Develop Bugs

New Google Maps, includes low end software based GPS for Hermes

www.google.com/gmm
I did not see this when I searched so I thought I would post it.
Latest version of google maps (2 beta) is out and it includes my location (tower based locater)
Its not great but depending on your location it can give pretty good fix as to where you are (and provide directions/searches nearby). Pretty useful tool, I find the performance better than Navison.

I always wondered why a gps locations couldnt be created using cell phone towers!
Thanks for the heads up!
Downloading now!!
When you click on Menu click My Location to find your location via softgps.
Aww..my location is temporarily unavailable
*edit*
This works better when NOT connect to computer via USB cable LOL
This is totally sweet!

Wow, very nice. Just tried it out and it is accurate to a few blocks.

I've been using for a while now...I like it.
Gives you a decent starting point as opposed to typing in address. In directions...just use "my GPS Location" as a starting point and it will use the nearest tower as your starting point.
Looks like I might hold off on the tilt a bit longer. ($149 on premier has me tempted)
-AD

Very cool! Simple, Fun, & Progressive for our non-gps Hermes!

Well I installed it and My location is not available.... But thinking about it I read somewhere that it uses Celular broadcast, and I am afraid T-Mobile NL does not provide celular broadcast maybe because it is an 1800 MHZ network ???

Google Maps 2
This is an uterly brilliant program! For the first time, I can use my phone, without a GPS receiver, to find my approximate location, view the map or satellite picture, and find the nearest pub, garage, hotel etc. Wow!!

Works like a charm here! Pretty amazing stuff. We just went out tonight, got hungry, wanted pizza....and google told us where to go!

Churchill said:
Well I installed it and My location is not available.... But thinking about it I read somewhere that it uses Celular broadcast, and I am afraid T-Mobile NL does not provide celular broadcast maybe because it is an 1800 MHZ network ???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Probably. Couldn't get it to work either.

Isnt Proximus Belgium 1800 Mhz too? Works here and very accurate.

Can confirm also works well on Telstra (Australia) GSM/UMTS networks.
Nifty bit of software.
Many thanks to aaronsmckee for alerting us to it.

Churchill said:
Well I installed it and My location is not available.... But thinking about it I read somewhere that it uses Celular broadcast, and I am afraid T-Mobile NL does not provide celular broadcast maybe because it is an 1800 MHZ network ???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That might be it... or it may be that Google has not added the tower id number for NL yet (it is still in beta). The way the app works is that it draws down the tower id number from the tower your using to connect with. Then it matches it up against a DB that google has of all the tower ids. So it might just be that they have not yet added NL yet or perhaps just your particular carrier (I would be intrested to see what results NL users with different carriers get).

Tower ?
Let me ask a quick question. The location indicated. Is that the actual location of the tower or and approximation of your position ????

angelome said:
Let me ask a quick question. The location indicated. Is that the actual location of the tower or and approximation of your position ????
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
its not the tower location. I work ~2 miles from home and at work it said i was within 1400 meters of the location. Which was pretty close, when I was at home it gave the same location (well about 1 block difference from the one at work) but said I was within 5000 meters of said location. Pretty neat program update. Its not the tower location because I looked at satelite view and there isn't any tower anywhere close to the blue dot

Very nice! Works ok on weak GSM signal near Swindon (UK) on T-Mobile. At home it shows within 1 ml of actual location. Now - will they enable some interaction with Google Map so you can send a web page link to someone that will show where you are on Google Map . Lots of potential with this one.

illavbill said:
its not the tower location. I work ~2 miles from home and at work it said i was within 1400 meters of the location. Which was pretty close, when I was at home it gave the same location (well about 1 block difference from the one at work) but said I was within 5000 meters of said location. Pretty neat program update. Its not the tower location because I looked at satelite view and there isn't any tower anywhere close to the blue dot
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I believe there is some extrapolation based on signal strength but the tower is the key identifier (from an article about it)
"Cellular networks work in this way that neighbouring base stations form "cells" in which users can make phone calls. Interestingly each base station sends unique "cell identification" (cell ID) so if you know where physically each base station is located you can extrapolate physical location of a phone! Apparently Google has database of cell IDs and Google Maps application sends to Google list of neighboring base stations and in return Google servers are returning approximate geographical location of your phone! "

GPS-A
This is probably based on the GPS-A(assist) technology that 911 uses. I would guess that it uses signal strength(distance), and multiple towers(direction) to make its guess. Its pretty neat really. just installed it tonight. I had given up on google maps in favor of live search, but I think I may have just changed my mind. trying to figure out where you are, to tell it to find you kind of sucked when you were wwalking around a new town that you had never been before. This one is definatly a keeper.

