Bluetooth Share has Stopped / DeadObjectException

[franrx]

In some mobiles, particullary on Samsung phone, we have got constantlly this exception

01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): android.os.DeadObjectException
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.os.BinderProxy.transact(Native Method)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.bluetooth.IBluetooth$Stub$Proxy.isEnabled(IBluetooth.java:745)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.bluetooth.BluetoothAdapter.isEnabled(BluetoothAdapter.java:524)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.radiusnetworks.ibeacon.service.IBeaconService.scanLeDevice(IBeaconService.java:365)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.radiusnetworks.ibeacon.service.IBeaconService.finishScanCycle(IBeaconService.java:463)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.radiusnetworks.ibeacon.service.IBeaconService.scheduleScanStop(IBeaconService.java:417)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.radiusnetworks.ibeacon.service.IBeaconService.access$2(IBeaconService.java:403)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.radiusnetworks.ibeacon.service.IBeaconService$3.run(IBeaconService.java:413)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.os.Handler.handleCallback(Handler.java:730)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:92)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:137)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:5450)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:525)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:1187)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:1003)
01-29 13:17:57.969: E/BluetoothAdapter(25322): at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method)

This cause frozen app and in sometimes system reboots.

[davidgyoung]

Thank you for the report. I have not seen this before. Can you please tell me under what conditions you see this exception? Is Bluetooth turned on at the time? I'd really like to see a longer log snippet so I can see (a) what happens just before the first time you see this exception, and (b) multiple instances of this happening. If you want to share this log privately, you can email it as an attachment to david@radiusnetworks.com.

Looking at the Android OS source code, it appears that this happens when the Android OS Bluetooth Service has stopped running, which is why a DeadObjectException is logged in the Android OS code below.

If this happens, the Android iBeacon Library is designed to treat this condition as if Bluetooth is turned off -- it will simply try again a second or so later in case the user has turned Bluetooth back on. This may be why you are seeing repeated errors in the log.

Ideally, the library would be able to detect this situation and recover from it somehow. But investigating that possibility requires me to see a longer log snippet.

Thanks,
David

android.bluetooth.BluetoothAdapter.java:448

public boolean isEnabled() {
    try {
        synchronized(mManagerCallback) {
            if (mService != null) return mService.isEnabled();
        }
    } catch (RemoteException e) {Log.e(TAG, "", e);}
    return false;
}

[davidgyoung]

After some offline testing with @franrx, we discovered that a Samsung Galaxy Note 3 with Android 4.3 had its Bluetooth Service crash intermittently whenever an LE scan was going on. This was true with or without the Android iBeacon Library, although the Android iBeacon Library does require bluetooth LE scans to work properly.

This appears to be a problem in at least one Samsung Galaxy Note 3 running Android 4.3. I would be interested in hearing other reports of this problem.

[pselden]

I also see this on a Nexus 5 with 4.4. A application crash dialog also pops up for "Bluetooth Share" whenever this happens.

[nsathish41]

I am getting the error as

E AndroidRuntime: FATAL EXCEPTION: trimDatabase

Can anyone tell me what will be the problem

[davidgyoung]

Update: We have received a number of similar reports in the past two weeks. It seems some (but not all) Android devices upgraded to 4.3 or 4.4 are experiencing intermittent crashes of the operating system's BluetoothService whenever a Bluetooth LE scan is executed. This appears to be a low-level problem between the hardware and the Android OS. Unfortunately, when the BluetoothService crashes and restarts, it temporarily affects the Android iBeacon Library's ability to detect iBeacons.

We are still investigating possible workarounds, but it is likely that a complete fix to this problem will require either an Android update or a firmware update from individual phone manufacturers.

[nsathish41]

thanks for the reply.

I found the following line mentioning com.android.bluetooth has been killed. I have no idea why.

Process com.android.bluetooth (pid 4090) has died.

[davidgyoung]

Clarification:

When an Android device pops a dialog saying BluetoothShate has stopped the underlying cause is that the OS BluetoothService has crashed. The logs will typically have DeadObjectException entries from the Android iBeacon Library because the link to the Bluetooth Service has died. (The library will automatically reconnect to the BluetoothService when it starts back up.)

These are all symptoms of the same underlying problem with Android 4.3 and 4.4 on some devices.

If you are experiencing this issue, please add a comment with the following info:

• exact phone model
• android OS version
• did this problem start after an upgrade?
• does running a specific app trigger the problem? If so what app?
• any specific steps to reproduce?

[nsathish41]

• Model: Nexus 7 (Wi-fi only TAB)
• Android Kit-kat 4.4.2 (Manually compiled from the source code - flashed using fastboot)
• Using script turning off and Turning on BT @ the count reaching nearly 500 , BT crashes.

[ksyamkrishnan]

Faced the similar issue in models:-
Model: Samsung S4
Android 4.3.
While start scanning beacon.
and
Model: Moto g
Android Kitkat
While start scanning beacon.
any work around to avoid this crash ?

