Mobile App: Personalized Sound Experience
With the help of RUBICON, the True Wireless Stereo Company offers personalized sound to their users
“A great team that quickly can assess, plan and execute on complex projects with many unknowns. Our industry is reliant on technology with many black boxes, something the team at RUBICON navigates with confidence and calm.”
(Head of Product & Design, True Wireless Stereo Company)
Intro
In the past couple of years, we have experienced a significant increase in the number of True Wireless Stereo (TWS) earphones on the market. With so many different ones to choose from, companies must come up with creative ways to make their product stand out. That’s where the idea for personalized sound comes in. Besides comfort and quality, being able to control the sound is a great and useful addition to the overall experience.
Every person hears things differently, which is why it is important to be able to modify the sound in ways that suit the individual.
Background
After designing the earphones, our client came up with the idea to expand their functionality and offer a personalized approach to their users. The idea was to create an application that enables the user to manipulate the earphones and personalize the sound to their liking. The client started the collaboration with our team, in order to help them achieve their goal of creating a multiplatform mobile app.
The Client
Since the foundation of the company in 2012, the client has implemented the latest technology in order to create premium audio devices that comply with the highest standards of design, sound, and simplicity.
A deeper and more immersive listening experience, which this product offers, is derived from analyzing ambient noise and generating anti-frequencies in real-time.
The Project
The Problem
The client created new earphones, which were designed for all-day comfort with an idea to help the user personalize the sound. The reason for that is that every person hears things differently and has different sound preferences so it would be best if each person could have the exact sound they want.
RUBICON’s challenge was to create a cross-platform mobile application that enables the user to have more control over their earphones. This includes a personal sound test that automatically generates a custom equalizer for the person completing the test and a customizable equalizer with advanced presets available for more fine-grained control over the sound. The application also supports Over-the-air (OTA) updates for the earphones.
The Solution
The solution entailed an app that enables the user to manipulate the sound on the earphones whilst making that process easy and enjoyable. The app has a very easy-to-follow onboarding process with clear instructions on what to do. When the onboarding process is done the users are presented with the main part of the application that is easy to use and understand. Users can then select one of six predefined sound profiles or create their own custom sound profile. One of the app’s main features is the personal sound profile test where the users can take a hearing test that will determine the best sound profile for their hearing.
Project Objectives
- The main objective was to make an easy to use app which enables users to manipulate the sound on their earphones
- Scanning for appropriate BLE devices and connecting to the client’s earphones
- Selecting custom or predefined profiles
- Adding new and editing existing custom profiles with real-time sound manipulation
- Deleting custom profiles
- Creating a personalized sound profile using the personalized test
- Easy access to the device manual and help center
- Supporting multiple vendors for TWS chipsets (BES, Airoha)
- Updating the firmware of the earphones Over-the-air (OTA) to support future enhancements
The Challenges
During the development phase of the project the following challenges were overcome:
- Testing incoming chipset firmware for needed functionalities
-FW would sometimes regress to lose functionality
-Reporting bugs back to FW vendor for fixes
-Incomplete documentation coming from the FW vendor required reverse engineering of the protocols - Designing a user-friendly interface with a simplistic feel
- Creating an easy to use flow for the earphone connection process
- Allowing users to change the sound on their earphones through an easy-to-use equalizer interface
- Creating a way for the user to personalize the sound based on their hearing abilities
The Software Development Process
Prior to the development of the application, our developers focused on de-risking in order to make sure that there are no impediments to the app development. Communication with the Smart Audio SoC Supplier together with the firmware testing helped us establish that the Airoha and Bestechnic chips work as advertised and as needed for the application to be implemented. The outcome of the de-risking phase was that both Airoha and Bestechnic chips can support the functionalities that the client requested, and only then, the development process could begin.
The duration of the project was about two months and the development roadmap was split into five two-week sprints. The team worked in Scrum and the Scrum Master role was assigned to one of the developers.
At the beginning of application development, the main focus was to create a functional and aesthetically pleasing UX/UI design. The client had a general idea of what the application should look like, and our designer made sure to turn those ideas into reality. At the same time, the development team was examining the sample mobile applications provided by the hardware manufacturers to get a better understanding of how the communication with the earphones is carried out.
Communication between the device and the earphones needed to be achieved using Bluetooth Low Energy. Due to a lack of documentation for the implemented BLE protocol on the firmware and closed-source library from the suppliers, the team relied on sniffing the BLE traffic to fill in the gaps.
The team was able to deliver the main functionalities of the app on time, with some time left for additional testing and fine-tuning.
Once both the development and the testing were finished, the application was launched to Google Play Store and the App Store for users to download.
RUBICON’s team consisted of:
- Two software engineers
- A QA Engineer
- A UX/UI Designer
- A Product Owner
Results
The development team delivered a fully functional application for controlling the equalizer of the client’s earphones. The final product is practical and useful for everyone who wants to have more control over their earphones.
Technology Stack
Flutter
- An open-source UI software development kit used for creating the UI and implementing the functionalities of the mobile application
Swift
- Used for developing the iOS part of the Flutter BLE plugin
Java
- Used for developing the Android part of the Flutter BLE plugin
Xcode/Android Studio
- IDEs used for development
Packet Logger/Wireshark
- Tools used for sniffing BLE traffic between iOS and Android devices and the earphones
Clean architecture
- Coding principles that separate different layers of the application and enable fast and testable development
The App Preview
Information
- Company: True Wireless Stereo Company
- Region: Northern Europe
- Industry: True Wireless Stereo
- Project Duration: October 2021 — December 2021
- Project: Mobile development & UX/UI
Originally published at: https://www.rubicon-world.com/case-studies/mobile-app-personalized-sound-experience/
