[APP][2.2+][Retired] ALTitude, Latitude updater with a low battery footprint

As Google shut down Latitude I was forced to retire ALTitude as well.

I like Google Latitude for its location history and the possibility to share my location with friends. Unfortunately the price to pay in terms of battery drain is too high and that the is the reason why I started this project.

To get the benefits of ALTitude you should change the setting in Google Latitude to "manual update" and use ALTitude to update your location instead. If you want to see your friends you can still use Latitude but without the energy footprint.

Features:
- OAuth2 logon to google latitude: no username / password stored
- configurable accuracy and frequency for updating Latitude.
- start on boot (full version)
- show your friends on Latitude

How it works
Android has the concept of LocationProviders to deliver location based information to apps. There are three LocationProviders:
- Coarse location: provided by wifi / cell towers
- Fine location: GPS
- Passive: relies on the next location info requested by another app

In addition to this there are requirements to the LocationProvider in terms of "accuracy" and "frequency", e.g. "I want updates at least very 15 minutes with a precision of 1000m". The higher these requirements are the higher the battery drain will be. No only will the phone be waken up when a location change was detected but this information must then be passed o latitude using the google latitude API.

What ALTitude does is us a sensible mix of LocationProvider and accuracy/frequency to track location changes and update those to Latitude.

ALTitude is available on Google Play (https://play.google.com/details?id=com.asksven.betterlatitude) for free with with ads (fully featured).

Starting from version 0.10 ALTitude supports multiple languages. If you miss your language please feel free to contribute: http://www.getlocalization.com/altitude/

Follow me on twitter to be notified of updates and get insights in new features/developments.

New I have decided to give the new beta channel possibilities on google play a try and have created a google+ community. If you are interested in testing release candidates you can now also subscribe to that community or drop me your g+ contact so that I can invite you.

Changelog
V0.13
Same as RC4

V0.13RC4
#90: Free version is now fully features

V0.13RC3
#83: after google logon / auth an empty page is shown, suggesting an error
#84: added last updated location name to status on main screen (if geocoding enabled)
#85: lat/long were reversed in locale/tasker plugin
#86: added better precision to fix when set from locale/tasker plugin
#89: free version now has all features enabled

V0.13RC2
#77 and #78 limit the update accuracy/frequency independently from the location manager updates
ActionBar for pre-ICS devices as well as dark/light themes
Update to current locale plugin implementation

V0.13RC1 2013-01-26
#50: locale plugin to set location manually

V.12.1 on Google Play
#71: screen showing two inconsistent update times
#72: interval shown on screen on free version may be wrong
#73: fixed units for intervals

V0.12 on Google Play 2013-01-01
No change from .012RC4

V0.12RC4 2012-12-31
#70: added more logging details when latitude update fails

V0.12RC3 2012-12-29
#69: fixed QoS alarms always being triggered
Make better use of criteria to make sure "network" is used most of the times even if "gps" is on

V0.12RC2 2012-12-26
#66: add option to disable location updates on main screen

V0.12RC1 2012-12-21
#62: Quick setup at a glance
#63: Moved status info to main screen
#67: Widget to toggle quick settings
#68: Cancel button in quick settings not working when quick settings running

V0.11.0.1 2012-07-19
#61: License not recognized on JB (many thanks for superbobup for the intensive testing!)

V0.11 2012-07-15
#53: Fixed multiple FC conditions from crash reports
#57: Status dialog was always showing interval as 0s
#60: Added a QoS option to make sure that the last known location is updated at least every <interval>
Added more extensive logging
V0.10.0.1 2012-06-25
#52: Error condition at boot
V0.10.0.0 2012-06-24
#16: allow changing setting from tasker
#33: add threshold to avoid obcessing about connection errors
#35: option to update (buffered) locations when a wifi connection is available
#43 and #44: fixed multiple error conditions from google play logs
#45: notifications not shown when geo is off
#46: add german and french
#49: added passive location provider

V0.9.0 2012-02-26
#41: added release notes
#37, 38, 39, 40: fixed various FC and null pointer exceptions from market logs
#36: ALTitude stops working after a period in airplane mode
#32: FC if no location provider is present (see also #36)
#34: Redesinged status concept and display on mains screen
#30: Added intervals > 1 hour to preferences
Moved to ICS SDK / guidelines

V0.8.2 2011-11-29
Fixed FC upon opening quick action dialog when a quick action is running
Fixed notification of address not always showing
Added number of buffered location to the status dialog
V0.8.1 2011-11-29
Fixed FC on free version when opening preferences
V0.8.0 2011-11-28
#8: Added current city (geo location) to notifications
#24. Detect data connection prio to updating Latitude
#26: Added Menu option to jump from ALTitude to Latitude
#28: Added a quick action in order to change location settings (precision) for a given period of time

V0.7.0 - 2011-10-11
#19: categories to preferences
#23: Fixed bug: service was not starting on boot
#6: added nearest city to badge on map
#20: Fixed bug: default values of location manager not showing in free version
#22: reposition map when turning device from landscape t portrait
#21: show latitude connection status on main activity

Feature requests

I maintain the original list of features to be implemented and bugs here.

Known issues

Reserved for future use

Placeholder for future use

thank you guys, I really appreciate.
And I am always open for new ideas too.... I got myself a tablet so I guess the next project will be about fragments and support of small and large displays.

khaytsus said:

Never noticed any battery usage with Latitude except my tablets which are offline when they're in standby. In those cases, I've seen Latitude keep the device awake (wakelock). Is that the fix here? Otherwise my phone, I've never noticed Latitude at all.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

On an average Samsungs galaxy s2 (android 2.3.X) for examples the partial wakelocks generated by latitude for location consume 20-30 mAh. This is due to bad design in terms of location accuracy and update frequency.
Altitude remedies to that.

fraencko said:

How exactly does it work? In which way does your app behave differently than GMaps? Is it only avoiding wakelocks or does it also rely more heavily on A-GPS?

Also: How do i have to set my Google Maps app to display my Latitude mates but not update my location by itself and let your app do the trickery?

Feature request: Can you implement a setting where I can adjust how often my Latitude gets updated?

I love Latitude but I think Google's current implementation is rather poor. So: Thank you very much for your efforts. Really looking forward to follow the progress of your project.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

I have added "how it works" to post #1: http://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=18062211&postcount=1

Unfortunately Latitude does not distinguish between displaying your friend's location on the map and tracking your location and there is no way to configure the LocationProvider of Latitude (in a way ALTitude does it). In order to get the benefits of ALTtitude you should log off from Latitude when you are not using it and just let ALTitude do the updating.
I would really love to provide friend's functionality in ALTitude and will try any possible way to implment it but unfortunately there is no API from Google for that so I have to explore unconventional possibilities. I anyone has a hint I'd be happy to explore that path.

About your feature request: that functionality is included and will be made available in the full version soon

netarchie said:

Hi,
great utility, thanks.
Do we need to be signed into latitude if i have installed this utility?

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

No you should sign out from latitude as ALTitude is a replacement for the poor logic for updating the location Latitude uses (in terms of battery usage)

Update

ALTitude was updated to support a license model. You can buy the license from Android Market here: https://market.android.com/search?q=com.asksven.betterlatitude_license
and the the full set of features (seet also post #2)

I will start decompiling Latitude this week end to see if I find any way to access the friends data. I really would like to provide the complete set of features and then regret I decided not to stick to the "better" brand