Develop Bugs

Vote to get Wifi staying live on device sleep

Windows Phone 7 and also mango will drop wifi on device sleep/screen lock, making receiving emails and other notification impossible unless you have data.
There are people who dont like to use their data services at home, and would love to have an option to keep wifi alive at screen lock, so please vote for this feature:
Vote here for Microsoft to add this feature

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1251336
it's like reading my thread again

you are not alone having this issue, its not smart thinking by MS. We need to voice our issues on their site.

I completely agree. It's borderline retarded if MS expects everyone to have a data plan.

Most people do have a data plan, especially here in the US. The issue is the battery, a lot of people will complain if it stays on consistently and kills the battery. But, I do agree there needs to be an option, which is off by default, to enable this. I also think they need to make it stay on while it's actively downloading something, whether it be an app or a website, not start on WiFi and then dip to 3G when the screen is off.

I don't think that's completely true ...
I have a feeling that the WiFi isn't off 100% of the time when the screen is locked, because there are sometimes that I unlock the screen (after a long time from locking it) and I find out that it's already connected to WiFi !
So I'm guessing that it enables WiFi during sleep at certain intervals to synchronize with the cloud (e-mail, notifications, ... etc), if that's the case, then it's not a stupid decision after all

FiyaFleye said:
Most people do have a data plan, especially here in the US. The issue is the battery, a lot of people will complain if it stays on consistently and kills the battery. But, I do agree there needs to be an option, which is off by default, to enable this. I also think they need to make it stay on while it's actively downloading something, whether it be an app or a website, not start on WiFi and then dip to 3G when the screen is off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to agree here. The reason for the auto-off is for battery saving. I don't notice much difference in battery life myself with WiFi on or off because my screen is almost always off unless I get some sort of a notification or need to look something up. I also agree, that it would be nice to add an option that is defaulted to the current set-up, but when turned on, makes WiFi stay on permanently. Although, I wouldn't expect much battery life with that turned on.

This is great idea, but I would like to ask every1 to vote on everything you think that should be on WP7 (always use 3 votes). It just takes 5mins and helps a lot.

Voted !!! 3 votes

hassanselim0 said:
I have a feeling that the WiFi isn't off 100% of the time when the screen is locked, because there are sometimes that I unlock the screen (after a long time from locking it) and I find out that it's already connected to WiFi !
So I'm guessing that it enables WiFi during sleep at certain intervals to synchronize with the cloud (e-mail, notifications, ... etc), if that's the case, then it's not a stupid decision after all
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Found this happen to me, but in my case, wifi keep connected when plugged in to the charger, checked that in my router and unlock the phone to see the wifi is keep connected. But wifi will not keep connected if not plugged in to the charger

FiyaFleye said:
Most people do have a data plan, especially here in the US. The issue is the battery, a lot of people will complain if it stays on consistently and kills the battery. But, I do agree there needs to be an option, which is off by default, to enable this. I also think they need to make it stay on while it's actively downloading something, whether it be an app or a website, not start on WiFi and then dip to 3G when the screen is off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sure everyone has a data plan. I'm also sure none of those people are stupid enough to waste it when there's a perfectly good and faster WiFi connection at home. Would you rather use your WiFi @ home connection or a data plan when you're at home?

wifi will be kept alive if plugged in a wall socket, this is because if you have setup wireless sync then phone will syc with zune wirelessly when connected to wall socket.
However, the reason for this vote is to voice our opinion for choice...a choice in shape of a simple toggle under settings where we users like us who'd like to use wifi than data at home to keep wifi alive at all times under screen lock....
I've mentioned this before that 3G chip use far more battery power than wifi, so keeping wifi alive at home shouldnt be a BIG hit on battery.
MS can by default have the same setup as is....but users should have an option to toggle this on/off.

iPhone has shown that simple = better. Too many options and choices just confuses the user.

