Comment by akersten | Hacker News Reader

Comment by akersten | Hacker News Reader

This is great news. Hopefully it fixes a lot of the jank that I've always experienced with Android Bluetooth. I don't think I've ever had a smooth experience - even with a supposedly flagship device (Pixel 4a!) I've encountered all of the following problems:

* Devices getting stuck at max volume (thankfully not headphones)

* Devices getting stuck at really low volumes

* Devices randomly switching between absolute volume and relative volume (not really sure how to describe this, but sometimes changing the volume on the phone changes the volume on the receiver, and sometimes it changes the mix volume on the phone only (like an aux output would behave) and keeps the volume on the receiver)

* Needing to enable Developer Settings to change the Bluetooth protocol version and other wacky stuff that I just shouldn't have to do [0]

* Headphones cutting in and out when exercising, like the phone can't figure out it needs to stay in the higher of two radio power profiles that it's switching between, as the receiving antenna on my workout band moves 2-3 inches away from the phone and back again

[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/GooglePixel/comments/8hbcuu/the_100...

Bluetooth has been awful on Android for a long time. I've never not had to futz with it to get it to work. I hope this is a move toward making it as seamless as it should be. I couldn't imagine trying to figure all this out as a non-technical user.

That's bizarre. I have a Samsung phone with Samsung Bluetooth earbuds and I've only ever experienced a single connection issue in the whole year I've owned them and they are a daily driver for me. I wonder what the difference is.

same, s10 + galaxy buds+ (also, sony's XM4) and i never had a single issue.

Samsung phones actually use their own Bluetooth stack not the one from AOSP Android. This is why the Bluetooth feature set sometimes doesn't match with the others.

Well that solves that. It seems much more reliable.

Generally, Samsung's bluetooth implementation has worked better than any other Android I've used. On top of that, Bluetooth seems to work better if both devices are from the same vendor

Samsung bluetooth is different from Android, and it has been much better for many years now. In fact I use Galaxy Buds with my S10 and it is an amazing seamless experience. No lag, no disconnections, great audio quality, and I don't even need to have bluetooth enabled for them to connect, just need to open the buds' case. I don't know how that last part works.

I havet not had any issues with Bluetooth on standard android or Samsung devices.

What I _do_ have problems with is the stupid accompanying apps on Samsung phones (Wear and Buds) that are reinstalled automatically every time I reconnect.

Dear Samsung, how many times do I have to refuse the ToS and delete the app before you get my point?

(I don't use the apps because I don't want any of the "smart" functionality and I don't like Samsung sharing my data with unspecified third parties)

I like the gear app, it has many options to customize the buds sound and gestures. How else do you propose they deliver those features and software updates to users? Keep I mind that Samsung needs to support other Android and ios phones too.

I believe the user should not have to choose between not geting firmware updates and not signing away their personal information.

Let me explain: on the first run the app demands access to lots of personal data including contacts and location data while at the same time stating they may share this data with partners and third parties. If you don't agree to _all_ these the app will not start (but continue to nag you)

If Samsung wants to make the app a requirement, they should remove analytics and also let the user choose if he wants to give the app all these permissions.

I get these same issues on a Pixel 3a! The most common ones (~daily) are:

- volume stuck low or high (on headphones :/) - "fixed" with a quick bluetooth off/on cycle

- volume okay but not responsive to changes in system volume

I've become used to these issues but I'd love a new driver that made them go away!

All my Bluetooth woes from iPhone finally went away when I got a Pixel last year. The iPhone is still here and being used, but not for exercising due to the connectivity issues.

I think it’s just Bluetooth itself being cursed.

What’s interesting is the iPhone Bluetooth experience with Apple products is excellent. I remember my partner used to have an Android wear watch for her Android phone and it was constantly disconnecting and having to be disconnected/reconnected to fix issues. When I got my Apple Watch, I couldn’t believe how smooth the experience was. To the point where if you didn’t know it ran off Bluetooth you would think it is some new protocol. Similar experience with AirPods as well.

I’ve had some issues with AirPods and AirPods Pro, but they are much rarer than other bluetooth devices I’ve used. I use AirPods Pro several times a day and for hours a day so even with a very low failure rate I’d expect things to break occasionally.

re:Watch, it is likely using WiFi at least some of the time. My Watch shows up on my WiFi and conveniently connects using the same network as my phone, so it apparently knows the WiFi credentials from the phone, at least on a personal network. I never explicitly set that up, and getting Watch to stay off WiFi isn’t something I persisted at - mainly because it does help create a more perfect connection experience than is possible with Bluetooth.

I discovered this initially when I was charging my Watch, while well outside of bluetooth range but just barely in range of WiFi.

> I think it’s just Bluetooth itself being cursed.

Hence my desire for a headphone jack.

Hah, I've experienced the absolute/relative volume bug. Sony headphones sometimes end up connecting with independent (relative?) volume controls and then switching the volume control from independent to absolute when you use a track skip gesture. The volume goes to the max instantly as a result. One of the reasons I'm staying away from wireless Sony headphones.

Yep that happens to me every now and then..

Hopefully they fix the Bluetooth issue with YouTube and Chromecast. It is such a odd issue for me. Chromecast will pause the video because YouTube demands to have the Bluetooth audio back to the app instead of the TV (I have specialized Bluetooth audio transceiver hook up to my TV because of my disability). YT keep forcing the bluetooth audio back to my phone instead of the TV after few second of casting on my TV. This cause the cast to pause the video because my phone detected that audio switched to different source (YouTube). The only way to stop that from happening is to swipe away the YouTube casting notification after casting the video in my phone, then YouTube will stop doing that.

Honestly, I think the issue is the bluetooth itself, it an amazing but extremely fragile technology. My Win 10 laptop crap the bed with the internal bluetooth. And it crap the bed with the USB bluetooth transceiver as well. Microsoft been having issue with bluetooth. The same for OSX, Apple have their issues with it. They recently released a update to fix the bluetooth issue in Big Sur M1 and that didn't fix the issue.

Wow, that's awful. I've had a large number of Pixel phones and bluetooth has been basically flawless (other than an old Pixel 1 where I think the hardware actually failed). I guess I have been lucky with the devices I used with the phones.

Why would changing code from c++ to rust fix those issues? It looks more like bugs in logic rather than language.

Of course I can only speculate, but I see two primary reasons to suspect improvement:

* It's a purposeful re-write: not just because it sounded like a fun idea, but because there are reasons to redo the stack. Memory security a main one given the choice of language, but presumably cleaning up the logic and making it better overall is another.

* Broken-windows theory of software development: Writing in a sloppy, old, foot-gun language encourages bad code that just barely works for the happy path. Writing in a language that is far stricter and requires intention and design makes one think a little more critically about the logic.

Shit like that is why I always wondered where all the claims of Android being superior to iOS came from.

One isn't better than the other. This thread itself is full of people saying the same shit about both android and iOS.

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