Send Notification when Ble Device is discovered.

Question

stuckdexter OP

Created Oct ’23

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Hello there,

So I'm currently building a small Ble Device that can be controlled via an app. For ease of use I want to give the users the ability to turn on a setting to receive a notification when the the device is turned on or in range. In other words if the phone can discover it. The difficult part is that I want this behaviour to also work if the app is terminated. I already tried using iBeacons by adding the iBeacon capability to my Ble Device and waiting for it to be discovered so the app launches in background mode.

This technically works but I'm looking for a more elegant solution to bring the app from terminated to background if a Ble Device is scanned. Is there any way to accomplish that?

Thanks for your help.

Answered by WeagleWeagle in 769423022

Launching an iOS app from a terminated state to the background based solely on a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) device being scanned is not straightforward due to iOS limitations. The app lifecycle and background execution modes in iOS are tightly controlled for battery and privacy reasons, and there are limited options for waking up an app from a terminated state.

However, there are a few potential approaches you can consider:

Core Bluetooth Background Processing: iOS provides some background processing capabilities for BLE through the Core Bluetooth framework. You can set up your app to act as a BLE central and listen for advertisements from your BLE device. When a device is discovered, your app can receive a callback even if it's in the background. You can then use this opportunity to perform some background tasks, like showing a local notification to the user.

Keep in mind that this approach doesn't directly launch your app from a terminated state to the background. Instead, it allows your app to respond to BLE peripheral advertisements when it's already in the background.
Remote Notifications: If you want to notify users about BLE device events, consider using remote notifications (push notifications). When your BLE device is in range, it can trigger a remote server to send a push notification to the user's device. Tapping on the notification can then launch your app.

This approach allows you to wake up your app from a terminated state when the user interacts with the notification. However, it relies on a network connection and a server to send notifications.
iBeacon: As you mentioned, you've explored using iBeacon. While iBeacon can help your app launch in the background when an iBeacon region is entered, it may not be the most efficient approach for your use case, as it's primarily designed for proximity detection.
Background App Refresh: If your app has the "Background App Refresh" permission from the user, you can periodically wake up in the background to scan for BLE devices. This doesn't directly launch your app from a terminated state, but it allows you to perform BLE scans periodically when in the background.

Remember that for any background processing, you should consider the impact on battery life and user privacy. iOS places strict limitations on how often and for what purposes an app can run in the background to ensure a positive user experience.

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Answer 1

WeagleWeagle OP

Oct ’23

Accepted Answer

Launching an iOS app from a terminated state to the background based solely on a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) device being scanned is not straightforward due to iOS limitations. The app lifecycle and background execution modes in iOS are tightly controlled for battery and privacy reasons, and there are limited options for waking up an app from a terminated state.

However, there are a few potential approaches you can consider:

Core Bluetooth Background Processing: iOS provides some background processing capabilities for BLE through the Core Bluetooth framework. You can set up your app to act as a BLE central and listen for advertisements from your BLE device. When a device is discovered, your app can receive a callback even if it's in the background. You can then use this opportunity to perform some background tasks, like showing a local notification to the user.

Keep in mind that this approach doesn't directly launch your app from a terminated state to the background. Instead, it allows your app to respond to BLE peripheral advertisements when it's already in the background.
Remote Notifications: If you want to notify users about BLE device events, consider using remote notifications (push notifications). When your BLE device is in range, it can trigger a remote server to send a push notification to the user's device. Tapping on the notification can then launch your app.

This approach allows you to wake up your app from a terminated state when the user interacts with the notification. However, it relies on a network connection and a server to send notifications.
iBeacon: As you mentioned, you've explored using iBeacon. While iBeacon can help your app launch in the background when an iBeacon region is entered, it may not be the most efficient approach for your use case, as it's primarily designed for proximity detection.
Background App Refresh: If your app has the "Background App Refresh" permission from the user, you can periodically wake up in the background to scan for BLE devices. This doesn't directly launch your app from a terminated state, but it allows you to perform BLE scans periodically when in the background.

Remember that for any background processing, you should consider the impact on battery life and user privacy. iOS places strict limitations on how often and for what purposes an app can run in the background to ensure a positive user experience.

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