I think the best solution is not an option in the settings to keep it turned on, but to enable it when it's needed, eg,
- Keep it on constantly for push email/applications with push support
- Enable it every 30 minutes (or whenever) for tile updates, email downloading
- Wait until current downloads are finished before turning off WiFi!

regspy said:
wifi will be kept alive if plugged in a wall socket, this is because if you have setup wireless sync then phone will syc with zune wirelessly when connected to wall socket.
However, the reason for this vote is to voice our opinion for choice...a choice in shape of a simple toggle under settings where we users like us who'd like to use wifi than data at home to keep wifi alive at all times under screen lock....
I've mentioned this before that 3G chip use far more battery power than wifi, so keeping wifi alive at home shouldnt be a BIG hit on battery.
MS can by default have the same setup as is....but users should have an option to toggle this on/off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FYI, no wifi sync is setup...

Voted!

I understand the reasoning of what you guys say but now we have another toggle to switch lets not vote WP into being Android with toggles all over the damn place. If you want continuous WiFi its simple plug your phone in then it will stay on even if locked that is a much better solution so when you unplug or are ready to go out the door you know that you have a full battery when you leave.

chicagolive said:
I understand the reasoning of what you guys say but now we have another toggle to switch lets not vote WP into being Android with toggles all over the damn place. If you want continuous WiFi its simple plug your phone in then it will stay on even if locked that is a much better solution so when you unplug or are ready to go out the door you know that you have a full battery when you leave.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats just ridiculous, its a mobile phone not stationary phone. Whats so bad about toggles, i mean MS is treating you like a imbecil or a retard.

ammarmalik said:
I'm sure everyone has a data plan. I'm also sure none of those people are stupid enough to waste it when there's a perfectly good and faster WiFi connection at home. Would you rather use your WiFi @ home connection or a data plan when you're at home?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why would I want to use WiFi when my phone is asleep? It's not like I'm downloading gigs of data for the tiles. The phone synchronizes only Mail, Push Services, Notifications and a few more things. All in all just a few kb. I don't want my phone to use the battery intensive WiFi connection for these tiny downloads.

ChrisKringel said:
Why would I want to use WiFi when my phone is asleep
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why not? Some people just like it that way, or having a choice is a bad thing on WP 7? They can leave it off by default, and for people that can think with their brain, thay can put something like this, so people can CHOOSE what they want.
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[Q] Google Maps always running (even if I stopped)

Hi,
Maps appears always in the battery stats. I don't use Maps. I don't have GPS enabled (I enable it only when I use navigation software; not maps). Location services are always disabled.
When I force stop Maps, this app start itself automatically (right after stopping; sometimes afte some time).
How should I stop it permanently. It drains battery not that much.. but still would like to save some percent.
Thanks!!
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I believe you can disable it, if you dont like/have that option you can freeze it with Tibu.
Edit: Strange though it doesn't ever show in my bat stats. Are you using Latitude? I guess it could be showing because of Navigation.

I noticed my g-maps kept showing up in recent apps, and it turned out that it was because of an updated. Once I went into maps, and saw the "new features" page, it hasn't done it since.
Probably not related, but figured I'd throw it out there.

I agree with the Pirate; seems like latitude is signed in.

Thanks. I did following:
- started maps and 'accepted' new features.
- signed out from latitude. Yes.. seems that it was signed in all the time
Will report later if the maps will appear or not in battery stats again.
Thanks!!!

bullka said:
Thanks. I did following:
- started maps and 'accepted' new features.
- signed out from latitude. Yes.. seems that it was signed in all the time
Will report later if the maps will appear or not in battery stats again.
Thanks!!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For sure signing out of latitude will save you some juice!

I have issues with google maps.
Version 6.3
Gps and location disabled not signed to latitude. But still have 3 google map service running. Quite annoying.

from what I've read around the internet, this is a problem across devices.
I don't use Latitude (never have), and have turned off location services. But Maps is still a persistently active service/process. I posted on a Google board, so hopefully they will reply.
Maybe the operative question is: who isn't experiencing this issue? Maybe we can figure out why.

Maps is always running for me too, but it is never using enough battery to even be on the battery usage statistics. I rarely see it in the recent apps list either.
I went a few days disabling Maps and noticed absolutely no difference in battery either. I'm perfectly OK with it running and taking up 9.3mb of RAM.

noma_pride said:
from what I've read around the internet, this is a problem across devices.
I don't use Latitude (never have), and have turned off location services. But Maps is still a persistently active service/process. I posted on a Google board, so hopefully they will reply.
Maybe the operative question is: who isn't experiencing this issue? Maybe we can figure out why.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well i never have maps show up in my battery list, nor in system panel list. But i do see maps running in my settings app menu, 1 service and 1 process. So never seems to use any resources for me.

