Develop Reference

Using kura framework, how can I specify the address type to "random static" when connecting to a BLE device

I'm trying to create an OSGi bundle that'd be installed on a eurotech gateway (reliagate 10 05).
This bundle would essentially connect the gateway to a BLE device.
To do so, I use a framework provided by eurotech called Everyware™ Software Framework (ESF) that adds up an extra layer on top of the kura v1.2.0 framework.
The catch is, the BLE device only accepts random static address type.
I managed to connect the gateway manually to the BLE device using the following commands in console:
hcitool -i hci0 lecc --random <BD_ADDR>
then
gatttool -i hci0 -b <BD_ADDR> --interactive
This works fine. The hard part is when I try to do the same thing in code using the ESF/kura framework.
Here's a snippet from a sample I use that I found on this page
public boolean connect(String adapterName) {
this.bluetoothGatt = this.device.getBluetoothGatt();
boolean connected = false;
try {
connected = this.bluetoothGatt.connect(adapterName);
} catch (KuraException e) {
logger.error(e.toString());
}
if (connected) {
this.bluetoothGatt.setBluetoothLeNotificationListener(this);
this.isConnected = true;
return true;
} else {
// If connect command is not executed, close gatttool
this.bluetoothGatt.disconnect();
this.isConnected = false;
return false;
}
}
Here is a list of some objects that the sample uses to scan and establish a connection:
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothAdapter;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothDevice;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothGattSecurityLevel;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothGattService;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothLeScanListener;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothService;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothDevice;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothGatt;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothGattCharacteristic;
org.eclipse.kura.bluetooth.BluetoothLeNotificationListener;
So I searched through the api doc but didn't find anything.
Though, one interesting SO post mentions a command code to send to the device.
I found a method in kura framework that might help.
Here's the signature:
void ExecuteCmd(java.lang.String ogf, java.lang.String ocf, java.lang.String parameter)
but I couldn't figure out the OpCode Group Field (ogf) associated to the OpCode Command Field(ocf) in any documentation (I skimmed the ~2300 pages of the Bluetooth 4.0 core spec). If anyone knows where to search... :)
In the end, the question is: is there a way to set the address type to random (as with the hcitool command) with the kura framework ?
Or am I totally misleaded ? :/
Anyway, I'm really new to the kura and ble ecosystems so, sorry if it looks like an obvious thing to do but I feel like I'm running out of inspiration and could totally use a hand!
PS: Congrats if you made it to the end!

Haha lol. Kura seems to just start a gatttool process, send commands in text, and parse the output as its interface...
Here is where it is stated, using the address as parameter: https://github.com/eclipse/kura/blob/0339ac787f90debdfc270c1dee0c16de16ea6f7e/kura/org.eclipse.kura.linux.bluetooth/src/main/java/org/eclipse/kura/linux/bluetooth/util/BluetoothUtil.java#L319. Unfortunately the Kura developers seem to have missed that there is something called Random Address in the BLE standard and I don't see how that could be worked around using the current API.

Okay so for those who find themselves in my position in the future, I just received an answer from the Eurotech support team.
Dear Mr. Carneiro,
[...]
Regarding the random BD_ADDR, this is a configuration of the BLE device.
So, your BLE device is advertising an address of type random, not public, and you should specify the address type on the connection string, as you already did.
Unfortunately, current Kura Bluetooth API doesn't provide a way to specify the type of address into the connection string. We are developing a new set of APIs for BLE that will be available on preview on the next Kura/ESF release, but the Reliagate 10-05 will not support these yet.

Enable/Disable Wifi on iOS simulator using selenium/Appium

I want to test some scenarios on my app when there is no Wifi connectivity, I need to first LogIn on good connection and then switch off the Wifi and continue doing some activities, Is it possible to disable and enable the network by code? I am using Java/Selenium and Appium Server.

