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Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2024 08:01:43 +0200
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Subject: Re: Bluetooth for hearing aids support (ASHA)
To: Stefnotch <brandmairstefan@gmail.com>
Cc: Luiz Augusto von Dentz <luiz.dentz@gmail.com>,
 Arun Raghavan <arun@asymptotic.io>, linux-bluetooth@vger.kernel.org
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From: Paul Menzel <pmenzel@molgen.mpg.de>
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Dear Stefnotch,


Am 27.07.23 um 19:31 schrieb Luiz Augusto von Dentz:
> Hi Stefnotch,
> 
> On Wed, Jul 26, 2023 at 6:13 AM Stefnotch wrote:

>> On Tue, Jul 25, 2023 at 8:07 PM Luiz Augusto von Dentz wrote:

>>> On Tue, Jul 25, 2023 at 6:49 AM Stefnotch wrote:

>>>> I have hearing aids, which can be connected to devices that support
>>>> the Bluetooth ASHA protocol.
>>>> https://source.android.com/docs/core/connect/bluetooth/asha
>>>> That protocol is open and somewhat well documented. However, it is
>>>> only supported on Android devices at the moment. BlueZ on Linux does
>>>> not appear to support it.
>>>>
>>>> The idea is with Bluetooth ASHA, one can stream audio from a computer
>>>> directly to a pair of hearing aids. Without Bluetooth ASHA, I'm
>>>> limited to using a battery powered, clumsy accessory from Cochlear.
>>>>
>>>> I was wondering if it would be worthwhile to support that in BlueZ.
>>>>
>>>> For the record, this has been requested in the past, but hasn't
>>>> progressed any further.
>>>> https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxquestions/comments/l54zku/accessibility_for_the_deaf/
>>>> https://github.com/bluez/bluez/issues/481
>>>
>>> Don't think there is any objection to having support for ASHA, the
>>> problem is that most of the companies contributing to BlueZ are
>>> focusing on LE Audio which supersedes ASHA, so the challenge is to
>>> find someone to support this feature.

>> Glad to hear that I found the right place to ask about this. Do you
>> think it would be worthwhile to try to find someone to support this
>> feature, or is the Bluetooth team usually very short staffed?
> 
> There are not so many people dedicated to upstream full time, besides
> normally for big features like this we normally rely on companies
> interested in the feature to support the work upstream.
> 
>>  From a user-perspective, I think that a number of existing hearing
>> aids support ASHA, and might never receive a firmware update for any
>> newer Bluetooth Audio Standards. For example, the Cochlear Nucleus 7
>> supports ASHA, however it has been superseded by the Cochlear Nucleus
>> 8. I really don't know if companies have much incentive to update old
>> devices that many people rely on.
>> Considering the price tag on some of those hearing aids, I fear that
>> this ASHA support request might still be relevant in 10 years.
> 
> Well you could consider asking the manufacturer, or google, to support
> Linux in general, but I'm afraid they might push back saying they
> support just the major OSes.
> 
>> If it is indeed worthwhile to try and find someone to support this
>> feature, is there anything I could do to support this?

Just for the archive, as you probably know already from the issue [1] 
referenced in your message starting the thread, Arun is working on this 
[2], and it is currently reviewed on this list.


Kind regards,

Paul


[1]: https://github.com/bluez/bluez/issues/481
[2]: https://github.com/bluez/bluez/pull/836