Bluetooth wake

BLOOMIN8 Canvases spend most of their time in deep sleep, with Wi-Fi off. The official app wakes them over Bluetooth Low Energy; the hub can do the same, so you do not have to press the button on the back.

There are two ways, and you can use both:

• From the hub (server Bluetooth): the Wake button on a Canvas, and optionally automatic wake before sending photos or actions. Needs a Linux host with a Bluetooth adapter within range of the frames.
• From your phone (Web Bluetooth): the Wake with this phone button wakes the Canvas with the Bluetooth of the device you are holding. Needs Chrome or Edge, and the hub opened over HTTPS.

What the wake does

The hub connects to the Canvas over BLE, writes 0x01 and then 0x00 to characteristic 0xF001 of service 0xF000, and disconnects: the same pulse the official app and the Home Assistant integration send. Wi-Fi comes up a few seconds later; the hub waits up to ~25 s for the Canvas to answer and then refreshes its status.

A Canvas that already answers over Wi-Fi is not pulsed. The Bluetooth address is read from the Canvas (bt_mac in /deviceInfo) the first time it connects, and can be edited in Settings of the Canvas.

Compatibility

From the hub

Host	Status	Notes
Linux with BlueZ (Debian, Ubuntu, Raspberry Pi OS, mini-PC…)	✅ Supported	Mount /run/dbus (below). Built-in or USB adapter. Can share the adapter with a Home Assistant Container on the same host.
Unraid	⚠️ Advanced	Unraid ships without BlueZ. You can install it yourself, see Unraid. Otherwise, use the phone.
TrueNAS SCALE, VM with USB Bluetooth passthrough	⚠️ Should work	Needs BlueZ (bluetoothd) running on that host or VM.
Proxmox LXC, rootless Docker or Podman	⚠️ Advanced	The container must reach the host's system D-Bus, and BlueZ's D-Bus policy must allow it (it allows root by default).
Synology / QNAP NAS	❌ Not supported	No BlueZ for USB dongles on the host. Use the phone, or run the hub on another machine.
Docker Desktop on Windows or macOS	❌ Not supported	Containers run in a VM without access to the host's Bluetooth. Use the phone.

From the phone (or computer browser)

Browser	Status
Chrome / Edge on Android	✅ Supported
Chrome / Edge on Windows, macOS, Linux, ChromeOS	✅ Supported
Any browser on iPhone / iPad	❌ No Web Bluetooth (third-party browsers such as Bluefy do support it)
Firefox, Safari	❌ No Web Bluetooth

Browsers only allow Web Bluetooth on secure pages: open the hub over https:// (reverse proxy, Tailscale HTTPS…, typically your EXTERNAL_URL) or on localhost. On a plain http://192.168.x.x:8080 address the button is hidden and the Canvas Settings explain why.

Web Bluetooth does not expose addresses, so the browser shows a list of nearby Canvases and you pick the one in front of you.

Setting up the hub (Linux)

1. Check Bluetooth works on the host:

   bluetoothctl show

   It should list a controller with Powered: yes. If not, sudo systemctl enable --now bluetooth and bluetoothctl power on.

2. Uncomment the D-Bus mount in docker-compose.yml:

   volumes:
     - ./data:/data
     - /run/dbus:/run/dbus:ro

3. Recreate the container: docker compose up -d.

4. Open a Canvas → Settings → Bluetooth. It should say the hub can wake Canvases, and name the adapter (hci0).

No privileged mode, extra capabilities or packages are needed: the hub talks to the host's BlueZ through D-Bus, the same way Home Assistant Container does. network_mode: host is not required for Bluetooth.

To turn the feature off entirely, set BLE_DISABLED=true in .env.

Automatic wake

With Wake automatically before sending on (per Canvas, off by default), when the Canvas does not answer the hub wakes it and retries once:

• sending a photo (instead of queueing it for the next wake),
• the frame actions (next, clear, reboot…) and device settings,
• the push-mode rotation, only when there is a photo to send.

Status polling never wakes a Canvas. If a background wake fails (out of range, flat battery), the scheduler leaves that Canvas alone for 15 minutes.

Every wake keeps Wi-Fi on for the Canvas's idle time (Settings → device), so it costs battery. For frames in pull mode the scheduled wake-ups are usually enough; automatic wake is most useful for push frames and for sending a photo right away.

Troubleshooting

Message	What to do
mount /run/dbus into the container	Step 2 above, or the host is not Linux.
D-Bus but not BlueZ	sudo systemctl status bluetooth on the host.
adapter is off	bluetoothctl power on.
not found over Bluetooth (out of range?)	Move the adapter closer (BLE reaches ~10 m indoors, less through walls), or use a USB extension for the dongle. bluetoothctl scan le should list the Canvas.
did not answer over Wi-Fi	The pulse arrived but Wi-Fi did not come up in time: check the Canvas is on your Wi-Fi and its IP has not changed, then try again.

Server logs mention bluetooth auto-wake when a background wake fails.