Initiate Bluetooth connection from phone

[antares]

Hi!

I've got internet via bluetooth working fine so far. The only thing that causes problems is, that if I get out of the range of my bluetooth PC signal, I have to return to my PC and start with the whole procedure over again.

Is it somehow possible to initialize the BT connection from the mobile phone, so the computer runs the script from Mack's connectivity pack (I put it in /usr/bin/a780_internet.sh) to set routes and everything, and then I just can start surfing again from my phone?

Since my PC is a level lower, it is quite annoying to go downstairs every time and re-start the connection.

Thank you in advance for your answers.

[rpconnect]

there may be two solutions to your problem. alhtough i haven't tried it myself, i thought i've read that some users have set their PC up to persistantly try to make the BT SPP connection, this way if the phone shuts off or gets out of range the PC will shut down the link then start searching to try to re-connect to the phone.

an alternative is to use the bluez stuff; i haven't made it into a nice package yet but it is relatively easy to set up a script to initiate a bluetooth networking connection. basically the PC runs pand in --listen --role NAP mode, and the connection is made from the phone using pand --connect XX:XX:XX:XX:XX --role PANU. you would still have to get the gprs faking/routing working on the phone and PC, or if your lazy like me, you can just use the web-browser that comes with opie.

[antares]

Hi!

Thanks at first for your reply. Unfortunately I am quite a n00b considering bluetooth (never worked with it before) an know only a little on networks and scripting under Linux (my main field is Java programming).

I would be very glad if you could specify your answer a bit or post one or two script files that would do that job. Sorry for asking you that, but I really don't know how to make this myself. How do you mean the first solution you give that it non-stop makes BT calls?

Thank you in advance.


P.S.: What is opie?

[rpconnect]

@antares
i'll go in reverse order: opie is an open-source linux GUI/desktop for PDA's, and is based on very similar software to the EZX phones, qt-embedded. There is currently a couple of packages avialable that allow both opie and our native EZX apps (eg the phone) to run at the same time even though each is based on different versions of qt-embedded (thanks again to cyph on this!!!). for a description of how this works go here http://www.motorolafans.com/index.ph...+open+embedded and for the latest opie package go here http://www.motorolafans.com/index.ph...+open+embedded )

as far as getting the PC to persistantly try to initiate a BT SPP connection with the phone i can't really help you on this; perhaps you could write a shell script that trys to make the connection once a second, but i'm not a linux expert and haven't messed with this.

although it may require a bit more up-front work, i found the bluez solution to be cleaner. bluez is an open-source bluetooth stack that supports a wide variety of BT protocols, for example SPP, bluetooth audio, bluetooth netowrking, etc. The bluetooth software that is built into the phone, is similar to the bluez option, but quite reduced in size and functionality. Using the bluez utilities and libraries that have been built to work on our phones (again, thanks to cyph!!!) opens up a lot more potential for bluetooth connectivity. For his bluez package see here: http://www.motorolafans.com/index.ph...ighlight=bluez

once you have bluez working from the phone, the next step is to address what kind of PC you want to initiate the BT network with. To this end i'll try to put together a short README file and maybe some scripts pertaining to BT networking w/ bluez and post them in the development forum under an appropriate bluez related thread. So far i have found it relatively easy to get the phone to initiate a BT network connection with either a linux or win pc, the trick then is getting the ip forwarding to work correctly on the PC....

[antares]

Hi!

So do I understand correctly, that opie can replace my operating system on the mobile phone?

What are the benefits of opie? Is it worth to install it on the A780?

Is there any other alternative to the Motorola software on that mobile phone? Another Linux? Windows mobile? Palm OS?

[rpconnect]

not quite, opie is just a alternative for the GUI, not the whole OS. opie was desinged around PDA's and although there are some phone related apps, at this point opie is more of a second GUI option rather than a formal replacement of the existing EZX GUI.

The main benefit of opie is its open source potential thereby leading to a huge number of potential apps for the phone. Note that many of these apps could be ported from the opie environment to our native EZX GUI, but due to the conflicts between qt-embedded its not a trivial task.

IMO yes, its very well worth it to install opie. In addition to the potential number of apps that would be available, developing new apps is a bit easier in Opie (native ezx can be developed but rely on reverse-engineered lib headers, and java apps can also be developed but they end up being limited by the fairly limiting and restrictive kvm). For apps that would be fairly specific to the phone then i'd probably recommed EZX development, but if you wanted to invest development time for apps that could be used by a wide variety of linux-based PDA's and phones then the open-source opie direction might be preferred; in either case for me having opie running on the phone is a definate plus.

currently i know of no other OS for the phone, with the exception of an alternative linux kernel, but even this is only in the developmental stage.

[antares]

Hi!

Wow - this opie seems great. I have downloaded the file, unpacked and copied it to the phone and at first look it is great.

I only miss a german keyboard and a german environment. And some apps are not with it (!?!) since it tells me that the file cannot be started.

Anyhow very nice to see what is possible. I hope opie will be once available as full ezx replacement

[lucienium]

this bluez thing ...can installing it give A780 A2DP support? can it potentially do that?

[rpconnect]

i have yet to work w/ bluez and audio but in theory yes it can be used to support both the A2DP (stereo audio) as well as headset (bi-directional mono) audio; but that doesn't mean that the built in real-player will recognize it.