Beacon Emulator

This page will show you what a Bluetooth beacon is and how to emulate a Bluetooth beacon device on HackMaster Pi.

What is a Bluetooth Beacon?

A Bluetooth beacon is a small wireless device that broadcasts signals using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology. These devices are designed to transmit simple data over short distances.

Key Points About Beacons:

• Small and Portable: They’re typically small hardware devices that can be placed almost anywhere.
• Battery-Powered: Most beacons run on batteries and can last for months or years.
• One-Way Communication: Beacons only send signals; they don’t receive information back.
• Location Services: Their main purpose is to help with indoor positioning where GPS doesn’t work well.

How to Emulate a Bluetooth Beacon Device?

Here we will show you how to emulate a Bluetooth beacon device through a clock-in system example.

1. Use the Android mobile phone close to the clock-in Bluetooth device.

2. Download and open BLE Scanner app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.macdom.ble.blescanner&pcampaignid=web_share.

3. Find the Bluetooth device with the highest dBm value.

   

4. Note the UUID, Major and Minor values. For example, in the picture above:

   • UUID: AA2198B2-4630-11EE-BE56-0242AC120002
   • Major: 0
   • Minor: 0

5. Convert them to hexadecimal data with a space character between each byte. For example, in the picture above:

   • UUID: AA 21 98 B2 46 30 11 EE BE 56 02 42 AC 12 00 02
   • Major: 00 00
   • Minor: 00 00

6. Enter them in the Beacon Storage page: http://[IP]/BLE/beacon-storage

   

7. Press ADD PROFILE button to save the Bluetooth beacon information.

   

8. Go to the Beacon Emulator page (http://[IP]/BLE/beacon-emulator), select the Bluetooth beacon information profile, and then you can activate and terminate it.