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Hello!

I am currently using the TPSDK for Catalyst to be able to connect with Trimble R-Series devices in the mobile app I am working on. I am curious if Trimble has any standard naming convention that is used when it comes to the reported Bluetooth device name coming from the receiver. I am hoping there is some sort of reliable naming convention to tell if a Bluetooth device is a Trimble receiver in general and hopefully something to differentiate whether it is an R-Series vs a Spectra Precision vs a Trimble S-Series, etc...

My thought process behind this is I am looking to implement logic in my app to automatically load the proper drivers for use with the TPSDK based on the paired Bluetooth device the user has selected. I could always implement an option in our UI for the user to manually select which receiver type they are using but I am looking to avoid that if possible!

Thanks!

Hi Charles,

this is a bit tricky as BT names may get changed and we are honestly not as consistent as we could be.

What we suggested as an option in the past is a RegEx like this:

//Trimble driver
.*Trimble.* //Something with Trimble in the BT name
.*GNSS.* //R1 special handling

 

//RegEx for Spectra driver, no FAZA2 support
SP_?[0-9]{1,3}.* //Read: 'SP' AND one or none underscore AND digits 0-9 with a 1, 2 or 3 occurrences AND whatever comes after
.*R4S.* //Check for R4S string specifically

So Trimble is rather easy - just check if the string 'Trimble' is somewhere in the BT name.

Exception is the R1 which has just 'GNSS' in the name - therefore the special handling here.

Spectra gets more fuzzy... So the Regex above SHOULD show strings with SP, one or none underscore and then 1, 2, or three numbers... So something like SP80 or SP_85 should be found.

R4S is also 'special'... And while copy/ pasting this regex I'm wondering if it ignores the case of the S or not... It should not be case-sensitive...

For all receivers you can use the RSeries driver (its not necessary to use the Spectra driver for Spectra unless you use rare features of Spectra family - like external radio etc). So we do the same in TMM v2.3. 

Note that this only works with TPSDK 2020 and later (and an up-to-date firmware in the Spectra receiver). 

Note also that e.g. Android (depends on the version) tends to broadcast a newly found device first with just the BT address - and later with the name and the services etc. At least thats what we noticed (might also be because of the amount of devices here). 

 @Nico Becke,

Thanks for your detailed response! The regex you shared is very useful and the issues you brought up with taking the route of relying on Bluetooth name are great points. At the end of the day it's going to end up being a trade off between ease of use and reliability.

Also - thanks for throwing in that bit about being able to use the RSeries driver with the Spectra receviers. That is really good to know and something I wasn't aware of before!

Correction on the Spectra-family of receivers - some details here: Issue Connecting to SP80 Receiver Using R-Series Driver.
Long story short - in TMM v2.3 not all family members of the SP receiver family are covered! 

In case you get a 'not supported' exception you must use the SP driver.

This statement is true for SDK TPSDKCatalyst.2020.0.82.19504 and earlier.