How to get BT working on Pi3B.

[clivem]

I figured this was going to be really simple, with something like using hciattach to the UART, to make the device visible.....
Any instructions anywhere?

[JamesH65]

You really need to post this sort of question on the forum, but in short

sudo apt-get install pi-bluetooth

should install a load of stuff you need. Not sure how to get the panel icon
in LXDE though.

On 1 March 2016 at 15:42, Clive Messer notifications@github.com wrote:

I figured this was going to be really simple, with something like using
hciattach to the UART, to make the device visible.....
Any instructions anywhere?

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#1314.

[pelwell]

sudo apt-get install blueman gets you the GUI (which is just about functional).

[clivem]

Guys, I'm not using Raspbian. I never will be using Raspbian, I have no interest in Raspbian.

I can see that the BT section of chip is connected to UART from DT config. I don't want to install Debian packages. I am asking for the technical info to be able to get it working on any distribution.
How do I get the device recognised, so that "hcitool dev" actually shows there is a device available.

Don't want blueman, LXDE, any desktop gui..... blah, blah, blah. Just want the device to be recognised.

[pelwell]

But Raspbian is the supported way. All the information is out there for smart, motivated people to use, but don't expect to be spoon-fed.

[clivem]

Sorry, Raspbian may be the only supported OS. I can understand that. What I need is the lower level info to make this work with an OS that is not Raspbian. That's the info I am looking for.

Sorry, I must be really stupid. Would you please educate a stupid person where he should look, to find the information I seek. I don't require spoon-feeding, just a pointer to the info. I have looked!

[clivem]

@pelwell Phil, at least tell me what I am looking for. A Broadcom technical document? Documentation in the PiF documentation github?

[pelwell]

You need the modified BlueZ package found in Raspbian (source available) and the systemd script called hciattach.service from Raspbian.

[XECDesign]

http://archive.raspberrypi.org/debian/pool/main/b/bluez/bluez_5.23-2+rpi1.debian.tar.xz
(debian/patches/ 50-53)
/usr/bin/hciattach /dev/ttyAMA0 bcm43xx 921600 noflow -

[clivem]

@XECDesign Thank you for the help. Where are those params documented?

/usr/bin/hciattach /dev/ttyAMA0 bcm43xx 921600 noflow -
bcm43xx_init
Initialization timed out.

I have vague recollections of some sort of firmware upload needing to be done before the attach. (Think that was with Wandboard which used a BRCM chipset for wifi/BT). Does something like that need to happen with the Pi3B?

[ghollingworth]

Have you tried typing hciattach into google?

[clivem]

Yes, but it returns rather a lot of results. None of which seem to be telling me where to obtain the firmware file. Is it available from PiF github? Or only buried in a Raspbian package?

[clivem]

I'm going to ask nicely...... Is it possible to make any firmware files needed to support Pi3B wifi/BT operation available directly from the PiF github, rather than them just being available via specific distribution packages?

[Cheong2K]

I am using a BT module on Pi2, first I enable the UART flow control by:
gpio -g mode 16 alt3
gpio -g mode 17 alt3
and then using the brcm-patchram-plus tool to load the BT firmware to the BT chip.
Try google it.

You also need to remove the console=ttyAMA0 in /boot/cmdline.txt

[Cheong2K]

@clivem,

I don't have a Pi3 at this moment but I tried my Pi2 with NOOBS version 1.8.0, BT works natively, only need to make some scripts.

[davidpronk]

@clivem

Did you manage to get wifi to work on the Pi3B without Raspbian? I'm trying to figure out how to do this but I'm kind of in the dark on this...