Does iOS 8.3 now support Wifi debugging? - ios

I updated iOS on my phone to 8.3 and I saw this message popup on first boot, but I have not seen it since:
I have been searching all day for information and I can't find a single reference to this message or to Xcode supporting wifi debug.
I am using a macbook pro 2009 model, and I have read that this is not compatible with the new continuity features (as well as airdrop etc). I am wondering if this is part of the wifi debug (and also if BTLE is involved at all). Of course it is all speculation since I cannot find any documentation about this.
Has anybody used wifi debug, or can point me to any documentation?

No, the feature was disabled as it causes serious security flows, for example when debugging you can fake location for any app, access confidential data like your number, udid etc. WiFi can be used now only to sync using iTunes.
It's restricted to USB only. You would need to write a bridge between USB and WiFi. You could in theory connect iPhone to Raspberry Pi, use open source crossplatform libMobileDevice. And mirror all USB requests from your XCode to this device USB.

Related

How to debug Lightning Accessory via Xcode on iOS

I am developing an iOS application that talks to a lightning accessory. Now, when the accessory is attached, I cannot use the lightning port to debug my application in Xcode.
Is there a way to attach debugger to my application when a lightning accessory is connected to iOS device?
or
Can I somehow attach the lightning accessory to my Mac, and debug it in simulator?
I know some people are talking about WiFi debugging, but that is not supported in Xcode 6.
With Lightning accessories, there doesn't appear to be an option for connecting both Xcode & the Accessory at the same time. I think this has something to do with the way Lightning cables require authentication hardware inside (so nobody has been able to come up with a dongle/splitter). The solution I ended up using was a remote logging tool that sends log messages via network to your Mac. I use NSLogger but there is also CocoaLumberJack.
Granted, you have to pepper your code with log messages for this to be useful and there are other limitations, but it is better than nothing. You can also clean up your log messages by using a custom log macro (Objective-C only).
I am attempting the same thing. I could do it on 30 pin device using the CableJive adapter. But there does not appear to be a way to do this with Lightning. I suspect that since lightning connections (including cable) are all secured though embedded serial number chip, it means that the iOS device only allows one authentication chip per lightning connector, which means no splitters / bridges / Y-Connectors or other items unless approved by Apple.
Apple does have some magic devices for MFI approved developers, but my MFI approval expired, so not sure what they have now for Lightning device testing.
You may be able to connect to XCode wirelessly and develop with the accessory connected. This question may help guide that process.
What does the Xcode 4.2 preference "Support Wirelessly Connected Devices" do?
Wireless debugging is now available as of Xcode 9 or later and iOS 11 or later. A nice write-up on how to connect your mobile device to remotely debug are here:
https://medium.com/swiftist/wireless-debugging-xcode-b6e98e26e022
How do you perform wireless debugging in Xcode 9 with iOS 11, Apple TV 4K, etc?

Serial or HID (usb) Communication in iOS (iPhone/iPad)

