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Motorola rocks on Accessories, SonyEricsson rocks on Phones
I just had some gadget fun in the last week or so. I now have a new phone (SonyEricsson w880i) and a new set of Bluetooth Headphones (Motorokr S9). That's "headphones" not "headset" as they're stereo, support A2DP, and are ideal for listening to music streamed wirelessly over Bluetooth, among other things. Oh joy of joys!
They are both rather excellent (so far) and the Bluetooth stuff has all worked tickety-boo. The SE plays nice with the headphones, and happily streams music to them. The headphones themselves have rather nice audio quality - the controls are a little sensitive and fiddly to get used to, but once you do, they're fine.
The SE of course has JSR82 (ahem, supplied by the world's leading independent vendor of JSR82 technology). The headphones, being small, lightweight and very embedded, do not (AFAIK).
If you're stuck for gadget ideas for the special someone in your life, the Bluetooth SIG have some suggestions, in their Summer Gift Guide!! :-)
Bluetooth Summer Gift Guide 2007
Reviewing this list, it seems to me that SonyEricsson's strength recently has most definitely been on the phone side of things, as opposed to the accessories. Meanwhile Motorola have been having phone woes, but their accessories really shine.
Good Point Bruno
Bruno Ghisi has a short, succinct comment regarding MSA, JSR82 and OBEX on his blog. We agree! There's been a fair amount of OBEX confusion over the years due to some roll-your-own implementations and varied interpretation of the standard. In our experience, it remains one of the few areas in JSR82 where we still occasionally come across weird variations in spec interpretation and implementation. The MSA will bring some goodness here.
Bluetooth and Art
From the BBC, I came across Project Loca, which is an artist-led project exploring surveillance and mobile-media. An excellent twist on the standard "let us proximity market at you" use for Bluetooth, Loca deploys a network of sensors around a city, and willing participants set their devices to 'discoverable". Then the fun begins.
As people pass by sensors (Bluetooth Access Points), Loca picks them up and records some information. With the data, Loca can "know" certain things. For example - you spent an hour in the park; you were standing at that bus stop for 25 minutes; you spent the whole night in this bar, etc.
Loca sends messages to the participants, starting off by sending them "chatty" conversational style comments: "you're looking good", "saw you in the bar", "lovely weather in the park today", and gradually becoming more cryptic and/or sinister: "are you ignoring me", "meet later?".
[Aside: surely someone will plug a twitter feed in to Loca so that participants might auto-generate tweets, plus potentially receive random tweets from other participants?]
Ultimately, people are directed to a specific access point where they can get a full log of their activities, giving them a concrete feel for what Loca (or other surveillance systems) can track, and infer, from their movements.
Loca has been run as an "installation" at specific events in London, San Jose and Helsinki.
It's waaay cool. I can see social/commercial/fun angles all over the place.
Great job all.
Cool Projects using JSR82 [2] : BlueKey? AutoBlue?
The Automotive industry is one of the key growth markets for Bluetooth, and Java/Bluetooth, over the next few years. Bluetooth followed the typical trend for new technology in cars. The auto industry tends to "refresh" at a much slower rate than (say) the more fashion-oriented and almost disposable phone industry, so initially, Bluetooth appeared as an optional extra on high end cars (BMWs and Mercedes I think), and then gradually trickled down to mid-range and now compact cars. Initially the key application was of course handsfree access to the phone (often driven by regulatory requirements in various countries).
Now though, we're seeing initial demand for Java/Bluetooth and JSR82 to be built-in to cars for applications other than hands-free. For example, to download new diagnostic applications to Engine management Systems (EMS) that can then "report back" wirelessly to auto-technicians, or (my favourite), to enable a user to select some information from their in-vehicle navigation system (local map, places to eat, directions to hotel) and to send that over Bluetooth to their phone/PDA/laptop, thereby extending the useful range of your GPS system when you leave the car.
