ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Thomas Voß <thomas.voss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Nov 27, 2015 at 3:50 PM,  <ubuntu.mexon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On 2015-11-27 22:28 , Thomas Voß wrote:
>> Sorry to hear that you have had a frustrating experience with the
>> phone. I hope your vacation
>> still went well, though :) That being said, we fixed quite a few bugs
>> for our positioning infrastructure and
>> you might want to check:
>>
>>   https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/location-service
>>
>> for open bug reports.
>
> Thanks for the link.  But I don't think you're going to get much in the
> way of useful bug reports out of me - my chief complaint is the lack of
> feedback from the location system about which component is responsible.
> So "GPS doesn't work" is about all I can do for now, hence a too-long
> list email rather than a bug report.
>>
>>> First of all, GPS doesn't seem to work when the phone is offline.  Is
>>> this a known issue?  Is it hardware related at all?  The iPhone
>>> performed very well, especially with Here Maps.  One interesting way it
>>> beat Mappero is that Mappero would only show me a location once it had
>>> got a full fix, whereas Here Maps quickly gives me a circle at least a
>>> few tens of kilometers across.  That's actually useful, for example when
>>> you suddenly wake up because the night bus has stopped and you need to
>>> know if it's your stop or not.
>>>
>> Whenever the phone goes to deep sleep (that is, it is suspended in your pocket),
>> the GPS also switches off. It is one of the main parts of the system
>> draining power.
>> The behavior is intended at this point in time, though. We are working
>> on enabling apps
>> to selectively tell us that they are actively carrying out navigation
>> tasks to prevent the device
>> from going to deep sleep, though.
>
> It kinda sounds like you misunderstood this point.  By "offline" I mean
> "has no network connection", not "switched off".  I sat down on a park
> bench completely still for ten minutes waiting to get a fix,
> deliberately keeping the screen switched on the entire time.  No fix.
> So I came to the conclusion that if the location service doesn't have an
> internet connection it doesn't try to get a fix using "pure" GPS.
> Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Ah, thanks for the clarification. Pure GPS is certainly something we
are supporting (obviously modulo bugs).
I will see if I can reproduce your problem locally.

>>> Second, the main map app I'm using is OSMTouch.  If I open that app it
>>> doesn't seem to automatically turn on GPS.  I have to separately turn it
>>> on in the notifications area.  This is surely not how it's supposed to
>>> work, right?
>>>
>>> There are huge problems with OSMTouch, but the reason I'm using that one
>>> is that it at least caches map tiles for offline use.  Possibly other
>>> apps work better, but without offline functionality they're all
>>> irrelevant to me.
>>>
>>> However, with OSMTouch, even when I'm online and I get a fix I can't
>>> zoom to my current location.  After tapping the pin icon, often as not I
>>> get a message like "geolocation failed".  It sometimes works, sometimes
>>> doesn't.  There's very little feedback as to what the problem is.
>>>
>>> OSMTouch's offline tile caching also doesn't actually work reliably
>>> enough to be useful.  I deliberately focus on a map I'd like to keep,
>>> then quit the app.  When I next load that map many of the tiles are
>>> missing - seemingly at random.
>>>
>> Please see https://bugs.launchpad.net/osmtouch for filing bugs against omsTouch.
>
> The failure to automatically turn on GPS, and the "geolocation failure",
> presumably aren't bugs in OSMTouch but rather in the location service?
> Unless OSMTouch is using the wrong APIs or using them wrong?

For the GPS turned on issue: I think that's mostly a problem with how
we present the current status in the UI.
As you summarize further down below, a problem with communcating
clearly to the user what is going on with
the positioning engine. For the timeout: That's somewhere between the
service and the app.

I mainly provided you with the respective link for the other
issues/ideas you were mentioning.

>>
>>> I haven't found any map app that allows me to pin points of interest and
>>> keep them.  Even if there are no actual maps GPS can still be useful
>>> this way, for example noting down the location of the hotel or park
>>> entrance so you can always find your way back.  I definitely shouldn't
>>> have to be online for this - that's the one area where Here maps is a
>>> complete failure.
>>>
>> Probably a good idea to file a feature request against your favorite
>> mapping app on Ubuntu Touch.
>
> I guess, but the broader problem with Ubuntu Touch is that there are
> many mapping apps, none of which have the resources to make something
> that really works.  I've seen this problem brought up on this list
> before.  My take on this is that mapping is a core app, of similar
> importance to Dekko.  Like Dekko, one app should be taken under
> Canonical's wing and brought up to scratch.  I know, resources, but
> that's how I see it anyway.

Sure, I tend to agree with you. However, resources and such.

>>
>> Sure it is, we are working on exposing the relevant satellite
>> visibility information to applications right now,
>> please track https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/location-service/+bug/1448180.
>
> Great, glad that this bug is on the radar.  I really believe this will
> reduce the stress of trying to use GPS a lot.
>> Again, sorry for the inconvenience. I think you want to try out OTA8
>> and see if it works better for you.
>> At any rate: Thanks a lot for your feedback and I would be happy to
>> chat a little further about your ideas on irc (tvoss@freenode).
>>
>>
> FWIW I took care to install OTA8 and re-try before filing my bugs, and I
> haven't seen a big improvement.
>

ack, I will keep updating this thread to keep you posted.

Cheers,

  Thomas

>
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