The Magic Bulb is, as far as I know, the cheapest bluetooth RGB light bulb on the market : you can get it for as low as ~8€/9$ on sites like Gearbest. It works pretty good and comes with mobile apps.
Unfortunately I haven't found any API or documentation for it, which is why I started this project.
I haven't fully retro-engineered the protocol yet so it's not complete but Characteristics list page and How to use manually with Gatttool page should give you enough details to start working on your own implementation if you need to port this for another language / platform. On the research/bluetooth branch you'll also find capture of bluetooth packets exchanged between Android and the bulb (open hci_capture.log with Wireshark).
Tested on Linux only. I'll be happy to get your feedback on other platforms !
You must use python 3+ and have a proper Bluetooth 4.0 interface installed on your machine.
sudo apt-get install libbluetooth-dev
pip install git+https://github.com/Betree/pyMagicBlue.git
Gattlib may cause you some troubles if you're trying to set this project up for a Raspberry Pi. Fortunately Mark Otting proposed a solution for this :
Pip started installing gattlib, then handed something over to gcc and that crapped out,
often "freezing" the Pi. It turns out that whatever it was that gattlib needed compiling
ran the pi out of memory. The solution was to increase swap space to 512mb (or 1024mb on
a 256mb memory RPI. Also note that Raspbian uses dphys-swapfile). It takes 30 minutes or
so but succesfully compiled after that.
Library needs root permissions to use Bluetooth features.
If you run into problems during devices listing or connect, try to follow this procedure to ensure your Bluetooth interface works correctly : How to use manually with Gatttool page
>>> from magicbluelib import magicblue
>>> bulb_mac_address = 'XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX'
>>> bulb = MagicBlue(bulb_mac_address)
>>> bulb.connect()
>>> bulb.set_color([255, 0, 0]) # Set red
>>> bulb.set_random_color() # Set random
>>> bulb.turn_off() # Turn off the light
>>> bulb.turn_on() # Set white light
Script must be run as root.
You can always specify which bluetooth adapter (default: hci0) you want to use by specifying it with the -a option.
Just launch magicblueshell as root user :
piouffb@Ordinatron-3000:~/workspace/python/pyMagicBlue$ sudo magicblueshell
Magic Blue interactive shell v0.1
Type "help" to see what you can do
> help
----------------------------
| List of available commands |
----------------------------
COMMAND PARAMETERS DETAILS
------- ---------- -------
help Show this help
list_devices List Bluetooth LE devices in range
connect mac_address Connect to light bulb
disconnect Disconnect from current light bulb
set_color name|hexvalue Change bulb's color
set_warm_light intensity[0.0-1.0] Set warm light
turn on|off Turn on / off the bulb
exit Exit the script
> list_devices
Listing Bluetooth LE devices in range. Press CTRL+C to stop searching.
Name Mac address
---- -----------
LEDBLE-1D433903 C7:17:1D:43:39:03
---------------
^C
> connect C7:17:1D:43:39:03
INFO:__main__:Connected : True
> exit
Bye !
Script can also be used by command line (for example to include it in custom shell scripts) Usage is defined as follow :
usage: magicblueshell [-h] [-l LIST_COMMANDS] [-c COMMAND] [-m MAC_ADDRESS]
optional arguments:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-l LIST_COMMANDS, --list_commands LIST_COMMANDS
List available commands
-c COMMAND, --command COMMAND
Command to execute
-m MAC_ADDRESS, --mac_address MAC_ADDRESS
Device mac address. Must be set if command given in -c needs you to be connected
So if you want to change the color of bulb with mac address "C7:17:1D:43:39:03", just run :
sudo magicblueshell -c 'set_color red' -m C7:17:1D:43:39:03