Tried last night. My locationw as temporarily unavailable. I switched to 2G only and voila, it found me (well, sort of)
On Orange UK.

Tried it on mine, and got my location within 1400 meters. Its not bad, very useful if you wake up hungover in a doorway somewhere.....

Works in NJ
I had also given up on Google Maps in favor of MS Live but I may have just changed my mind. I loaded this last night, drove for about 40 minutes on highways in northern NJ, and it was reasonably accurate. It showed my location on the highway for the most part which makes me believe the location indicated is not the tower location. Now, the location on the map leads or lags wherever I might actually be but that is OK. I was in Central and Northwest NJ in the "boonies", way out in the hills.
All in all, pretty impressive. I am sticking with it and hope that there will be continual improvements.

Htc Sense weather location wrong

Im running mighty's latest rom as of now and when i try to do my location in the weather tab, it puts me in kingston jamaica or karlovac which i dont even know where that is. anyways google maps gets my location correct and within 20 meters. any one got any help? btw ive run quick gps, didnt work.

AFAIK, at least with the stock VZ ROM, location for weather is picked up from the tower location, not GPS location. So that fact that Google Maps works OK doesn't really help much. You might try posting in a thread for Mighty's ROM.

SecretAgentMan said:
You might try posting in a thread for Mighty's ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Now why would anyone want to do that when they can just start a new thread?
There is probably a Menu on your Weather tab. Check the settings and make sure you have enabled the Automatic Updates.
Did you enable Location Services? Don't ask what it is. Do a search and find out for yourself. You will feel much better about yourself.

It is 19 degrees here, so if my weather tab wants to put me in Kingston Jamaica, I will go get packed now...

I also have this issue - with standard HTC Rom jan. '10
Hi,
I have the same issue, different locations of course ;-)
My location places me in the middle east instead of western europe...
If it takes my location from my tower location it doesn't make any sense....
Help...

I'm getting the same issue, it also thinks I'm near Kingston in Jamaica.
I'm in North Wales, UK so was quite confused to pick up my phone see the clock on Eastern Caribbean time and 25C with thunderstorms...bit weird as it was snowing outside at the time.
Google maps also thinks I'm in Jamaica. Is this an issue with Google location services?
J

Kind of the same issue, but not really.
Ok, I kind of feel everyone's pain here. Since Sprint was gracious enough to release the Win6.5 & Touch Sense 2.5 upgrade (FINALLY, YOU SPRINT ********), I upgraded last night. Initially, it had said Minneapolis, MN. I am in MN, but not in Minneapolis. I am in Brainerd, MN.
Long Story short, a couple of times, I seen it actually default to Brainerd, MN. But Went to look again and found that it went Back to Minneapolis.
I guess what would really be good here is an application or extension of the HTC Sense Weather program that would allow for you to explicitly define what you want to see on your "Home" tab in HTC Sense.
Basically, the GPS, Tower, whatever it is... would be an excellent tool for travel and shouldn't be disabled, but only made as an option as part of the above suggested suggestion. If I could select it when I am traveling, and choose which city I wanted when I am not, this would be so much better.
Lastly, is there a way to make it updates it's location? Or even change and/or remove the "Detected" city?
Any Help would be appreciated.

This is really frustrating me now...
I've just moved house, and my phone is insistent on me still living in the old town. I can go anywhere and it will update to the nearest town correctly, but as soon as I'm back on my wireless network at home it always goes to my old home town.
I can remove my wireless network settings and just use 3G at home, and it gets the correct town. It's ONLY through my home wifi network that it chooses my old town!

Weather location
I think I have the same problem. My weather location isn't updating. I think it has something to do with the new radio 2.09

oedsdemeer said:
I think I have the same problem. My weather location isn't updating. I think it has something to do with the new radio 2.09
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you used any other apps (like google maps) to verify your ability to get a good GPS lock since upgrading to that radio? Somtimes after flashing to a new radio it's necessary to reestablish that ability before your My Location will update properly

Hey all, I don't know if this issue is the same as what I was having but I know how frustrated I was so I figured I'd pass along my results (I did finally solve it)
EDIT: crap, I can't post outside links. Go to AndroidForums and search for a thread called I feel like I'm in the effin twilight zone it was created by me (same username).