[davidgyoung]

Update: I have confirmed that the crash in the core Android Bluetooth Service can be triggered by potentially malformed BLE packets coming from other devices. I have been able to reproduce this problem on my Nexus 4 for the first time in the past week, and can do so at will by simply powering on an iBeacon sourced from China. I no longer believe this problem is related to an upgrade in Android, as I have experienced it on my Nexus 4 running a four-month-old install of 4.4 (last week) and on 4.4.2 (this week).

[nsathish41]

Still the issue remains.

could not allocate CursorWindow? error -24 ?
What error 24 means.?

03-07 07:04:09.910 4683 16897 E SQLiteLog: (14) cannot open file at line 30199 of [00bb9c9ce4]
03-07 07:04:09.910 4683 16897 E SQLiteLog: (14) os_unix.c:30199: (24) open(/data/data/com.android.bluetooth/databases/btopp.db-journal) -
03-07 07:04:09.911 4683 16897 E SQLiteLog: (14) cannot open file at line 30199 of [00bb9c9ce4]
03-07 07:04:09.911 4683 16897 E SQLiteLog: (14) os_unix.c:30199: (24) open(/data/data/com.android.bluetooth/databases/btopp.db-journal) -
03-07 07:04:09.911 4683 16897 E SQLiteLog: (14) statement aborts at 25: [DELETE FROM btopp WHERE ( direction=0 AND status>=200 AND visibility=1 )] unable to open database file
03-07 07:04:09.912 4683 16897 W dalvikvm: threadid=25: thread exiting with uncaught exception (group=0x4cf96160)
03-07 07:04:09.912 4683 16898 E CursorWindow: Could not allocate CursorWindow '/data/data/com.android.bluetooth/databases/btopp.db' of size 2097152 due to error -24.
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: FATAL EXCEPTION: trimDatabase
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: Process: com.android.bluetooth, PID: 4683
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: android.database.sqlite.SQLiteCantOpenDatabaseException: unable to open database file (code 14)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.database.sqlite.SQLiteConnection.nativeExecuteForChangedRowCount(Native Method) 03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.database.sqlite.SQLiteConnection.executeForChangedRowCount(SQLiteConnection.java:734)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.database.sqlite.SQLiteSession.executeForChangedRowCount(SQLiteSession.java:754)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.database.sqlite.SQLiteStatement.executeUpdateDelete(SQLiteStatement.java:64)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.database.sqlite.SQLiteDatabase.delete(SQLiteDatabase.java:1497)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at com.android.bluetooth.opp.BluetoothOppProvider.delete(BluetoothOppProvider.java:457)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.content.ContentProvider$Transport.delete(ContentProvider.java:273)
03-07 07:04:09.913 4683 16897 E AndroidRuntime: at android.content.ContentResolver.delete(ContentResolver.java:1282)

[shobhitg]

@davidgyoung That could be possible. Couple of weeks ago I was in iBeacon hackathon in sf, where I was trying to get Radius Network's android api working for my Nexus 5. I swear that not only my app, but all iBeaconLocate type apps were causing "Bluetooth share has stopped" every 2 seconds. There must be atleast 100 beacons in range (of various manufacturers).
When I came home it crashes only once in 20 seconds. At home I have 2 estimotes, 1 radius's usb dongle and 1 gimbal. I will experiment tonight to see introducing which iBeacon in range causes "Bluetooth share has stopped" error.

Btw, I see no (or little) difference between Samsung S4 (Google version with 4.4) and Nexus 5. Both the phones get that "Bluetooth share" error equally.

[ksyamkrishnan]

thanks for the update david, I too found out the gimbal beacons are sending malformed ble packets. So is there any way to avoid this malfunctioned ble packet interference.

Thanks in advance.

[davidgyoung]

It looks like Chris Stratton has found the root cause. This problem is caused by an Android bug handling a full buffer holding recently seen BLE Mac addresses. The problem is most likely to affect developers who are around large numbers of BLE devices. The first thing to try to temporarily clear the condition is to put your phone in airplane mode, wait a few secs, and take it out. But the condition will return when you scan enough distinct BLE devices to fill the buffer. We are still investigating other more automated solutions. See: http://stackoverflow.com/a/22355276/1461050

[ZackFreedman]

I temporarily fixed this problem by doing the following:

1. Root your phone and install a file explorer, such as Root Explorer.
2. Turn off Bluetooth.
3. Open your file explorer and mount the filesystem as read/write. Navigate to {root}/datamedia/misc/bluedroid.
4. Make a backup of the file bt_config.xml.
5. Open bt_config.xml in a text editor.
6. The tags between and the corresponding are the cached Bluetooth devices. Delete them. Save the file in place and return to the folder.
7. Delete the file bt_config.old.
8. Rename bt_config.xml to bt_config.old.
9. Turn Bluetooth back on.
10. Check your Bluetooth settings. If all your paired devices are gone, the fix worked. Otherwise, repeat from step 4.