I'm struggling now for a few days to setup bluetooth services on an ARM embedded device running Linux. I'm using a bluetooth dongle connected via USB.
Let's start with the beginning. I had to compile myself all the required packages, and that means expat, dbus, zlib, libffi, glib, bluez-3.36-libs and bluez-3.36-utils (yeah 3.36, I know they're old but so is my cross-compiler), libopenobex-1.3, obexd-0.3, obexftp. Then I put the binaries and libs on the device. Also, bluetooth is enabled in kernel.
I'm able to activate the bluetooth using hciconfig hci0 up command, I can perform scan using hcitool scan, I can even ping with l2ping previously discovered devices.
What I want is to be able to transfer files between that ARM device and another bluetooth device using ftp protocol and here my problems begin.
Are these the only tools that I need?
After putting everything on the device, I turn on bluetooth using hciconfig hci0 up, then I start dbus daemon using dbus-launch and after these I try to start obexd. When I run dbus-launch, it prints the values for DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS and some pid and next when I try to start obexd it asks me to set the DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS. Is this normal because I read that you have to set this only for test purposes? What is the default (real) dbus session bus address? How should I properly configure dbus?
I tend to think that the problem is in the pairing process, when the two bluetooth devices are trying to authenticate. How can I do this from command line as this is all that I have (no GUI)?
Could you please present me the detailed step to follow in order to achieve my goal. I tried to learn more about them from the Internet and also I tried to find these steps online but I could not find what I need.
Could you please explain me the difference between obexd, obexd-client, obexd-server, obex-data-server, obexftp? Are they meant to be used together or they offer the same functionalities? I could not clarify this from their man pages.
I know this is a really long post with a lot of questions, but I don't have experience with bluetooth and I'm under time pressure to solve this. Any help would be kindly appreciated.
Many questions you raised, but will try to answer them :
Thatz pretty much everything you will need.
Why are you starting session bus ? Will not starting system bus help and hcid uses system bus( as far as i know ). You need to execute the cross-compiled obexd ( or any other utility) with correct parameters.
you can use simple-agent ( it is in tools dir in 3.36 release if i am not wrong ). In a non-gui mode ( simple-agent --default [ follower by your pincode ] ) will work.
Basically you will need to find a device ( do scan ), authenticate ( pair ) and then proceed with file transfer which will involve obex level request / response ( to put in simple words).
As much i know, initially obexftp / obex-push were the only standalone utilities that worked on top of openobex for file transfer. Obex-data-serer was developed as part of GSOC competition, which got included in major distros. obexd is the slimmer version of obex-data-server specifically designed for embedded usage and is closely integrated with hcid ( and bluetoothd later). Please use only one of the utilities and not all at same time.