Wearable internet access options
Xasin wrote 07/21/2020 at 17:25 • 2 pointsHi!
I am thinking of building a second revision of my "Tap Badge" project, a small wearable I would like to use as general purpose interface with my smart home and other projects.
I am currently facing a bit of a design problem: How do I get internet onto it?
My current option would be to buy a U-Blox module for cellular internet connection, get a cheap IoT Sim Card with a few MB each month, and use MQTT. However, this would be quite a power drain and I wouldn't be able to use nearby WiFi, unless I also throw an ESP or similar onto there.
I might be able to add Bluetooth to my system and use BLE - this would be the preferred option since it can then use my phone's internet. I have tried this in the first revision, but I really disliked how problematic it was to keep my DIY app running in the background. Android loves to kill these things, which would sever my connection.
Here's my question: Has anyone of you done something similar, so I can take some inspiration from it?
Or does anyone know of an app that does this for you, i.e. it provides a bridge between a BLE Service and a internet connection like MQTT?
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Does your phone and plan support wireless hotspot? An ESP8266 that wakes up WiFi only to connect to your hotspot or other predefined APs to transmit the payload is the most straightforward solution I can think of.
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It's straightforward and definitely a good recommendation for temporary setups!but in the long term, it does have some drawbacks.
Hosting a WiFi AP from the phone means higher battery drain, and that the phone can no longer connect to local WiFi connections itself. It also leads to a higher drain on the wearable-device side, since the ESP8266 and ESP32 can get quite power hungry. The latter might do fine by using tickless idle mode, but a proper BLE module will still beat it, maybe by an order of magnitude in terms of average current draw.
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