Anyway, enough of my ravings. Today's project has no official name as yet. If you have a good suggestion, then maybe you'd send it in. It's the brainchild of Yoshua Victor, from Indonesia. Over to him:
Give us a brief description of the project. How did it come about - what was the inspiration?
My project is to enable remote control from mobile phone to a car. The usual analog car remote typically has some functions, but the basic function is to start the engine, to lock the door and unlock the door. I’m inspired from the many times that the analog remote is out of battery and then you're stuck, because the car can’t be opened! So I came up with this idea, when your normal car remote doesn’t work, your mobile phone may always be to hand. If you could use it as a replacement remote, that would be very useful.
Tell us a little bit about yourselves. What's your background? What are you working on in general?
I’m 21 years old and studied Information Technology in Maranatha Christian University Bandung, Indonesia. Major in java programming, and I’m working on this project for my final exam to get my bachelor degree.
How long have you been working on the project
About 3 month since this February until now.
What stage is it at now?
Early days. I’m still learning and reading tutorials about JSR-82, and I’m also getting up to speed with J2ME programming, as this is my first project with J2ME, JSR-82 and other stuff. So now I’m just working on how I use Bluetooth to send data (Strings in this case) to another device. And after I can send data, I’ll start programming in JavelinStamp (which is the micro controller). I get lot of information from parallax.com (micro controller stuff), Nokia developer web site and Java forum that discusses JSR-82 (JAWBT newsgroup on Yahoo Groups).
What was the biggest problem or roadblock you had to deal with in the project?
The major block in this project is programming in mobile phones. Despite the promise of Java, if I write a program for Nokia, maybe I can’t use it for Motorola. It makes it difficult to test my project in a real device, so it's hard to make real tests for what I’m trying to do. The other problem is to connect the PC and the mobile phone with Bluetooth because often the PC doesn’t support JSR-82. Finally, I'm on quite a "learning curve" with the MicroController and figuring out how to write a program on javelinstamp that uses Bluetooth. Plenty of issues! :-)
How do you see the results of the project being used?
I see if this project is a success, it could have a big impact, because I can control certain aspects of my car, which could be very interesting and useful. Also, and if I can develop it further maybe I can use this remote for my house system, or control something else with my mobile phone and Bluetooth.
What's next? What do you hope to work on over the next 12 months?
I hope I can finish this project before 12 month from now, maybe 6 month from now I hope I can 100% finish, and if I have finish this project maybe I want to try to have some little experiment to develop this project for home system (control home, ex: light, door, alarm, etc).
Anything else I should have asked you? Anything else you'd like to say?
If anyone out there has tutorials, guides, suggestions for where I should start, I'd very much appreciate it, as I'm trying to learn a lot of stuff in a short time! Thanks! :-)
Impronto Simulator Version 1.3 is out!
Ladeeees and genellmen, Impronto Simulator version 1.3 is now available! That's right, the world's first-and-still-best (IMHO) JSR82 Simulator has been updated, polished and primped, and is available for your consideration.
Rather than bore you with the details, let me say this: as usual, we continue provide the Simulator free for non-commercial use (hobbyists, academics, geeks!). Details on applying for it are here.
Stay tuned for more product news and the next in our series of cool JSR82 projects!
Cool Projects using JSR82 [1] : Marge
We sent the call out to JSR82 Java/Bluetooth developers everywhere - tell us about your project! And the replies have started to flow in. So today is the first in a regular series of short articles about projects (academic, hobbyist, commercial, whatever) that use Java/Bluetooth technology and JSR82 specifically in some way. We're structuring these as an interview-style Q&A with the developers themselves, so you hear it from the horse's mouth.
So without further ado, please welcome: The Marge Project!
The brainchild of Bruno Ghisi and Lucas Torri, Marge is about making Java Bluetooth application development even simpler for developers. As you may know, the JSR82 APIs are quite low-level, and tend to slavishly follow the underlying Bluetooth Stack profiles as defined in the Bluetooth Standard. All fine and well, but Java developers also need richer, simpler and more powerful abstractions that let them focus on the application they're trying to build, not the technology they're using. That's where Marge comes in. [Aside: Marge Project is named after Marge Simpson, yes that Marge Simpson. Why? Well - her hair is blue, big and tangled, something which the guys felt reflected the general state of Bluetooth for many Java developers. What a great name! :-) ]
Over to the guys themselves....