In my case (Win6.5 TouchPro2):
Open GoogleMaps, let it use GPS, let GPS get hold of the satellites. Wait for a few minutes, let it download the map to show your location. Exit GoogleMaps.
Now MyLocation is correct, hence weather shown is correct.

HTC HD2 weather location wrong.
uuuummmm, solution is embarissing.
Click on the time.
Choose my location (that will use the gps)
If your gps is not working, select your location.
Regards,
totter

[Q] A-GPS on HTC 7 Mozart

I have used Xperia X1 for a long time, before I changed to HTC 7 Mozart.
When I used X1, with Google maps, when I stayed inside my house, it will automatically changed to A-GPS, with a circle around my position.
But with my HTC 7 Mozart now, when I'm in my house, Bing Maps only "Searching ..." with no result, while other apps like JustAnotherMaps, TAMaps, Advanced Maps Viewer also have no respond at all.
// of course it respond perfectly when I'm outside.
Is there any problem with my Mozart?

1. goto settings > system (pivot, you'll be on this already) > location... make sure it's on.
2. goto maps > hit the me icon at the bottom (middle one)
3. if fail, turn off and on the phone and try maps again.
if nothing is showing, try and go outside and give it a couple of minutes and see if it locates you.
if you do not get aGPS (it looks the same as what you described, with "my position" being a diamond with a circle in it) and you do not get a positive lock... you probably have a fault device and you might want to try and exchange it for a new one.
the aGPS is pretty much instant on my phone and the proper GPS is reasonably close behind.

oh really
Can you show me the image(s) that aGPS is currently working on your device?
Thanks

There's no specific image to show, it just determines location, that's it. It certainly works for me. Whether it does or not depends on whether the service Microsoft is using to determine cell Tower locations is available and is correct for your location.

I'm in Vietnam now, and I don't know that M$ have supported my country or not :|

kirimaru89 said:
I'm in Vietnam now, and I don't know that M$ have supported my country or not :|
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's the problem. The feature you asked is not a-GPS, but rather cell tower triangulation. It largely depends on whether or not the pariticular serivce (Bing or Google) has exntensive collections of cell towers in your location or not. In this case, it seems Bing or Microsoft doesn't have the database for cell tower locations in Vietnam but Google does.
aGPS is a totally different feature. It is used to speed up GPS initial lock using assitance from the cell data network.

found me sitting at my computer in under 5 seconds....
Guess if the gov't wanted to find me it wouldn't be hard!

foxbat121 said:
That's the problem. The feature you asked is not a-GPS, but rather cell tower triangulation. It largely depends on whether or not the pariticular serivce (Bing or Google) has exntensive collections of cell towers in your location or not. In this case, it seems Bing or Microsoft doesn't have the database for cell tower locations in Vietnam but Google does.
aGPS is a totally different feature. It is used to speed up GPS initial lock using assitance from the cell data network.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes that pretty much explains my situation I described in other thread.
On my device - LG E900 - I get GPS position (outdoors) but no triangulation data.
I don't see any circle either. I live in Poland where Bing maps are pretty poor.
But GPS works.

I've searched, and I think that the only reason for this problem is M$ now doesn't have the data about Cell Tower in VN (and other countries)
Hope M$ will add more data soon.

Waiting for nokia help microsoft support in all country.

Using phone abroad - offline maps and SMS issue

Hey all,
I've recently taken my 4.1.1 GSM Gnex abroad to Germany, having first preloaded the maps I need using the new offline feature. Stupidly however, while I can access the maps offline, I need to turn on data roaming and get a costly data connection in order to actually get my location. Otherwise it just says 'location temporarily unavailable'... But I thought one of the points of offline maps is to avoid costly roaming charges, so what's going on there?
Also, I've noticed that some text messages that I send while abroad to foreign numbers don't go through. Not all of them, strangely, but only to specific numbers. And I can still RECEIVE messages from those numbers. Anyone experienced something similar?

How are these numbers stored? To reach numbers also from foreign networks they've to start like +49*, else you'll call/text a local number. Like on landline, when you call to a different city. You need the calling code. That is for example for the UK +44, or for Germany +49.

You need to have a GPS lock before location will work.
A cold GPS lock takes around 1minute 30 seconds with a good view of the sky.

Mach3.2 said:
You need to have a GPS lock before location will work.
A cold GPS lock takes around 1minute 30 seconds with a good view of the sky.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you sure it's just a line-of-sight issue? It literally says location is temporarily unavailable, and this is has happened in a variety of settings, including outside.
As for the country codes, they're all correct. I've triple-checked this.

