Flippi

Skateboard Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) controller using bleno

Table of contents

• Setup
• Usage
• Environment variables

Setup

Environment

This application was created for Raspberry 2 B+ on Raspbian and developed on macOS.
It was tested on:

• Raspbian 8.0 Jessie (Production)
• macOS 10.12 (Development + Test)
• Ubuntu 14.04 (Development + Test)
• Ubuntu 12.04 (Test)

Dependencies

• nodejs >= 6.x
• bluetooth
• bluez <= 4.x
• libbluetooth-dev
• libudev-dev
• git

Install the dependencies

# Update dependencies
sudo apt-get update
curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_6.x | sudo -E bash -

# Install dependencies
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y git nodejs build-essential
sudo apt-get install -y bluetooth libbluetooth-dev libudev-dev libdbus-1-dev libglib2.0-dev

# Prerequisites
sudo systemctl stop bluetooth

# Downgrade bluez to version < 5
curl https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/bluetooth/bluez-4.101.tar.xz | tar -xJ
(cd bluez-4.101; ./configure && make && sudo make install)
rm -r bluez-4.101

Install the application

This application can then be installed with git and npm:

# Install app from git
git clone https://github.com/jeandesravines/flippi.git
cd flippi
npm install

Usage

Start

Launch as sudo:

sudo npm start

Environment variables

Environment variables can be passed to override the default configuration.

Channels

GPIO channels' settings.

Motor

The GPIO channel for the first motor.

• Options: FLIPPI_CHANNEL_0
• Type: Number
• Default: 5

Example:

sudo FLIPPI_CHANNEL_0=7 npm start

Device

The used compatible gpio's device.

• Options: FLIPPI_DEVICE
• Type: String
• Values: gpio | five
• Default: five

Example:

sudo FLIPPI_DEVICE=gpio npm start

Roles

• gpio: The local Raspberry's GPIO. In this case, @jdes/gpio will be used.
• five: An USB connected device connected to the Raspberry. In this case, Jonny Five will be used.

Debug

Indicate if the application use the module debug.

• Options: DEBUG
• Type: String | undefined
• Values: flippi | * | undefined
• Default: undefined

Example:

sudo DEBUG=flippi npm start

Name

The name of the application.
This option will automatically set the BLENO_DEVICE_NAME with the same value.

• Options: FLIPPI_NAME
• Type: String
• Default: Flippi

Example:

sudo FLIPPI_NAME=Hello npm start

Pin

The Pin to secure the communication between the remote and the application.

• Options: FLIPPI_PIN
• Type: String
• Default: 1234

Example:

sudo FLIPPI_PIN=2468 npm start

Bluetooth Advertising interval (bleno)

A custom advertising interval in ms.
Advertising intervals must be between 20ms to 10000ms.

• Options: BLENO_ADVERTISING_INTERVAL
• Type: Number
• Default: 500

Example:

sudo BLENO_ADVERTISING_INTERVAL=200 npm start