My first problem....GPS Won't Turn Off Anymore

[f4phantomii]

Having had my G1 for a couple of weeks now and using it extensively, I've gotten pretty used to using it day and night.

I usually turn it off (i.e. completely power it off) at night. This morning when I turned it on, it booted up as usual. Then the GPS icon appeared.

I had not even run any apps. I waited a few minutes to see if it would stop, but no luck.

So I completely powered it off again and then powered it back up. Same result.

I can manually turn off the GPS feature, but I shouldn't have to do so. The previous two weeks it has behaved normally. The GPS would power up when I was using an app that required it. As soon as I exited that app, the GPS would power down automatically.

Now it runs full time.

I received the OTA update (RC29) on Monday, but it's been several days and I don't believe that is the cause.

I've only installed apps directly from the Market. I do not have any of the apps that toggle the GPS on/off.

Is there a way to list the running processes to see if I can determine what is accessing the GPS in the background? It *has* to be one of the apps.

Any other ideas that might help me track down the problem?

-Michael

[juice]

Your phone is haunted by the GPS Ghost of Technology's Past. Because there was no GPS back in the day, he goes around turning all of them on because of the 'mind-blowing technology.'

[gavinfb]

try take battery out and back in....dunno but sometime this trick works

[f4phantomii]

try take battery out and back in....dunno but sometime this trick works

Rats....no luck with that either.

Anyone else have constructive ideas to try?

[birdtales]

Try running maps, hit "my location" then back out of maps. Mine got stuck once and this worked for me. GPS icon went away about 10 secs after I exited maps.

[f4phantomii]

Try running maps, hit "my location" then back out of maps. Mine got stuck once and this worked for me. GPS icon went away about 10 secs after I exited maps.

Nice to see we think alike....that was actually the first thing I tried.

No luck there either. Right now I'm one-by-one uninstalling apps that might use the GPS.

[juice]

Anyone else have constructive ideas to try?


Preform an exorcism?

[MrGibbage]

Mine has the same "problem", but I actually consider it a "feature"! Anyway, I can easily see why some people wouldn't want this behavior, so let me see if I can figure it out. I have installed a few applications that use GPS, and some of them run in the background. You can easily figure out what programs are running in the background using the pTerminal program and running the "ps" command. You'll see entries like "edu.mit.locale" which means (wanna guess?) Locale is running in the background. Believe it or not, the program that I think that is keeping the gps running all the time on my phone is a program called "AccuTracking". I've installed it, but never activated it. I can see that it runs in the background as it is listed as "com.accutracking" when I run the "ps" command. So give that a shot. Even if you haven't installed accutracking, it is probably an app that you have installed. Run the ps command and look at the entries near the bottom of the list. I'll bet it's one of those.

[f4phantomii]

Wonderful! I'm a long-time linux user...just didn't realize pTerminal gave me access to the command line.

I'll take a crack at that and see what's up.

Thank you!

[Stanovoy]

This is not an RC29 issue.

I have had this problem ever since I downloaded the app, ToggleGPS. There seems to be no way to fix this except for a hard reset. I have already uninstalled ToggleGPS, that did not help. I also have GPS Tracker, but that is not shown as running in the background. I have even removed it to see if that would help. It didn't. Other apps that I have that use GPS are iSafe, ParkMark, The Weather Channel, cab4me, and PinPoint. None of those are running in the background either. My guess is something in ToggleGPS screwed the GPS up.

On a good note, however, this is making my "initial" GPS lock a lot faster. It currently takes approximately 1 to 3 seconds to acquire an accurate lock. My battery life is very good, so having the GPS constantly collecting data doesn't really bother me.

[f4phantomii]

Uh oh.....I just realized I don't appear to have any network connectivity either. I don't have 3G in my area, but EDGE has worked flawlessly thus far.

I don't have a wifi connection at the moment to test that.

Looks like I have more than one problem.

[f4phantomii]

This is not an RC29 issue.

I have had this problem ever since I downloaded the app, ToggleGPS. There seems to be no way to fix this except for a hard reset. I have already uninstalled ToggleGPS, that did not help.

It isn't that app either...I've never downloaded or installed it on my phone.

I also just noticed that the GPS stops searching (the notification icon goes away) when it is looking for the network or trying to load a page in the browser.

I'm wondering if my phone is "lost" and if it is trying to use the GPS to figure out a location because it can't triangulate off the towers or something.

[MrGibbage]

On a good note, however, this is making my "initial" GPS lock a lot faster. It currently takes approximately 1 to 3 seconds to acquire an accurate lock. My battery life is very good, so having the GPS constantly collecting data doesn't really bother me.

Heh heh, this is why I consider it a "feature". I like it running all the time, and yes, I get my fix much faster (sounds like I have a substance abuse problem). My phone stays on the charger most of the time, so battery life isn't an issue for me. And longer life batteries are already starting to show up, so it's even less of a concern for me.

