BLE 5 feature support

Technical Support
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1

Hello,
We are trying to develop an application for BLE 5.0 and above.
Some Necessary info:

  • Board - Colibri iMX6ULL 512MB WB IT
  • Carrier - Aster
  • OS Build with Yocto Project
  • BlueZ Version - 5.64 (experimental and compat flag used in bluetooth.service)

We are currently developing for following features of BLE5 with nRF52 hardware.

  • Extended advertisement
  • Periodic advertisement

When I use bluetoothctl to scan for devices I cannot find the advertising device. Following are the list of commands in order.

$ bluetoothctl
[bluetooth]# power on
[bluetooth]# menu scan
[bluetooth]# transport le
[bluetooth]# back
[bluetooth]# scan on

Also, going through BlueZ documentation, we couldn’t find anything related to the following:

  • Set or Get Scanning parameters(scan interval, scan window)

except the mgmt-api. However, we are not sure how to use the same.

Kindly give some insights regarding the same.

Regards,
Nikhil

2

Hi @hexagun,

Please see the instructions given here on how you can enable and connect to a bluetooth device.

3

We have followed the steps, but are stuck with receiving BLE 5 advertisements.

bluetoothctl does not show BLE 5 advertisements. Similarly sniffing with btmon doesn’t show advertisements too.

If the hardware supports for BLE 5, why are we not able to view the advertisements?

4

Hi @hexagun ,
Just to have more clarity, “stuck with receiving BLE 5 advertisement” you mean your BLE 5 enabled device is not discoverable on Colibri iMX6ULL and vice-versa?

5

Hello,

Yes, that is the case.

We have a Nordic NRF52 device sending BLE 5 extended advertisements. I looked at the received messages at HCI using btmon but couldn’t see the advertisements received report for the advertisements.

6

Hi @hexagun,

I don’t have Nordic NRF52 to test with but I tested with my mobile device supporting Bluetooth 5.0. I can see the advertisements on both end.

Here are the steps

root@colibri-imx6ull-06398948:~# connmanctl enable bluetooth
Error bluetooth: Already enabled
root@colibri-imx6ull-06398948:~# bluetoothctl
Agent registered
[CHG] Controller D0:C5:D3:33:CE:8A Pairable: yes
[bluetooth]# scan on
Discovery started
[CHG] Controller D0:C5:D3:33:CE:8A Discovering: yes
[NEW] Device 64:A2:F9:05:3C:3B OnePlus 6
[NEW] Device 90:61:AE:EF:CD:9B tdev-HP-ProBook-440-G4
[DEL] Device 64:A2:F9:05:3C:3B OnePlus 6
bluetooth]# discoverable on
Changing discoverable on succeeded
[CHG] Controller D0:C5:D3:33:CE:8A Discoverable: yes
[DEL] Device 64:A2:F9:05:3C:3B OnePlus 6

More details here

Let me know if this solves your issue