Detect beacons uuid and name with react native - react-native

Question

I have simulated a beacon from computer and i'm trying to read beacon info (uuid,identifier etc) from my react native app.
I decided to use this library
https://github.com/dotintent/react-native-ble-plx as the library.
The issue i'm facing is although it shows some devices when i scan, the name,uuid and other info shows as null.
For ex:
'device', { serviceUUIDs: null,
isConnectable: null,
overflowServiceUUIDs: null,
txPowerLevel: null,
serviceData: null,
manufacturerData: 'TEACFCd6h5jcoxKqh9ACQqwTAAOBqZYcxQ==',
name: null,
mtu: 23,
rssi: -47,
solicitedServiceUUIDs: null,
localName: null,
id: '32:BD:32:6C:E9:C2',
And this is my code
const bluetoothInstance = new BleManager();
const scanAndConnect = () => {
bluetoothInstance.startDeviceScan(null, { allowDuplicates: true }, (error, device) => {
console.log('device', device);
console.log('error', error);
if (error) {
// Handle error (scanning will be stopped automatically)
return;
}
if (device?.name === 'MyProjectName') {
bluetoothInstance.stopDeviceScan();
} else {
// bluetoothInstance.stopDeviceScan();
}
});
};
useEffect(() => {
bluetoothInstance.onStateChange((state) => {
console.log('state', state);
if (state === 'PoweredOn') {
scanAndConnect();
}
}, true);
}, []);
How i can read the beacon uuid and name? Is there any other library you can recommend? Or is there something missing in the code? Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

The scanning code is probably working fine. The information you are looking for is either not always present or present in a different field.
The iBeacon Proximity UUID is actually embedded inside the manufacturerData field. However, on iOS devices this field is deleted by the operating system for all iBeacon packets as a security mechanism by Apple. Apple forbids using the CoreBluetooth framework (used by react-react-native-ble-plx under the hood) to detect iBeacon. On iOS you must use CoreLocation. For that you can try react-native-beacons-manager. For Android, react-native-ble-plx will work fine to detect iBeacon but you must parse out the beacon fields yourself from the manyfacturerData field.
The Bluetooth name is only populated (in the name field) if a scan response packet containing the name has been received recently before the main advertisement packet. It is unclear how iOS will handle this process for forbidden iBeacon advertisements, but it will probably work for non-iBeacon advertisements just fine. On Android it will work fine, too. Just do not expect it to be populated 100% of the time on either platform.