[chbot] Starting point for Smartphone / Bluetooth / uP project

[David Churcher]

On 21/09/2013 11:38, Mark Atherton wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> Just starting on a new project and hope someone can help with a decent 
> starting point.
>
> The project will have an Android phone with some sliders, push buttons 
> and status indicators. Associated data will be sent via bluetooth to a 
> dsPIC which will control PWMs and digital outputs. A timer on the 
> phone will periodically fetch status from the dsPIC to update display 
> indicators.
>
> Not fussed at all about the hardware or the dsPIC programming, but I 
> am hoping to find a decent tutorial about starting Android development 
> (Java or C will be fine), and an example project that has full source 
> code, and associated builder resources to allow a simple GUI to be 
> constructed.
>
> There seem to be plenty of similar projects on the 'net, but most only 
> seem to provide pre-compiled applications for the phone. A decent 
> tutorial and associated full development source code is really what I 
> am looking for.
>
> Pointers to any appropriate projects will be most appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Mark

When I did a Bluetooth Android-to-Arduino program the Bluetooth Chat 
sample linked from 
http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/bluetooth.html 
was enough to get going. The standard Android tutorials on 
http://developer.android.com/training/index.html are pretty good. There 
is also the source code for Amarino, an app that turns an Android phone 
into a Bluetooth sensor package for Arduinos, on 
http://www.amarino-toolkit.net/ , although that was a pain to get 
compiled as I recall.

I remember the main problem with the Bluetooth Chat sample was that when 
you changed the phone orientation all your connections got torn down, 
they may have fixed that by now. :)