Mobile Support

[haslinghuis]

Draft proposal for adding mobile support

Given

• We use Vite for PWA and Vue3 event handlers for port events and serial connections.
• Android USB serial support is plugin-fragmented and brittle.
• iOS blocks USB serial.
• Firmware uses Dyad (raw TCP socket, not WebSockets).
• We do not develop BLE code.
• Only few boards available with wireless connectivity.

Questions

• How do we add zip support on host?
• Do we prefer BLE or WIFI?
• is there a USB dongle we could use on FC?
• We could use ELRS hardware?
• How about mDNS?

✅ Connection Methods to Support

Feature	Android	iOS	Approach
BLE (GATT)	✅	✅	Capacitor plugin + GATT profile
Wi-Fi (Dyad)	✅	✅	Raw TCP socket (needs plugin)
DFU over BLE	✅	✅	Nordic-style (or custom)
DFU over Wi-Fi	✅	✅	Raw TCP DFU (if supported)

🔧 Plugin Strategy

1. 🌐 Wi-Fi / TCP Support (Dyad)

Capacitor has no built-in support for raw TCP, but you can use a plugin like:

capacitor-plugin-socket (unofficial)

Or build a minimal custom plugin to open TCP sockets to the firmware IP on a fixed port.

❗ WebSockets won’t work with Dyad, so fetch / browser APIs are out.

Sample plugin code (Android/iOS) would use:

• Android: java.net.Socket
• iOS: GCDAsyncSocket (via CocoaAsyncSocket)

2. 🧬 BLE SupportUse @capacitor-community/bluetooth-le:

npm install @capacitor-community/bluetooth-le
npx cap sync

Works on both Android and iOS.

You'll need to define a BLE GATT profile that:

• Accepts commands from the client.
• Sends responses / telemetry back.

If DFU is supported over BLE (Nordic DFU-like), we can also handle that here.

3. 🧪 DFU Support Options

Transport	Approach	Notes
Wi-Fi	Raw TCP transfer over known port	Custom protocol handler for DFU
BLE	Nordic DFU or custom GATT service	If your firmware supports BLE DFU

You’ll need to implement matching upload logic in the app for DFU:

• Chunking firmware.
• Progress UI.
• Verifying upload and applying reset.

Capacitor can help wrap native file access and socket APIs needed here.

🧱 Suggested Stack

🔗 Wi-Fi

• Custom Capacitor TCP socket plugin
• Connect via local IP
• Protocol:
  • Command/control
  • Optional DFU

🔗 BLE

• Capacitor BLE plugin
• Custom GATT service (you define)
• BLE DFU (if available)

Tasks

• Generate a custom Capacitor plugin for TCP sockets (Dyad) - Add custom Capacitor plugin-socket for raw TCP support #4471
• Provide a DFU upload service that can handle Wi-Fi targets
• Provide a BLE service scaffold and how to structure the GATT commands
• Provide a DFU upload service that can handle BLE targets
• DFU transfer should use zip format to decrease transfer time.