Build IoT enabled apps with RAD Studio Berlin

In RAD Studio Berlin, we provide access to over 50 prebuilt components for popular IoT devices.

ThingConnect IoT device components range from healthcare devices such as heartrate montiors, blood pressure monitors and scales to home automation gadgets like BLE light bulbs, Z-Wave enabled door locks, smart switches, smoke detectors and more. Also included are components for popular fitness gadgets such as cycling sensors.

The available ThingConnect devices use one of the following technologies:

• Z-Wave
• Bluetooth Low Energy

The Z-Wave protocol is an inter-operable, wireless, RF-based communications technology designed specifically for control, monitoring and status reading applications in residential and light commercial environments. For more information about the Z-Wave technology, see About Z-Wave Technology.

In order to use a Z-Wave device, you need to have a device that acts as a controller. We test our devices using the VeraLite Smart Home Controller, but you may use any compatible Z-Wave controller.

The Z-Wave IoT Framework is HTTP based and acts as a layer between the user and the device, making the interaction easier and transparent. Using the Z-Wave IoT Framework you can interact with devices by accessing properties. The properties are either readable, writable or both.

Bluetooth Low Energy (Bluetooth LE) or Smart Bluetooth provides a new environment for devices with small amount of data to transfer and lower power consumption.

Connecting to the Devices

To connect to a Bluetooth LE device in your application, you need to:

1. Drop a TBluetoothDeviceDiscoveryManager component onto your form
2. Drop the corresponding component for the Bluetooth LE device onto your form
3. In the Object Inspector, set the DiscoveryManager property of the Bluetooth LE component to the TBluetoothDeviceDiscoveryManager.
4. Set the appropriate discovery mechanism in the DiscoveryMethod property of the TBluetoothDeviceDiscoveryManager.
5. To connect to the actual device you need to call the method DiscoverDevices of the TBluetoothDeviceDiscoveryManager.

   Delphi:

     FDiscoveryManager.DiscoverDevices;

   C++:

     FDiscoveryManager->DiscoverDevices();

6. After connecting to the device, the OnDeviceConnected event of the corresponding component is called.
7. Add the following units to the Uses clause of the application:
   • Iot.Family.BluetoothLE.GattTypes
   • The custom Types unit (if the component defines custom data types).

Looking to build an end to end solution with support for IoT devices?