Google needs to fix this...can't really do anything to remedy this besides freezing or disabling the package when you are not planning to use it.
I've noticed considerably increased battery life with the apk frozen...even with latitude off and location updating disabled Maps causes some battery drain.

Clear data is a solution . . . sort of!
By clearing the data of the maps (in the application manager), you can have the Google maps drop off from your running app list.
But, all the setup/data in the Google maps will be lost by doing so !
so, this is a solution if you don't care the setup / cached data.

I have a Captivate with rooted stock Gingerbread. I have to kill Maps ever so often when it shows up. It's always low double digits percentage of battery usage for me.
No latitudes (Join Latitudes shows up in Maps->More). GPS not enabled.

I allways unninstall it as i dont need it, but i do want it but will wait till they fix it. For me the best map and gps is me ( roll down the window and ask for directions)
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using xda premium

Sorry for the near-necropost, but I'm coming at a similar issue, from a slightly different angle, and wanted to scope out any thoughts anyone might have here instead of opening a new thread.
My issue with Maps constantly running is no as focussed on the battery life issue, but rather privacy. I run LBE (basically a selective App permission firewall) and one of the features of this program is the ability to Allow/Prompt/Deny certain application privileges. Well, I set it to prompt me to allow Maps to obtain my location, thinking that it would be only a minimal annoyance since I only use Maps once or twice a week.
Think again. Did you know that while Maps sits there, open, in the background, it checks your location constantly? (well, once every half our or so). I finally set LBE to allow maps to get my location without prompting me, but LBE still flashes a notification bar alert to let me know when an app has requested something like my location. Sure enough, every half hour or so, Maps asks for my location, regardless of how long (measuring even into the days) it has been since I have actually used the app. I don't have Latitude running.
This cannot possibly be something that everyone else is just cool with?
Please tell me this isn't just an accepted evil without a solution?

Root and delete maps from /system/app. do t hardly use it anyways. There is also an older version somewhere that doesn't run in the background and you can actually stop.
Sent From My Sprint Galaxy Nexus

Google Maps is running for the network location... barely uses any battery life (having your screen on for a minute will use more battery life) and will not slow down your phone. You guys are freaking out over nothing

derekwilkinson said:
Google Maps is running for the network location... barely uses any battery life (having your screen on for a minute will use more battery life) and will not slow down your phone. You guys are freaking out over nothing
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No, that's not the case, or at least that's not the behavior that I am referring to.
Looking at the event log in LBE, there are actually two things that Maps is doing at regular intervals in the background:
"Track Your Position"
"Obtain Your Current Position"
That's how it is worded. I'll also add that I have experienced other apps where LBE asks me whether I'll grant permission to obtain my "Network Location". That is a distinct permission (at least as far as LBE categorizes them), and is not what I'm concerned about with Maps.
Regarding the suggestion of uninstalling Maps, I still use it, as mentioned, once or twice a week.

Google tells us that to check the "use location data" means background location data will be sent. Weird thing is practically everyone has a blind spot for it - the old not-reading-the-EULA problem perhaps...
I personally think the info could be of interest for population densities, average distance travelled per day, literally where people go and when. With the obvious proviso that none of it is personally identifiable. Just aggregates...
Google is actually sitting on a goldmine of info, but realistically it will be parlayed into advertising profitability.

To be more precise: "Allow Google's location service to collect anonymous location data... ...Collection may occur even when no apps are running."