1. Give us a brief description of the project. How did it come about - what was the inspiration?
Marge is a framework to facilitate the development of Bluetooth enabled applications in Java, build in top of JSR82. The main idea (besides having fun with it) is to make the developers focus on the logical part of their software, hiding the JSR82 complexity, so they can build things easier.
Bruno was choosing a subject to his final year project and he saw this gap and started the idea of creating a project that could help developers in this way. After the initial startup, Lucas joined the project to help make it grows.
2. Tell us a little bit about yourselves. What's your background? What are you working on in general?
We are two guys from Florianópolis, Brazil. We study in the same University: Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC) and work at the same company, which is called Praesto Convergence Ltda, a digital convergence company. We have an interest in subjects like digital convergence, mobility, wireless, digital tv, ubiquitous computing and other ones.
Bruno Ghisi is finishing his Information Systems degree this year and Lucas Torri is in the middle of his Computer Science course.
3. How long have you been working on the project
The idea started last year, but the first line of code was written 5 months ago. We are now planning a new version for very soon!
4. What stage is it at now?
Marge is now at 0.3.4 version and it is already simplifying the inquiry/search and communication process, with RFCOMM and L2CAP protocols. The framework is not finished yet and maybe never will be (not because we will leave it, but because we are always thinking about improving it). So, the next step is make it even more simple to use and implement the OBEX protocol.
5. What inspired it. Were there particular limitations of JSR82 or other technology that you were trying to address?
Talking with other developers, we have noticed that is quite difficult for someone to make applications that uses Bluetooth with Java, like remembering all the connection parameters, always implementing the inquiry/search process or opening streams. So, we are trying to simplify the use of Bluetooth in a certain common context, for example: inquiry for a device, searching for services, connecting and then exchanging information.
6. What was the biggest problem or roadblock you had to deal with in the project?
Make it suitable to Java ME and Java SE and create automated tests to the framework.
7. How do you see the results of the project being used?
The project is new and because that, there are not too many people using it yet. Anyway, we believe the project has a good chance to be successful, and we are working for make it so! In the worst case, we will use it to change music in our laptops without the need to get up out of bed =P
8. What's next? What do you hope to work on over the next 12 months?
We now want to make it even easier to use and implement the OBEX protocol. Besides this, create a better documentation, make specific Marge extensions for J2ME and J2SE, improve the current demos and also create new ones. In addition, we met a guy called Neto Marin that will help with a Marge extension for J2ME games.
9. Anything else I should have asked you? Anything else you'd like to say?
In the beginning, we said that one of the main ideas of the project was to have fun, and that's true, cause when it was started our wishes weren't just to build a framework, but also get people together and build a bluetooth java community, which is the whole idea of Marge.
Also it's worth mentioning how people can collaborate with the project. We're interested not only in coding help but also with documentation (tutorials, cookbooks, howto's, etc), translation for other languages, promoting the project, using it and sending ideas or doubts, 'cause it helps us to make it better.
Thanks for giving this space to promote Marge. If anybody is interested and curious about the Project, can join us on http://marge.dev.java.net, everybody is welcome!
JSR82 in your project? Let us know!
You may know that we offer our tools free for non-commercial use. We just ask for a few details in order to check the bona-fides of anyone requesting the tools, but for over five years we've been very happy to assist personal hobbyists and academic projects with free software to facilitate their development goals. We've had a lot of positive feedback over the years, and have seen some great work produced that uses the JSR82 standard in some way! :-)
As we continue to do this, we're interested in sharing the information about interesting work underway with the wider world. So - if you're planning a project using JSR82 that you think might be of interest, or have one currently underway - let us know! We're interested in giving some coverage by writing an article and short interview for the blog. And - we're feeling inclined to award some small, random prizes to those we feel impress us the most! (Bluetooth gear of course....)