I want to get data from glucose meter devices by connecting into iPhone or iPad devices. I have different vendors glucose meters some uses simple HID interface for communicate and other uses serial communication.
These are the two possible ways of communication:
USB to 30-Pin connector.
3.5 jack to 30-Pin Connector.
USB or 3.5 jack will be connected to glucose meter and 30 pin connector will be attached with iDevice.
After having hours of research I did not find much help on internet for iOS specific.
I do find ORSSerialPort but I think it is for OS X apps only.
There is RedPark serial Cable but that is for RS232 to 30-Pin communication and secondly that can be only used in internal projects. I want to sell my application on Apple Store.
Someone also was discussing about using IOKit framework. We can communicate with iDevie but that is private framework.
Someone help me with this issue or let me know if that is even possible in iOS application.
Do Apple have any consideration on this type of working?
An iOS device can talk to external devices by following means of communications only:
Wifi
Bluetooth
GPRS &
GSM
USB (Don't exactly know what it is called)
There is no possible way to have RS232 serial port communication with iOS device.
Now What are the options left then?
Get a communication convertor in between your external device & iOS device. It can be
Serial to ethernet adapter
serial to USB adapter etc.
Embedd a wifi/bluetooth module in the external device (If it is being manufactured by you/your firm)
Have something with USB cable & mfi .(Never worked on this, but have seen stuff working with this). By something I meant, register your external device under MFI license & implement USB between devices (Again lack of clarity about USB stuff). Menwhile, I would appreciate edits on my answer by people who might improve it with USB stuff.
Update:
I visited the site of your vendor "glooko". I could not find any clue about them having any libraries for developers. So according to my opinion, they have kept their library private. They don't want you to develop apps based on their communication protocol. If you still need to develop apps for them, contact them here & let them know about your zeal.. M sure they will give you their private code. Anyhow, you don't need to register for any MFI or anything now. What you need is just the code they are using for communication & about that, nobody other than them can help you. So, all the best .. :)
Update 2:
What I understood from your updated question is, you want to create an iOS application that works with various Glucose meters, from different vendors. In a way you can call it as "universal Glucose meter app"
The short and straight answer for this is .."You Can't" . But wait, apple is not responsible for this. Neither it is impossible.
Let me tell you why. When you want your application to talk with a hardware device, there must be a communication channel between you too. You are well aware of those two options available. now, if your app must run on iDevices, the communication channel cables must be registered for mfi. Here that is also not the issue.
What is the issue then?
Different vendons don't generally follow the same communication protocols between their hardware & softwares. What happens if a german commander commands to indian soldier. Obviously, nobody will understand.
So, to achieve your objective, the only way is, you have to include SDK provided by each supported vendors in your app. Let me know if you are not yet clear..:)
There is a device called Lightning Serial Cable, the link is following.Take a look at their SDK.
http://redpark.com/lightning-serial-cable-l2-db9v/
It seems work with your application. I'm also looking for the solution that iOS device can talk to another device via serial port. In PC world, all PC has USB ports, so there is large amount of USB to serial port devices and vendors, such as FTDI and Prolific. I don't know if similar situation happens in iOS world.
Unless you join the Made For iPhone program you can not directly connect anything to an iOS device unless you use Bluetooth or TCP/IP.

Bonjour not advertising over BT

I've been banging my head against this for the last week or so. I've already gone through the following resources:
StackOverflow: Bonjour over bluetooth WITHOUT Gamekit ? (3844189)
StackOverflow: How does Bonjour Over Bluetooth Work (3350094)
StackOverflow: Using iOS GameKit's “Bluetooth Bonjour” with other platforms (8070998)
Technical Q&A QA1753 -- Apple Developer
WiTap sample application
SRVResolver sample application
DNSSDObjects sample application
I'm using Mac OS 10.7, Xcode 4.5, an iPhone 4 with iOS 6, and an iPad 1 with iOS 5.1.1.
My problem is this: I am modifying an application that currently uses GameKit's peer picker to connect between an iPad and a iP{hone|od touch}. We want to modify this to use Bonjour over Bluetooth instead because we've had issues with reconnecting the devices using Gamekit if the connection is lost. I've used dns_sd.h API to some success and have gotten the service to advertise and resolve over wifi, but even though I am passing kDNSServiceFlagsIncludeP2P I am not getting any success over bluetooth.
I thought possibly Bluetooth Bonjour need a PAN established between devices already, but even pairing the iPad to the iMac and browsing for DNS-SD services gives me nothing...and the iPhone won't pair to the iPad anyway.
I just finished solving this in my own app in the last 24 hours. I used the core classes from the OS X sample app DNSSDObjects. I only had to change three lines of code to add support for bluetooth. This works great in my iOS app.
In DNSSDBrowser.m, the call to DNSServiceBrowse needs to have kDNSServiceFlagsIncludeP2P passed in for the 2nd parameter.
In DNSSDRegister.m, the call to DNSServiceRegister needs the same change.
In DNSSDService.m, the call to DNSServiceResolve also needs the same change.
If you want to limit yourself to just bluetooth, and not WiFi, then the same three lines of code should be updated so the 3rd parameter is kDNSServiceInterfaceIndexP2P instead of kDNSServiceInterfaceIndexAny.
Indeed, it looks like the kDNSServiceInterfaceIndexP2P flag won't work on OSX.
If you run the code on IOS, you'll notice that Bonjour will publish two IP Adresses: one for your local WiFi network, and an 169.xx.xx.xx adress for Bluetooth.
The same code on OSX never publishes the 169.xx.xx.xx adress, so it's only found over WiFi.

What is the simplest way to connect a device to an iPad from an application?