Zslev said:
As for the country codes, they're all correct. I've triple-checked this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Interesting. Which network? I know that sometimes there are issues with texts Telekom/D1 <-> Vodafone/D2, so that texts arrive a few days delayed, if at all. Maybe you have a similar problem.
It is a problem with the network, not with the device, I guess.

Zslev said:
Are you sure it's just a line-of-sight issue? It literally says location is temporarily unavailable, and this is has happened in a variety of settings, including outside.
As for the country codes, they're all correct. I've triple-checked this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know if you look at the map and wait for the GPS to lock, it may seem like it's taking forever, give the location button a break, just wait
Actually, i always use this app to get a GPS lock before firing up Maps, at least you can see how many sats are connected and all the information, instead of staring at the GPS icon.

Zslev said:
Are you sure it's just a line-of-sight issue? It literally says location is temporarily unavailable, and this is has happened in a variety of settings, including outside.
As for the country codes, they're all correct. I've triple-checked this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This happened to me on a recent trip to Sri Lanka and India - in both countries. I had a local sim card with regular voice but no data (because it would have taken half a day queue to apply and I wasn't there long enough to be worthwhile).
I didn't have GPS test but I had used faster fix to use the Asian servers.
At one point I had the phone outside, no obstructions, for 20 minutes, still 'location temporarily unavailable'.
I presume it's something to do with having no data connection. Next time I'm OS I'll try GPS test and see what it finds.

abnah said:
Interesting. Which network? I know that sometimes there are issues with texts Telekom/D1 <-> Vodafone/D2, so that texts arrive a few days delayed, if at all. Maybe you have a similar problem.
It is a problem with the network, not with the device, I guess.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is Vodafone de, so that may be it.
I downloaded the GPS Test app and yes, it did manage to get a lock without a data connection if I left it open for you a few minutes. The problem in maps then is that the app simply gives up trying to get a lock after a few seconds, when it says location is temporarily unavailable. Or does it keep trying in the background?

Zslev said:
It is Vodafone de, so that may be it.
I downloaded the GPS Test app and yes, it did manage to get a lock without a data connection if I left it open for you a few minutes. The problem in maps then is that the app simply gives up trying to get a lock after a few seconds, when it says location is temporarily unavailable. Or does it keep trying in the background?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have recently been to Spain where I experienced the same problems on my Galaxy Nexus GSM flashed with Jelly Bean. I was using my danish SIM-card and had therefore no data connection. Were you able to get a GPS connection in Google Maps?

Lumia 900 Location (GPS) issues

Hi,
Recently my Lumia 900 is not finding it's location when I use apps like Bing Search or Yelp. When using the built in Bing search it finds my search request but when I click on the directions icon it is unable to find my location and gives me a No Location Information error.
The only app that consistently gets my location is Nokia Drive. I'm getting frustrated that many of the apps that use location are not working. I've enabled location sharing for the phone and all the apps to no avail.
Anyone else seeing this? Any suggestions?
TIA!

ganks said:
Hi,
Recently my Lumia 900 is not finding it's location when I use apps like Bing Search or Yelp. When using the built in Bing search it finds my search request but when I click on the directions icon it is unable to find my location and gives me a No Location Information error.
The only app that consistently gets my location is Nokia Drive. I'm getting frustrated that many of the apps that use location are not working. I've enabled location sharing for the phone and all the apps to no avail.
Anyone else seeing this? Any suggestions?
TIA!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Mine is doing the same thing. It used to work fine. Over the last several weeks it has been getting worse. I've uninstalled most of the apps that have access to location to see if they were causing some interference with something but nothing is working. Local Scout fails to load anything half the time now, too. Nothing has changed with my phone. Never dropped, never abused, and used to work like a charm.

awesomeindeed said:
Mine is doing the same thing. It used to work fine. Over the last several weeks it has been getting worse. I've uninstalled most of the apps that have access to location to see if they were causing some interference with something but nothing is working. Local Scout fails to load anything half the time now, too. Nothing has changed with my phone. Never dropped, never abused, and used to work like a charm.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
To be honest I can't tell if Local Scout works well or not. It never has what I want (like an option to search) so I just use better apps like Yapf or Yelp. I do know that it took a while for my location to be correctly determined when I was in NYC this past weekend. Today on a drive from southern Vermont to northern New Hampshire, my Nokia Drive lost GPS a few times. It took 5 or so minutes before it was back on track.

Do you guys also have issues with losing/having an incorrect GPS location while using Maps or Nokia Drive?