894323 - [B2G][NFC][User Story]: Support Reading of NFC tags

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(Firefox OS Graveyard :: NFC, defect)

Description

[Ken Chang[:kenkai]]

The NFC enabled Mobile device can read an NFC tag. NFC tags are used most commonly to direct a mobile device to a particular web page for a coupon or promotion etc. The reader/writer mode within the NFC stack is used for reading NFC tags.
--Core Protocol stack requirements
1)     Firefox OS must support the reader/writer mode in the NFC stack.
2)     Firefox OS must support the NDEF data exchange format.
3)     Firefox OS must support NFC tag types 1,2,3,4
--User experienceThe user can tap an NFC enabled mobile device against an NFC tag. This will typically cause the mobile device to open up the browser and go to the URI specified by the NFC tag.

Comment 1

[Garner Lee]

In development code suports this usage (and demo-able now).

Comment 3

[Casey Yee]

So does this in-effect work like a QR code?  

What exactly are the use cases for this technology?
URL's?  Web URL/addresses?  Contact information?  Transferring media?

Is there any real-world use cases of this technology that is out there in the wild and in use that we can evaluate?

Comment 4

[Garner Lee]

Use Case wise: I can't speak authoritatively, but QR codes are far more common at various conferences and events.

Technology-wise, support for reading (and writing) does support all other use cases due to shared code underneath.

Comment 5

[Peter Dolanjski [:pdol]]

Moving NI to Sandip

Comment 6

[Walter Chen[:ypwalter][:wachen]]

Where can we get NFC tags? Also, is there any app created for NFC tags? Or, will there be one after all the function completed? If not, I could make an app for testing later maybe (only if api and other stuffs are not restricted to certified/privelege )

Comment 7

[Walter Chen[:ypwalter][:wachen]]

I think it is not just doing what QR codes is doing. There are many use cases. I can just come up with some now:
1. User can read the payment information and pay
2. User can save their website or information in a tag and allow user to fetch it
3. User can rewrite their information in a tag
4. User can reencode the tag to keep it secure
5. User can save bunches of settings in NFC, put them in different places, and phone would automatically sense it/change settings. For example, you put the tag under charger before, you can put a tag of mute settings. Also, you can put a tag of vibration only on the desk you study so if you put phone there. It will change to settings of environment you like when you are studying
6. Contacts info
7. Bluetooth auto pairing ...
I think it is way more creative than a QR code. :P

Comment 8

[Garner Lee]

Hi Walter,

We just updated the internal NFC interfaces, and I'll upload the Gaia side nfc-demo app (Bug 860910) that can read, write, and P2P exchange NFC NDEF formatted tags. NDEF is an open standard, so nfc-demo in no way covers al use cases.

Where to get tags: I'll get back to you...

Comment 9

[Chuck Lee [:chucklee, Triggered by NI, Review, and Feedback requests]]

Hi, Garner,

This is not for the real user story or acceptance criteria.
That's for answering Casey's comment 3.

About the nfc-demo app, is it a certified/privelege app?

Comment 10

[Garner Lee]

@Walter:
Tags: At least for US based folks, here's were I believe we got them last time:

 http://nfctags.tagstand.com/

@Chuck:
NFC-Demo (and System App/NFC) is a certified app (it can access the DOM functions to use NFC function), but we can consider how to safely loosen that up a bit. What that means currently is unprivilaged apps will merely get MozActivity notifications with information on it (a vcard, a URL, a phone number, etc), instead of directly from the navigator.mozNfc DOM.

Comment 11

[Kai-Chih Hu [:khu]]

(In reply to Ken Chang from comment #0)
> The NFC enabled Mobile device can read an NFC tag. NFC tags are used most
> commonly to direct a mobile device to a particular web page for a coupon or
> promotion etc. The reader/writer mode within the NFC stack is used for
> reading NFC tags.
> --Core Protocol stack requirements
> 1)     Firefox OS must support the reader/writer mode in the NFC stack.
> 2)     Firefox OS must support the NDEF data exchange format.
> 3)     Firefox OS must support NFC tag types 1,2,3,4
Based on the discussion with DT during NFC work week, we will remove this one. 
> --User experienceThe user can tap an NFC enabled mobile device against an
> NFC tag. This will typically cause the mobile device to open up the browser
> and go to the URI specified by the NFC tag.

Comment 12

[Kai-Chih Hu [:khu]]

So, the core protocol stack requirements only contains: 
> 1)     Firefox OS must support the reader/writer mode in the NFC stack.
> 2)     Firefox OS must support the NDEF data exchange format.

Comment 13

[Sandip Kamat]

Will add the exact required tag types after we confirm the OEM/HW. OK to remove this line ("Firefox OS must support NFC tag types 1,2,3,4") from the user story for now on v1.2.

Comment 14

[Kai-Chih Hu [:khu]]

Remove blocking-b2g flag from User Story bugs. Use whiteboard to indicate what FxOS version we target.

Comment 15

[Jean Gong :jgong]

Update whiteboard tag to follow format [ucid:{id}, {release}:p{1,2}, ft:{team-id}]

Comment 16

[Ken Chang[:kenkai]]

Close this bug so that QA can do verification.

Comment 17

[Walter Chen[:ypwalter][:wachen]]

It was verified. However, moz-trap- for no real test cases can be applied

Comment 18

[Wesley Huang [:wesley_huang] (EPM) (NI me)]

Hi Juwei,
Per discussion with QA, we would still need UX doc updated for future tracking.
Tags with URL or vCard are the use cases we would claim as FxOS features.

Set back to RESOLVED FIXED as we are adding more test cases.

Comment 19

[Juwei Huang[:juwei]]

Attachment: [NFC] Reading tag_v1.0.pdf

Spec updated.

Comment 20

[Alison Shiue]

Verified on
Device    Flame 
Gaia      2e5636e852a9354a5f8072b179cf16f72647cfd6
Gecko     https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/8bd92dc9ef59
BuildID   20140608160201
Version   32.0a1