ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Sam Bull <sam.hacking@xxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, 2016-07-14 at 15:13 +0100, Alan Bell wrote:
> and the utterly broken location services
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/location-service/+bug/15546
> 04
> 
> the only way to get a location is to use a moving dot map
> application 
> and wait and wait for a fix, then you can go to your other location 
> aware thing so it doesn't give out a spectacularly stale location.

As far as I can see, the location services are not broken, just the API
design. Apps such as the Weather app, typically ask for a location
once, and the location service provides the best location it has at
that moment in time.

The first thing I'd like to see changed, is that the accuracy of the
location should consider the time that has passed since that location
recording. E.g. A GPS position might be 10m accuracy, but if it is 30s
later, then that should give something like 100m accuracy. If it is
hours or days old, then the accuracy becomes 10's of km.

The second thing I'd like to see, which I've suggested here before, if
an app wants a location one time, such as the Weather app, there should
be a second parameter which defines the minimum level of accuracy. E.g.
for the Weather app I only need a roughly city-level position, so it
could specify a minimum accuracy of 2km or so. If this level of
accuracy (factoring time into it) is less than the minimum, then it
should get a new location that meets the minimum requirements and
return that. The app can then display a 'waiting for location' message
while the location service is working.

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