BLE Examples

This repo contains a collection of BLE example applications based on mbed OS and built with yotta. Each example subdirectory contains a separate yotta module meant for building an executable.

Please browse to subdirectories for specific documentation.

Getting Started

Pre-Requisites

To build these examples, you need to have a computer with the following software installed:

• CMake.
• yotta. Please note that yotta has its own set of dependencies, listed in the installation instructions.
• Python.
• ARM GCC toolchain.
• A serial terminal emulator (e.g. screen, pySerial, cu).
• If the OS used is Windows, the serial driver of the board has to be correctly installed.
  • For boards with mbed interface firmware the installation instructions are located (here)[https://developer.mbed.org/handbook/Windows-serial-configuration]
  • For nrf51-based board with a J-Link interface please install the J-Link software and documentation pack available (here)[https://www.segger.com/jlink-software.html]

In order to use BLE in mbed OS you need one of the following hardware combinations:

• A Nordic nRF51-based board such as nrf51dk or mkit.
• A supported target, such as the NUCLEO-F411RE, with a BLE shield or an external BLE peripheral, such as an ST shield.

The ble yotta module provides the BLE APIs on mbed OS. The ble module uses yotta targets and yotta target dependencies to provide the appropriate implementation of the BLE API for your chosen hardware combination.

A yotta target is a supported combination of hardware board and toolchain. This means that, for any of the hardware combinations above, you will need to use or create a yotta target that describes your configuration. The existing supported configurations are described below.

Targets for BLE

The following targets have been tested and work with these examples:

Nordic (using the nrf51822-ble module):

• nrf51dk-armcc
• nrf51dk-gcc
• mkit-gcc
• mkit-armcc

ST (using the st-ble module):

• st-nucleo-f401re-st-ble-gcc (a NUCLEO-F411RE board with an ST BLE shield)

Building and testing the examples

To build an example:

1. Clone the repository containing the collection of examples:

   $ git clone https://github.com/ARMmbed/ble-examples.git
   

   Tip: If you don't have GitHub installed, you can download a zip file of the repository.

2. Using a command-line tool, navigate to any of the example directories, like BLE_Beacon:

   $ cd ble-examples
   $ cd BLE_Beacon
   

3. Set a yotta target. For example, if you have and Nordic nRF51 and the GCC toolchain:

   yotta target nrf51dk-gcc
   

4. Run the build:

   yotta build

To run the application on your board:

1. Connect your mbed board to your computer over USB. It appears as removable storage.

2. When you run the yotta build command, as you did above, yotta creates a BIN or a combined HEX file in a build/<target-name>/source directory under the example's directory. Drag and drop the file to the removable storage.

Exactly which executables are generated depends on the target that you have chosen. For Nordic Semiconductor targets, the following .hex files will be present:

• <module_name>-combined.hex is the one which can be flashed to the target.
• <module_name> is an ELF binary containing symbols (useful for debugging).
• <module_name>.hex contains only the application (not the SoftDevice binary) and can be used for Firmware Over the Air.

Creating or porting your own BLE applications in mbed OS

If you're interested in creating BLE applications for mbed OS, or porting existing applications from mbed Classic to mbed OS, please see our Introduction to mbed BLE.