How to use?

[starfishmod]

First off thanks for the work you are doing here :)

I am a little confused on to make this work (currently working on command line only - and still very new to this)

I compiled/install your version of bluez and I have connected to a BLE peripheral via gatttool and can see data from the peripheral being sent. However I'm lost on this next stage on how this becomes a midi device in alsa? I'm sure I'm missing something fundamental but I would appreciate your help

Thanks
Andrew

[ftonello]

Hi Andrew,

It's easy to use this feature of BlueZ. Make sure you are using the latest BlueZ master branch since this initial version was merged upstream already. Run the ./configure script with --enable-midi option. Then run bluetoothd normally (make sure no other instance is running). Use normal procedure to connect to a BT device to connect to your MIDI device. if you use the command line, use bluetoothctl. Once that is done, a new ALSA Sequencer client and port will be created so you can start using. To test it out, use aseqdump tool.

More info at my blog

Let me know how it goes.

Felipe

[starfishmod]

Thanks - sorry for not getting back sooner - been trying to fix other issues... I still can't get it to work but I think it is the equipment I have.

[ftonello]

Hmm, ok. What exactly is not working?

[starfishmod]

@ftonello I have a raspberry pi 3 and I'm using the Android app "BleMidiSample (peripheral)"
It seems that because (from my limited understanding) it's Android it cycles it's mac address so I can connect but it doesn't register the midi device in alsa (checking this via aconnect -l)

like I said It could be something at my end though - or I could be doing something wrong I'm sure but I ran out of time to check... I might retry tonight.

[starfishmod]

So I re-investigated.. I used the bluetooth widget to "Add device" and I could connect although it was saying sending a pairing request which eventually timed out..
I then checked aconnect and got 4 connections
Client 128: Oppo f1f [type=user]
0: Oppo F1f bluetooth

This repeated another 3 times upto ' Client 131'
Using aseqdump and then tried to see data coming from the app. Only the last midi client (131) actually presented data. Is there a reason it creates 4 midi in's not just one?

So I also then disconnected and I noticed that it then doesn't clean up the connections. acconnect -l still will list the midi ports even when they are long gone?

I hope all this information helps

Thanks again
Andrew

[starfishmod]

This repeated another 3 times upto ' Client 131'

Sorry just realised this might have been my other connection attempts that i did not think were successful...

So it's just the cleanup when a connection is stale... or reuse the old connection if it is the same device?

[ftonello]

Make sure you don't have 4 MIDI services in the same device. BlueZ only supports one MIDI service per device, which is what is recommended anyway.

bluetoothd will create an ALSA Sequencer client for each device connected and delete the client when the connection is lost.

[starfishmod]

Yep I only have one midi service in the one device. It seems that the ALSA sequencer clients are not being cleaned up on disconnect. So after I shut down the app on the phone and turned of bluetooth on the phone and then waited for a bit - the alsa sequencer clients were still there.

I'm sorry if I was a bit confusing about this earlier I was getting a bit tired :)

[ftonello]

Have you tried the latest code (from midi branch or bluez's master)? The code was updated since you opened this issue.

[starfishmod]

I'm pretty sure I did? However I will get a clean copy tonight and rebuild, I'll let you know how I go, thanks!

[starfishmod]

Just got a chance to rebuild and retest before I start work. It is still not clearing up the alsa sequencer after a disconnect. i.e aconnect - l still displays the device.

[ftonello]

Ok. So, can you provide more information?

• What steps are you taking?
• Once you connect, can you read/write MIDI data to the remote device?
• Can you run bluetoothd -n -d and check the output it provides once you start the disconnect procedure?
• If nothing shows up, please provide a btmon log as well.

[starfishmod]

Okay so I did a video here https://youtu.be/oHkkQSsBiAQ of the process for me to connect and disconnect where it did not clean up. I have also added the 2 log files you requested

bluetooth.txt
btmon.txt

Hope all this helps - thanks :)