Wireless bluetooth (BLE) controller using an Arduino Uno

Projects General Guidance
1

Hey!

So I'm about to embark on a project that involves the use of an Arduino Uno to get input from some buttons, triggers and a joystick, and send this data wirelessly via bluetooth to my computer.

I'm confident I can get the inputs working and get the arduino to read the data. However, I'm brand new to bluetooth and BLE and I'd love a little advice or guidance as to the best way to proceed with this idea!
I've got a Red bear Labs BLE shield., an Uno, a Plugable bluetooth 4.0 dongle for windows and linux and have access to other basic electronics equipment.

My main questions are:

  1. I know BLE is mainly designed to work with smart devices running ios and android. Can I still use the BLE shield to send data directly to my computer instead of a smartphone? If so, how would I go start doing this?
    [I've got the red bear labs BLE shield SDK for Ardunio, but that seems to have been made keeping ios or android apps in mind. Im still reading through it and attempting to understand it. I]

  2. Is there anything else out there (other hardware, SDK's or approaches) that would be better suited to this idea? [Bluetooth/BLE is essential, to make the project integrate with some other stuff later]

  3. Would it be easier to use linux as a dev platform for the BLE stuff? I have access to a machine running debian and know people more experienced with linux programming than I am.

  4. In the future, I'd like to write software that easily allows multiple bluetooth (BLE) enabled controllers like these to connect and sync to a machine. What would be a good way to approach that?

Aside from answers to these specific questions, I appreciate any input on the subject.

Thanks!

2

I'm sorry to bump this but there's a slight update.

I also have a Bluno (an Uno with a TI BLE module) which I'm attempting to use with the Plugable dongle.

I got my computer (Windows 7) to find the Bluno and connect to it. The link light on the bluno lights up and I can see it in the Devices list. I intend to write a program where the Bluno prints data to the serial port every few minutes.

What I want to know is how do I get the dongle to scan for devices, connect to it and accept any data being sent by the Bluno?

I've sent Broadcom an email asking for the SDK/API for the module's chipset. I was hoping to do this part of the project in C# (Unity3d).