Mystery outgoing SSL traffic. Lots of it

Few days ago I installed the new Kernel that fixes the network counters from here http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1468626 (thanks to ardatdat).
Immediately I noticed that the traffic is counting up way too quickly. I looked at my bills to see if this is new, and realized that since I got the phone, my monthly traffic was consistently at 200-400MB per month, even though I can explain maybe 30MB per month (I have access to wifi pretty much anywhere I go).
So, started digging. In the last 3 days there's been 25MB down and 50MB up. With all the testing I was doing, I can explain maybe 10 down and 5 up. So, using the TrafficCounter app, I found that a system app called "Task Manager" is responsible for the traffic (attached screencap displays traffic over 4 hours).
It doesn't slowly count up. Instead, it will stay at the same mark, then all of a sudden change by 2.2MB. Every time. So it looks like it packages something and sends it off. The most interesting thing? It only does it when on 3G. If I'm connected to WIFI, it's silent. Like it doesn't want me to see what it's doing.
So, installed Shark, and made a traffic capture. I was able to capture the outgoing SSL stream that was exactly 2.18MB. Destination IP 74.125.226.65 resolves to yyz06s07-in-f1.1e100.net. Browsing there gives google's front page......
Checked the TCP stream, right before the transfer, there's a DNS lookup for android.clients.google.com, which responds with that IP address.
Checking SSL Cert gives me *.google.com cert. Same one as for all of their sites
So it turns out every 3 or so hours there's a 2.2MB transfer from my phone to the google servers via encrypted channel.
Looking further, my wife's and my mother's androids are showing just as much data on their bills, they got Nexus S and Galaxy S. While I can see my wife using so much data, it's doubtful my mom has even figured out how to consume so much traffic.
Anyone else notice this?
What is the purpose of it? If it's legitimate, how can they justify using so much of my limited monthly bandwidth?

You've checked the "keep my phone backed up to my google account" button on setup. You can re-run the setup to uncheck that option, but until then it'll continue to send those big packages, and it prefers the 3G connection. I've taken to leaving my WIFI on and connected at all times. With a measly 200MB/month plan (AT&T can blow me for un-grandfathering my unlimited data), a 15MB backup nightly was killing me...
L4T

If it is the sync feature using all this data, you can disable the automatic sync from Settings > Accounts and Sync. It doesn't appear there's any way to tell it to only sync on Wifi, but I'm sure most of the data monitoring apps out there can stop apps from using mobile data. Onavo, for instance, claims to have this feature, but I haven't had cause to use it yet.

Lookin4Trouble said:
You've checked the "keep my phone backed up to my google account" button on setup. You can re-run the setup to uncheck that option, but until then it'll continue to send those big packages, and it prefers the 3G connection. I've taken to leaving my WIFI on and connected at all times. With a measly 200MB/month plan (AT&T can blow me for un-grandfathering my unlimited data), a 15MB backup nightly was killing me...
L4T
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, that was it! Didn't expect that setting there. It's upsetting that there's no way to configure that feature - such as how often to send data, to only send incrementals, or such an advanced setting as upload only when connected to WIFI.
Problem with leaving wifi on all the time is the fact that it eats battery a lot. If my wifi is on all the time, the battery life is about 40% shorter

kvantum said:
Thanks, that was it! Didn't expect that setting there. It's upsetting that there's no way to configure that feature - such as how often to send data, to only send incrementals, or such an advanced setting as upload only when connected to WIFI.
Problem with leaving wifi on all the time is the fact that it eats battery a lot. If my wifi is on all the time, the battery life is about 40% shorter
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problem, could you append [SOLVED] to your original post?
Thanks
L4T