Some potential on this topic is contained over here.
You can try creating a class of yours which includes an instance of NetworkConnectionSetting in the java-client of appium and set the flags accordingly by calling the built-in methods.

try{
((HasNetworkConnection) appiumDriver).setConnection(Connection.ALL);
assertEquals(Connection.ALL,((HasNetworkConnection) appiumDriver).getConnection());
// NetworkConnectionSetting ncs = new NetworkConnectionSetting(false, true, true);
((HasNetworkConnection) appiumDriver).setConnection(Connection.NONE);
assertEquals(Connection.NONE, ((HasNetworkConnection) appiumDriver).getConnection());
}
catch(Exception e)
{e.printStackTrace();}
}

This class 'NetworkConnectionSetting' works on Android. As per the request, the need is for iOS app.

I only can recommend you use the Network Link Conditioner app from Apple. For more information please read NSHipster blog.

Getting Access on the Android VideoView received packets when Streaming a URL

Does the native code of the VideoView give access to the received packets of the video before or after decoding it? I need to access these packets in order to transmit them to another device. The initial solution is to modify the Android native code. Other possible solutions that I found are to use GStreamer or FFmpeg libraries.
I need bit guidance in order to achieve that goal.
Assume the phone is rooted.

Short answer is no, not that I know of.
Long answer is that you haven't given enough detail. What data exactly do you need access to? Are you writing an application, or modifying your OS to do this to other applications?
The code that actually fetches a remote video is in MediaPlayer and is native. See the following method in MediaPlayer:
private void setDataSource(/* snip */) throws /* snip */ {
/* snip */
else if (scheme != null) {
// handle non-file sources
nativeSetDataSource(
MediaHTTPService.createHttpServiceBinderIfNecessary(path),
path,
keys,
values);
return;
}
/* snip */
Unfortunately for you, almost all of the relevant MediaPlayer code is native, and if not, it is private (so subclassing will not work here).
However, depending on what you need to do, you could possibly override VideoView method setVideoURI(Uri, Map<String, String>), which is public. Here you can grab the URI and then proxy it through your own web service, or something. This isn't quite what you were asking, though.
Or, you could possibly look into modifying the Surface that is drawn to by MediaPlayer. Most of the relevant code is still native though.
The final possibility that I'll mention (there are probably hundreds of possible approaches) would be to modify the MediaHTTPService class. This appears to be used by MediaPlayer, but I can't be sure because if it's used, it's used in native code.
This answer recommends finding the native code at androidxref.com
Edit:
As requested, here is a little more detail about what the "proxy server" solution might look like. I don't know the implementation details on Android.
Basically, when you get a URL to play in the VideoView, you pass it to your own server instead. Something like startProxyServer(videoUrl). This starts a server, which downloads and then re-hosts the video. To get this working locally, start a webserver listening on localhost. The server just downloads the video at videoUrl, saves it locally, and then hosts it at localhost:port/?video=${videoUrl}.
So in very high-level pseudo-code the server could look like.
public void startProxyServer(String videoUrl) {
int PORT = 28641; // random port
File f = downloadFile(videoUrl);
saveFile(f, '/path/to/server/storage');
startWebServer('localhost', PORT);
}
So now you give localhost:port/?video=${videoUrl} as url to the videoView instead. Also, now other videoView instances can download from that same localhost url.
To make it work with other phones, your server of course couldn't run on localhost.
Of course I've not implemented this, but it's just one solution I can think of.

