause I have read that apps are allowed to run in the background when they need to communicate to accessories??
Thanks in advance!
No you can't do this, you are only able to run an app in the background if its stream audio, a VOIP client or track user location. If you are in the accessories program (which means you can make hardware that works with the dock connector, then your app can also run in the background. but only if the accessories that is respons to is connected.
There is no way the schedule any operation to be triggered at a set time.
You can schedule a local notification, but the user wil have to view (open you app by click in the notification) before you app get informed about it.
Do you actually have the devices communicating? If not, you should take a look at Apple's MFI (Made for iPhone) program. Sending data or communicating from your iPhone to an external accessory through bluetooth falls under it. They provide you with certain protocol specifications that allow you to communicate with external accessories. It's difficult to do something like this if you are an individual developer though. Here's the link: https://developer.apple.com/programs/mfi/.