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GPS tracking in Background - Edge Hack (Not Devel, Stable, RC)

Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved App Development
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    • E Offline
      ernest
      last edited by 24 Jun 2020, 15:33

      Try to let the phone outside for 5-10 min.
      If test_GPS doesn't work for you, then my app will not work.

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      • H Offline
        herr-b
        last edited by 24 Jun 2020, 20:08

        GPS reception is not the problem, the app Activity Tracker is working and recording. I switched now the Activity Tracker to run in the background and it seems to keep running in the background. So I can navigate with Pure Maps in the foreground and record the track in the background. But as soon as the screen gets locked all the apps are stopped? Not sure, I will keep testing ... but if I play music in the Web Browser and the screen locks, also the music stops.
        It looks that in the case the UT phone should be my only phone I will have to reactivate good old Garmin Foretrex 401 for track recording.

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        • E Offline
          ernest
          last edited by 25 Jun 2020, 00:08

          Yes app not in foreground doesn't get GPS signal, see my request there : https://github.com/ubports/ubuntu-touch/issues/1067

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          • H Offline
            herr-b
            last edited by 27 Jun 2020, 08:26

            I can't confirm this. I allowed Activity Tracker to run in the background in UT Tweak Tool and started track recording in Activity Tracker. Then I started Pure Maps to navigate and switched apps from time to time. Most of the time I had Pure Maps in the foreground. At the end I had a complete track in Activity Tracker.

            So this means, that Activity Tracker has GPS reception and works in the background (if allowed in UT Tweak Tool) in my case.

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            • H Offline
              herr-b
              last edited by 30 Jun 2020, 07:13

              Another test showed again the problem with the locked screen. In my test Activity Tracker did not continue recording, once the GPS reception was lost shortly in a building, also GPS reception should have been good again after the interruption. Only after unlocking the screen it continued track recording.

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              • H Offline
                hsce1 @ernest
                last edited by hsce1 22 Jul 2020, 15:48

                Hi @ernest,

                I just had a look at the Utrack.py and made the following change (line 183), which made the code run on my phone:

                if re.search("^longtide", line): #longtide bug in test_gps
                    try:
                        long = line.split()
                -       if re.match(".\d+.\d+", long[1]):
                +       if re.match("(?:\d+(?:\.\d*)?|\.\d+)", long[1]):
                            longitude = long[1]
                        else:
                            subprocess.Popen(["truncate", "-s", "0", temp_file], shell=False)
                

                You are trying to match a floating point number here, right? Following this post it is apparently better to use "(?:\d+(?:\.\d*)?|\.\d+)". I've made a pull request.

                I hope this does not break other things. On the my phone it works..

                Here is the click if someone wants to test:
                https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AADkOrVwV-YvTo00XtHnC997e3gRNIi0/view?usp=sharing

                Best,
                Hendrik

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                • E Offline
                  ernest
                  last edited by 22 Jul 2020, 16:47

                  Thanks for the pull request,
                  I'll not be able to test it prior end of august 😕 (My goods and spare phone are in transit).

                  Let see the feedback of others.

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                  • H Offline
                    hsce1
                    last edited by 31 Aug 2020, 16:48

                    For me the fix seems to work. I am travelling by bike since more than a week and a combination of OSM Scout Server, Pure Maps and Utrack does a very good job guiding and tracking me. The error did not occur again.

                    However, I realized that two fuctionalities would improve Utrack a lot:

                    • Automatic saving of the track every few minutes in order not to loose the hard work of a day once the battery dies 😄
                    • A possibility for pausing/resuming the tracking

                    Do you think this would be possible without deteriorating the battery performance?

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                    • E Offline
                      ernest
                      last edited by 6 Sept 2020, 07:55

                      Thanks for testing, I got back my Nexus 5. I should be able to look at it soon.

                      The aim of this wrapper was to enable simple GPS background tracking, but not pretending to have a full feature app. I'm not going to add functionality on a "hack" even working. It would be better to enable on Utouch the GPS background then we could start thinking on improving apps (like Activity Tracker).
                      We need visibility there : https://github.com/ubports/ubuntu-touch/issues/1067

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                      • M Offline
                        Marcos
                        last edited by 4 Jul 2021, 19:03

                        Guys, I tested the last version from the OpenStore. Once I launch the script it indicates is searching for satellites but does not get the position so generates an empty gpx. If I run test_gps, it gives a "segmentation fault" message. However, GPS works (very) fine in other applications (GPS tracker or uNav). I' m on Volla RC. Any idea why the script is not working? I assume something related to halium or so but not really sure.

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