So - budding developers and academics - no matter how mad the project, let us know, and maybe we can push some limelight your way! Email us at info 'at' rococosoft 'dot' com or drop a comment on the blog.
Cheers, Sean
Bluetooth Gaming
Way back when we first started doing JSR82 work (eh, circa 2000), we were constantly asked:
"What applications will use this API?"
These days, I have a bit of a banter I can wheel out to answer this, plus I have something I didn't have then : data. Way back then though, there would be some mumbling, followed by :
"um....games?"
There have been a number of games using the API to good effect for person to person multiplayer Bluetooth games over the last year or two. We ourselves built a version of "Who wants to be a millionaire" as a *demo* for our JSR82 work back in 2001!! It ran on Palms and allowed one person to be the quizmaster, doling out questions wirelessly to the players, who could then answer, "phone a friend" or "ask the audience" all over Bluetooth and all in Java (via JSR82 of course). Ah, the old days :-)
Anyway, here's a register article about a new one called mobslinger.
I might try putting together a list of the best in the next week or two.
Bluetooth Marketing : Wising Up
We have long been advocates of Bluetooth and of course Bluetooth and Java. As you may be aware, those who make new standards tend to be techies, not marketing-types, which is why we end up with official names for standards like Java APIs for Bluetooth Wireless technologies (aka JABWT, which is the "official" name, believe it or not, for the only slightly-less-obtuse JSR82 (or JSR-82) standard). Have I closed all my brackets there? Good.
No one actually uses the term JABWT of course: it's always been, and will always will be, JSR82 (or JSR-82).
Anyway - this is on my mind as I was reading some coverage of the recent Bluetooth All-Hands meeting in Incisor magazine. As a fan of Streaming Stereo Bluetooth Audio, I'm convinced this year will be a Big Year for Stereo Bluetooth Headphones. As a nerd, I happen to know that, if I go looking to buy some Stereo Bluetooth Headphones, that one of the the key things I need to look for is A2DP support (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile). Of course, A2DP ranks about the same in consumer-friendliness terms as JAWBT or JSR82, i.e. not friendly at all.
Seems the Bluetooth SIG have copped on to the fact that they need to address how best to market Bluetooth Stereo:
There is this thing called A2DP. So far, marketing the Bluetooth stereo message
has been all about promoting this thing called A2DP. You need to make sure your
phone is A2DP–ready. What the heck does that mean to the average consumer? And
let’s not go into the territory of levels of interoperability between apparently A2DP-
compliant products. That just shouldn’t be an issue.
It was agreed that if Bluetooth stereo music is to gain widespread awareness, the first
thing that has to go is all references to A2DP. Consumers don’t need to know
about profiles. Full stop. The SIG’s experience icon programme is a first step,
but it was also acknowledged by the group that at this time, it is only really the SIG
that is fully behind the experience icons, with members planning to get behind it, but
not having done so yet.
So, if the first step is recognising the problem - then this is progress. I think we need a snappy name for Bluetooth Stereo to aid the marketing efforts. I offer here some initial top-of-the-head candidates. All suggestions to the Bluetooth SIG please!
- BlueTune or BlueTunes ("these headsets are BlueTune-ready!!")
- BlueMoo ("now with BlueMoo support")
- BlueStream (probably used for something else?)
- TuneTooth (eh, no thanks)
- audioBlue (no comment)
Anyone got a better idea?
Me want (more Bluetooth Stereo Headset Lust)
I tried this new Wireless Stereo Headset from Motorola at 3GSM in Barcelona in February.
Even in a very noisy environment (as you get with 45,000 + phone geeks at that show), these were very impressive: super light, comfy, and of course, "cool". Audio quality seemed to be very good, but you need a quieter environment to really tell for sure. I'll be checking them out whenever they finally appear in Ireland, and yes, they will be MINE!!!!
:-)