I am working on a major product release for my company. We are designing a new device that we would like to integrate into an iOS app. (FYI, we have recently been accepted into the Apple MFi program so we are past that step.)
What we desire is to create a hardware/software eco-system where our users can start our iPad app (yes, it is specific to the iPad and the not iPhone or iPod Touch devices) and the application will automatically discover and link up with any close-proximity hardware that we've developed.
This means that I will need to implement some form of device connection process on both the iPad and within the hardware.
Is there any way to code automatic connectivity to a Bluetooth device from within an iOS application?
I am aware of the Core Bluetooth Framework which has this capability, however, it only works with the new iPhone 4S. That's not an option.
I've also researched about the External Accessory Framework, which can be used to connect to external devices whether they are connected via the iPod port or Bluetooth. This is an option but, if my understanding is correct, our hardware must already be paired with iPad before the iOS software can connect to it. This is less than preferable because although many of our devices may not be in immediate vicinity at one point in time, our customers could potentially own 100's devices that they may desire to connect to with our software.
What are my reasonable options or alternatives? The end goal is to provide a very easy means for our users to be able to connect to our devices, from within our software, on an iPad.
NOTE: I MUST NOT jailbreak the iPad or break any Apple TOS agreements.
UPDATE (3-7-2012) I saw today that the 'New iPad' (as it is being officially called) will be Bluetooth 4.0 capable. I assume this means that this iPad device will be able to use the Core Bluetooth Framework. This doesn't immediately solve my problem because we do want remain compatible with at least the "last generation" iPad device, but this is worth pointing out for others who may be looking for such an answer.
You cannot connect an iOS device to a bluetooth device without pairing first. It is purposely built that way by Apple to reduce the likelihood that someone could connect a bluetooth device without the user knowing about it. If pairing each device is unacceptable (and it sounds like it is), and you don't want to develop a dongle, the only remaining path I can see is to make your devices capable of relaying data between them like a mesh network. That way the user would only have to pair with a single device, and that paired unit would relay communications between the other devices and the iPad.
One of your alternatives would be going WiFi (AdHoc or Infrastructure) with Bonjour. For example you would be able to detect the device nearby (if it is maintaining it's own AdHoc then by SSID; if it's in infrastructure network then by service being announced). One big drawback would be that you couldn't connect directly (from app) to the device's network - user would have to do it manually.
As for BT: big drawback is lack of a serial protocol (not implemented in iPhone/iPod/iPad).

RS232 for iOS device

Is it possible to pair an iDevice to an rs232-bluetooth adapter for the purpose of sending serial commands like it would through an iDevice dock connector to rs232 (just like the Redpark Serial Cable does)? I ask because the company I work for is thinking of having an iDevice control one of our systems for demo. I know it doesn't relate to anything specific but any information would be greatly appreciated.
(See also iPhone to RS-232 via Bluetooth)
Bluetooth modules exists that support MFi (Made For iPhone) such as this one from connectBlue http://www.connectblue.com/products/bluetooth-products/bluetooth-modules/bluetooth-iphone-ios-accessory-module-obs414/ So the standard iPhone Bluetooth stack can make a SPP/RFCOMM connection to that device. That device could be added to a board along with RS232 level-conversion etc... And thus success.
I don't know whether someone sells such a device. The RS232 device that connectBlue sells seems not to support MFi, http://www.connectblue.com/products/bluetooth-products/bluetooth-devices/bluetooth-rugged-serial-port-adapter-rbs433/
Not really. The GameKit is one way to access bluetooth in iOS, but it is very limited in what that API allows you to do.
Depending on what you are building, you might be able to use the Apple Made for iPod program, but it's probably a long shot.
http://developer.apple.com/programs/mfi/
The best way to go is probably to design a device that connects via WiFi. I've gone this route, and it worked out well. If you must interface with something with an RS-232 interface, you might design an intermediary "adapter" that connects via WiFi to the iOS device, and via RS-232 to the other device.
If you don't have a need to distribute your app via the App Store, you can use Redpark's iOS serial cable: http://redpark.com/c2db9.html. (Disclaimer, I've never tried one, but according to someone at Redpark, jailbreaking is not required, you just can't distribute your app on the app store.)
You could design a small dongle that attaches via the dock connector, and broadcasts over bluetooth to your other device.
Or you could use WiFi instead of bluetooth... perhaps communicating over WiFi to something that's physically plugged into whatever you want to control.
I worked on a jailbroken app which used BTStack to communicate with a serial device. You might be able to use this for your demo.
If you're still looking to use bluetooth, this helped me out alot to facilitate the standard serial connection for prototyping without jailbreaking:
http://www.seeedstudio.com/depot/bleshield-based-on-bluegigas-ble112-module-p-1367.html
It works on the Bluetooth 4.0 enabled iOS devices and all of the schematic, boardfiles, firmware sources and the iOS App sources are available here:
https://github.com/michaelkroll/BLE-Shield

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