ANT Forum

@Arggh

0) Currently the plugins do not support multiple devices of the same type with the same device id. As I said previously it is in place for forward compatibility scenarios. Additionally, if you are using the multi device search you should no longer need to use the async scan anymore. They both use a device ID for the same reason (even if the id is not the same, but since they aren't intended to be used together they don't need to be)

1) This is a known issue and is only an issue with some logging and has no behavioural impact

2) It appears the ANT Channel and possibly the ANT stack failed in this log, if you can capture it again, can you send some of the lines previous to the "AntChannel fired OnChannelDeath()" to see if the logs indicate why the channel is being closed.

3) This is also a known issue and we are looking into it.

Thanks for your feedback.      

arrgh - 03 July 2014 03:21 PM

With the new ANT+ Plugins Service I am not seeing a search timeout in response to a request access. When I activate the sensor later it is not found. Also, when the device state changes to SEARCHING, it will only reconnect if the device is found within a few seconds.
Everything works when going back to the previous service version.

Edit: This is on a Sony Ericsson Ray. A search timeout does occur on a Nexus device with a USB stick connected.

Edit2: MultiDeviceSearch is impacted by the lack of search timeout bug, and it is preserved across apps.
Let the ANT+ Sampler do a multi device search. After 10 seconds switch to my app, nothing is ever found in multi device search. If really quick switching when start search I have managed to get my app to find one of 4 devices.

Any comments for this?      

How can I continue to get RSSI updates while a MultiDeviceSearch continues to run? I only see onRssiUpdate() occur when the device is first found.      

RSSI updates will continue to occur as long as you leave the search running. The timing of the updates varies based on how many other ANT+ devices are nearby. The algorithm prioritizes discovering new devices over receiving updates for existing ones. After the first update the algorithm may not give any priority to an update for up to 10s before it is eligible for a new update again. As I said this is highly dependent on how many other ANT+ devices are in the area.      

So I believe the fact that I am not seeing any RSSI updates is due to the search timeout bug (search stops after 10 seconds). Any acknowledgement that this is an issue?      

Assuming you have an Xperia Ray, that issue should no longer appear if you use ARS 4.6.0 released on Play Store earlier this week.      

ShaneG - 07 July 2014 12:47 PM

Additionally, if you are using the multi device search you should no longer need to use the async scan anymore. They both use a device ID for the same reason (even if the id is not the same, but since they aren't intended to be used together they don't need to be)

This is incorrect, and we do currently need to use the async scan and multi device search at the same time (ok, we don't "need" to, but it makes development a whole lot easier). As the MultiDeviceSearch API is only in a release candidate SDK, there is no ANT+ Plugins Service available on the Google Play Store which supports it. This means using the AsyncScan is necessary. However, to add functionality like using RSSI we use the MultiDeviceSearch, so we can be ready for the functionality to be available to users. Hence using both at the same time, and wishing there was a consistent way to identify search results.

Thanks.
R      

If I understand you correctly you are saying that you need to use both because the new plugin version isn't live yet? Why not just wait until it is live then before you use the new features?

There are no plans to consolidate the id system across plugins currently, in each case it is intended to be used locally to the mechanism in use. If you want to do complicated things using multiple search mechanisms concurrently you will need to track each device identity yourself.      

When will the new plugin version be live?      

This seems like the appropriate place to report issues with the ANT+ Plugin Sampler sample app.
When I leave the ANT+ Plugin Sampler running in the background (press the 'home' button) with a sensor connected while I am running tests on our app, eventually it will disconnect and returning to the ANT+ Plugin sampler will show "DEAD".      

The sampler app does not use a service to keep the plugin connection alive. As such, anytime it is backgrounded it is eligible for Android to close it which would kill the plugin connection.      

Update on some errors showing up in the logs:
If you are seeing the following:

UnexpectedError, acquireChannel_helper called with null ArsComm

It is most likely caused by closing the PCC while an access request is still processing. This log does not indicate an error, as it is expected that the ArsComm will be nullified during shutdown and the case is handled gracefully inside the service. This error log will be hidden in a future release.

If you are seeing this in a case where you are not shutting down your PCC, please report it.      

New Release Thread here: http://www.thisisant.com/forum/viewthread/4393/