USB Communication, Endpoints in Monodroid/Android

I have a USB device that I'm attempting to communicate to with my Android 4.1 device using the MonoDroid API, and I've run into some issues setting up a proper connection. First, the steps taken to arrive at what I "think" may be an issue:
Filter my device by vendor and product ID with an intent filter in
my AndroidManifest file. This works well, as when I plug in my
device my app requests to launch by default, so permissions should
correct.
Grab my USB device from an Activity that my intent filter sends the program after discovering said device: UsbDevice device = (UsbDevice)this.Intent.GetParcelableExtra(UsbManager.ExtraDevice);
After checking that there is only one interface present, I grab the associated interface by issuing: UsbInterface intf = device.GetInterface(0);
Check the number of endpoints and grab them. There's 2, as this is an input and output device: UsbEndpoint endpoint_IN = intf.GetEndpoint(0);
UsbEndpoint endpoint_OUT = intf.GetEndpoint(1);
Grab a connection to the device using the UsbManager: UsbDeviceConnection connection = device_manager.OpenDevice(device);
However, and I noticed that the endpoint at index 0 of the interface (endpoint_IN above) has UsbAddressing enumeration type "DirMask", where endpoint_OUT has type "Out"; I'd expect endpoint_IN to be "In", which is not the case. What is "DirMask?" The inline documentation states "Documentation for this section has not yet been entered", and the online docs reflect the same: http://api.xamarin.com/?link=T%3aAndroid.Hardware.Usb.UsbAddressing
Could this be my issue? I'm just not really sure. I tried to implement the rest of the communication procedure, but haven't been able to yield any results. For example, the following code should input a command to receive one reading:
Byte[] sys_command = Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes("!001:SYS?\r");
Java.Nio.ByteBuffer sys_command_buffer = Java.Nio.ByteBuffer.Wrap(sys_command);
Java.Nio.ByteBuffer output_buffer = Java.Nio.ByteBuffer.Allocate(4);
UsbRequest request_out = new UsbRequest();
request_out.Initialize(connection, endpoint_OUT);
connection.ClaimInterface(intf, forceClaim);
request_out.Queue(output_buffer, 4);
connection.BulkTransfer(endpoint_IN, sys_command, sys_command.Length, TIMEOUT);
if (connection.RequestWait() == request_out)
readings.Text = output_buffer.GetFloat(0).ToString();
Any insight?

I had the interface endpoints backwards, all things considered. That is, I was attempting to read/write to the wrong interface.

In case anyone else stumbles on this, the DirMask type means look at the Direction attribute of the endpoint instead of the Type attribute. If the Type is DirMask, the Direction could be UsbAddressing.In or Out.
And the Direction of In is the out endpoint, and vice versa (which I'm guessing is why you had them backwards).

Playing live http stream in vlcj

I'm trying to use vlcj to play live internet radio stations in a project. I've played around with some sample programs for a few hours, but I cannot get either the sample programs or programs that I've played around with to play the stream from the URL.
An example of a URL I'm trying to play is: http://network.absoluteradio.co.uk/core/audio/wmp/live.asx?service=vr
Is there anything special I have to do in order to get vlcj to play this stream? I couldn't find anything to help in the API. (Assuming it can because it can be played through the VLC media player!)
Thanks a lot

Ok, the MRL you have provided us http://network.absoluteradio.co.uk/core/audio/wmp/live.asx?service=vr is a MMS server that may pull a ASX (XML) metafile which may contain at least one sub-item.
http://all-streaming-media.com/faq/streaming-media/Metafiles-ASX-Advanced-Stream-Redirector.htm
To be able to play this type of streaming media and go through each sub-item, you need to do the following code snippet:
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().setRepeat(true);
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().setPlaySubItems(true);
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().prepareMedia(media, options);
try {
Thread.sleep(2000);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
for(String s: VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().subItems()) System.out.println(s);
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().play();
For the example MRL above, it will list down all sub-items as follows:
http://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/g1/absoluteradio.co.uk/prerolls/ar_account_1310455302_hi.wma
mms://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/absoluteradio.co.uk/vr_lo?u=
http://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/absoluteradio.co.uk/vr_lo?u=
mmsu://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/absoluteradio.co.uk/vr_lo?u=
mmst://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/absoluteradio.co.uk/vr_lo?u=
mms://wms.absoluteradio.co.uk/absoluteradio.co.uk/prerolls/problems_lo.wma
To stop playing all of them, set the following code snippet:
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().setRepeat(false);
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().setPlaySubItems(false);
VideoPanel.getMediaPlayer().stop();
For a better explanation, refer to: http://code.google.com/p/vlcj/wiki/HowToHandleYouTubeMedia

You cannot use the http to play such link directly. You will ve to use the port number of the radio station router. this is because if i want to receive my home live video streaming from the internet at my workplace, i type the following on url: http://my dns server ip address:8080 The 8080 is the port number I opened on my router.