Bluetooth - the conspiracy over interoperability

The Bluetooth standard promises tangle-free enterprises where all types of equipment will communicate at short ranges, without cabling. But are leading manufacturers holding back information on device interoperability? Heather McLean investigates...

Many people now understand the concept of Bluetooth. We've heard about how, when the planet is infested with Bluetooth chips, printers will do our bidding without cable-carried commands, how our PC calendar will update a PDA in our briefcase as we run past our desk on the way to a meeting. Those are but two examples.

And there are dozens of devices on the market carrying the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) stamp of approval.

That said, there are very few new Bluetooth products able to talk to those with an older Bluetooth specification, or connect to products made by other manufacturers, or speak to devices a manufacturer didn't predict consumers would need.

In fact, back compatibility between the core Bluetooth protocol specifications is almost non-existent.

Michael Wall, analyst at Frost & Sullivan, explained: "The first specification - Bluetooth 1.0 - was basically a development standard for people to work with and iron out the glitches. But now some of the original specifications won't work with the latest version 1.1, or even the older 1.0b."

The flaws repaired by the 1.1 specification drastically altered the core Bluetooth protocol. Hugh Sheridan, CEO of alltalking.com, a website dedicated to listing compatibility between Bluetooth products, said: "The development of 1.1 solves chip-to-chip concepts so now any chip will always connect to another Bluetooth chip on the same radio frequency."

Bluetooth is a base protocol that can enable wireless connection between devices sharing interoperable Bluetooth profiles. However, what makes Bluetooth useful is the software stack - the profiles on top of the core protocol.

Profiles are the function languages that a manufacturer stacks on top of the Bluetooth base to enable chips to connect to corresponding chips in order to perform specific jobs. They include printing profiles or voice profiles.

At the moment there are around 60 Bluetooth profiles and more are being developed. Yet only a few profiles can be stacked on each product, depending on what a manufacturer expects or wants a product to be used with.

Frost and Sullivan's Wall commented: "There is potential for huge variance between protocol stacks and hence massive room for operability issues. Some profiles are official and ratified, some are being planned and some are still in the process."

The result of individual profiles being created and used by different manufacturers is instances such as Vodafone/Nokia Bluetooth-enabled handsets and headsets only working with each other, not with the competition.

alltalking.com's Sheridan said: "Ericsson and Nokia's Bluetooth headsets will only connect to their own Bluetooth phones. That's all wrong. It's completely against what Bluetooth should be."

Yet Lars Redder, Bluetooth product manager at Palm, disagrees with Sheridan. "Nokia and Ericsson's own product compliance is not a big issue. From a certification perspective, they are fully compliant Bluetooth products," he said.

Redder justifies manufacturers' reasoning behind 'proprietary' Bluetooth: "This protocol is in the early stages of its development. The consumer at this point doesn't know where to find Bluetooth stuff, so 'manufacturer bundles' work as a one-stop shop. As things move forward, the bundles will disappear."

This incestuous method - keeping Bluetooth interoperability within families - is something vendors do not wish to become public knowledge.

alltalking.com's Sheridan said: "There's an awful lot of secrecy around manufacturers and vendors not releasing what profiles are included in their devices. There was a big rush to get products onto the market but they hardly contain any profiles."

Manufacturers are reluctant to tell consumers what other SIG-stamped Bluetooth devices their products speak to. Sheridan said: "If Intel brings out a product that will only connect to one device but a competitor like 3Com has a similar product that will connect to five or even 10, Intel is likely to lose customers. Silly issues like this shouldn't even exist."

Silly issues such as disclosing information on profile compatibility to the public have arisen because of a lack of action by SIG, according to Wall as well as Lars Godell, European telecommunications analyst at Forrester Research.

Frost and Sullivan's Wall said: "There was an initial suggestion SIG would provide guidance on vendor responsibility towards enlightening the public on product compatibility but nothing has been done yet. This is something SIG should be doing."

Forrester's Godell said SIG should adopt a more rigorous interoperability testing method, similar to that used by the wireless local area network standards based on 802.11, nicknamed WiFi. WiFi follows the rules of certification laid down by the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA).

Godell added: "SIG Bluetooth products should have to announce what level of Bluetooth they support and what level of interoperability testing they conform to, like the WiFi use of the rigorous WECA testing standards. The existing interoperability work that SIG's come up with is not satisfactory."

The make-up of the controlling SIG committee may be the reason for the group's lack of action on interoperability for products that get its official stamp.

alltalking.com's Sheridan maintains his views have the backing of top people at 3Com, Intel, Lucent and Sony - though they cannot speak out.

He said: "The top guys at SIG are working for Intel. Intel is a manufacturer and is scared of disclosing what profiles it includes in its products as customers could be displeased with what they see and move to the competition.

"Bluetooth is supposed to be open source but it can't be open source if it is run by someone being paid by Intel, which as a hardware company will want to discourage too much openness."

Intel declined to comment for this story.

Palm's Redder said: "SIG has got the brand out there. The next thing to do is show people how to use Bluetooth. In these early stages, telling people what profiles a product uses is a very important step in educating the user."

Is the Bluetooth ball lying abandoned in the middle of the court? SIG does not seem bothered about what its associate manufacturers tell the public and the manufacturers are reluctant to tell consumers and the competition exactly what is in the box.

The next year is likely to see manufacturers become more open about interoperability as consumer interest picks up. It may be a prerequisite for Bluetooth's success.