[Stanovoy]

I also just noticed that the GPS stops searching (the notification icon goes away) when it is looking for the network or trying to load a page in the browser.

Mine goes on and off. It's not periodic either. Sometimes it would flash the icon with only a few seconds off in between. Other times, it would stay off for minutes. It doesn't really matter what I'm doing at the time.


I'm wondering if my phone is "lost" and if it is trying to use the GPS to figure out a location because it can't triangulate off the towers or something.

That's definitely not it. My G1 is triangulating properly. If you go into Google Maps and see a blue circle at first, then yours is also triangulating properly.

However, I did notice something interesting. Right after the icon disappears, if I start Google Maps, my position is super accurate, i.e. the blue circle is basically nonexistent and would disappear almost instantly. But right after the icon first appears, the blue circle is huge, and it takes a few steps of shrinking before locking on again. So maybe something changed in the phone and it will invoke GPS fixing when the accuracy drops below a certain point. Do you think the G1 is actually learning our habits? I use the GPS a LOT.

[f4phantomii]

Yep....this has got to get fixed.

I'm at 2:10 uptime with 1:20 "awake" time.

Battery is at 60% coming from a full overnight charge this morning. It isn't going to make it through the day at this rate and I've not even made a single call.

[Stanovoy]

Yep....this has got to get fixed.

I'm at 2:10 uptime with 1:20 "awake" time.

Battery is at 60% coming from a full overnight charge this morning. It isn't going to make it through the day at this rate and I've not even made a single call.

For some reason I don't think we have the same problem. My GPS "problem" doesn't drain much battery at all. My battery routinely lasts me over 12 hours. That's one of the main reasons why I had never looked into this "problem" until I saw your post. Alternatively, perhaps your battery is defective?

[f4phantomii]

For some reason I don't think we have the same problem. My GPS "problem" doesn't drain much battery at all. My battery routinely lasts me over 12 hours. That's one of the main reasons why I had never looked into this "problem" until I saw your post. Alternatively, perhaps your battery is defective?

I don't think I have a defective battery. It's been pretty good (no complaints anyway) up to this point.

I just noticed that when the phone is "sleeping" that the GPS does not appear to be drawing power. So all my fiddling with it this morning trying to make it stop probably is the reason for the power drain...the GPS has been running that whole time.

I think I've read a couple of places that with the GPS running full time the battery lasts about 4-5 hours. That would be consistent with what I'm seeing.

If yours sits idle most of the time, the GPS is turned off and it isn't using much power.

[f4phantomii]

OK....finally got network connectivity back via EDGE.

Installed pTerminal and rebooted.

Coming up fresh and running a PS command, most everything running looks like it is just the basic smartphone functions.

One that *does* look a little suspicious:

"com.google.android.gm"

Is that the google maps app? If so...why is it running immediately from a boot up?

[MrGibbage]

I don't know what that one is. I don't have it running on my phone. I just ran the maps app and then ran pTerminal right away and saw com.google.android.apps.maps running, so I don't think the app you found is the maps app.

[MrGibbage]

I just figured it out. It's gmail.

[f4phantomii]

That was my 2nd guess.

I've uninstalled the few apps that I've either installed or updated in the last 48 hours. No help there.

My last little bit of sleuthing will be to run a comparison on my wife's nearly virgin G1. She's only had it a week or so, and has not installed a single app nor has she yet received the OTA update.

I can install pTerminal on her G1 and do a side-by-side comparison of the applications that are running.

But I'm beginning to think this is an OS glitch. It's like the GPS process is getting respawned. It seems to shut down when it is supposed to, then pops right back up.

[juice]

Have you tried that exorcism yet?

[f4phantomii]

Have you tried that exorcism yet?

Can't find a qualified priest.

Quick...someone write an exorcism app!

[MrGibbage]

The interesting thing is I don't see anything different in the ps list when GPS is on and when it's off. I wonder how they are running it?

[f4phantomii]

I wondered that as well. I see processes for "radio" which I assume is the cell phone function.

I see processes for "wifi" and "bluetooth" that appear and disappear when those functions are enabled or disabled in the settings.

I was going to try Airplane Mode and see what all that turned off. I know GPS still works in that mode.

But I definitely see the GPS notification icon appear and disappear rather intermittently, especially when opening or leaving apps.

I wish there were a screen capture app (for the phone, not hte SDK) that would let me grab the output of the ps command. I'm guessing pTerminal doesn't have enough functionality to redirect output to a text file.

[f4phantomii]

That exorcism must have worked...it's behaving much more reasonably today.

The GPS flashes on for a few seconds and then goes back off. Looks like it is doing this around every 5 minutes or so. This is the behavior I would expect if one of the "location aware" apps was running in the background and wanted to check on the location every few minutes.

This is definitely different from the behavior yesterday where the GPS was just stuck on all the time and wouldn't go off unless I manually turned it off. In fact it was almost the opposite....it would be on full time and briefly turn off for a few seconds then come right back on.