Saving battery with weak signals: My Guide

I wanted to post a quick FYI for people that live or work in areas of weak signal, and therefore have crappy battery performance. I've been battling this for a long time and I finally nailed down some good, simple, reasonable solutions that will greatly extend your battery life.
The problem: A very weak signal means extremely slow data, if not a complete halt. We have all kinds of crap on our phones that utilize mobile data, even while the phone is lying on the desk doing nothing. You don't see it or know it. But it's doing it. Every time it tries to connect and do something, the phones in wakelock, not sleeping. With a strong signal, or wifi, these things happen very quickly and cause very little wakelock. However, with a crap signal, it basically becomes a never-ending task. Your phone can be in wakelock nearly 100% of the time while it stupidly tried to do something it will never be able to accomplish. Your google account alone has 19 different things it tries to sync. Then there is facebook. Exchange email. Dropbox, etc etc etc. Then there is NETWORK LOCATION! The phone tries to figure out it's location using the cell network. Since your signal sucks, it basically spends all day trying to do this. Even if you turn off sync, network location will still keep it awake trying in vein.
First I'll address network location since it is the easiest and shortest. This again is the phone using the cell network to triangulate a location rather than using GPS. The only way to resolve this is to turn it off and reboot the phone after doing so. In my experience, turning the checkbox off doesn't take effect until you reboot the phone. Settings > Location > Use Wireless Networks. Uncheck that. You can leave the GPS enabled. You can leave the Google Location enabled, unless you don't want google maps to work. This is not a setting that you can turn on and off with tasker. Sorry. And even if you could, it still requires a reboot to be reliable. So since network location is useless to me (duh, that's what the GPS is for), I elected to just turn it off and leave it off.
Now, how do we reduce or eliminate the phone trying to endlessly sync a billion different things that are impractical to sync with a weak signal? Three ways.
1. Just turn off sync. Pretty simple. Nothing will sync in the background anymore. If you open your email and manually refresh it, it will sync. But you will not get any push communication from any of those accounts configured to background sync. For some, this may be fine. I can't do that because I need to at least get my e-mail and calendar push notifications.
2. Use tasker to turn sync on and off. This is basically taking #1 and automating it. You can use any criteria you want to turn the sync on and off. Schedule it based on day/time for example. Or maybe tell it to only use sync while you're on wifi. Up to you.
3. This is what I did and I love it. Go to the play store and buy the "Synker". This is an app and tasker plugin. The tasker plugin will allow you to individually control every account's sync state. Where as #1 and #2 are global, all sync on/off. This allows you to pick and choose what you turn on and off. I configured mine to only enable sync on my gmail, calendar, keep, and tasks while I am not on a WiFi network. I need those things all day, every day. And the amount of data they sync is very very minimal. So I found it has very very little wakelock even with the weak signal. When I am connected to a WiFi network, I have it turn on most of the other account sync stats. Things like app data, contacts, photos, etc. You know, the other 15 things it does that are data hogs.
My results... Before, my phone would be dead after about 4-6 hours of sitting idle on my desk at work. After making these configuration changes, I still have 30% left after 10 hours. Success.

Possibility of Android networking hardware being physically disabled via ifconfig.

Using ifconfig Android to enable or disable a network device will effectively control it's powered state. I know this because I am an advanced Linux user. The basic function of ifconfig is the same between devices/architectures, and since all Android devices are based on Linux, i see no reason why this cannot be done.
Currently, when you shut off your wifi or mobile data, its never really off. To confirm this, I shut off my wifi, turned my phone to airplane mode to make sure I wasn't connected, but when I arrived home again later, I still received a couple of new messages from my yahoo mail and kik. My first though was "... The heck?" I knew I wasn't supposed to be able to receive anything. I even had autosync turned off also for good measure. I couldn't explain it at first... Upon checking the timestamp, it revealed to me that I received the notifications the exact moment I arrived home, but the original Sent time from the source is when I was not home. Remember, all data was turned off by me and I did not receive anything the entire time i was out. (airplane mode, and i have no active phone service)
I double-checked and surely enough, my settings were still all off according to what I could see and verify. That tells me it's not really off and it knew I was home and connected to wifi anyway briefly, even though I had it off. That tells me that even though I turned off the wifi and mobile data and set the advanced settings to never "always allow scanning even while turned off" for location services, its STILL on!! Unacceptable. Deceitful. Wrong. When I tell it to turn off I expect it to stay off, dang it...
Talk about unexpected battery drain. Imagine being comfortable in knowing you've shut off all these things, to then find out later that these settings are present just to trick you in to letting your guard down! The question is, why would Google put in place these settings if only to be overridden anyway? There is no reason except their own sneaky one.
My goal here is to recruit someone to build an app or widget for rooted users to physically disable the device via push-button widget or app, not just disassociate from any given wifi AP or mobile data service. (wifi_dassoc kernel command) Anyone with some spare time and knowledge of Android programming and use of ifconfig is welcome. I welcome more than one person also. A team even... Haha. You guys converse and figure it out. I'll be watching, and Thanks! Hope you find this to your liking and interest.
Sent from my SCH-I535 using XDA Free mobile app