GPS Status 2 for Adnroid 1.5

rhornig · Apr 18, 2009

Hello all,

As developers start to use firmware 1.5 I have updated the GPS status app to work with the new firmware.

The good news is that I no longer have to use internal APIs. Some features have been removed or changed:

- Screen orientation settig has been removed as it can be configured globally in 1.5
- Magnetic declination setting is removed too, but the good news is that declination is now automatically calculated (without internet access) based on a geomagnetic model. The model also gives the absolute value of the magnetc field at your location which is also displayed.
- finally: the GPS is not automatically turned on, because average programs can no longer turn on the GPS (it is possible only by using the system settings program) (GPS switch appliction will no longer work)

Have fun, comments are welcome.
Rudolf

Karolis · Apr 18, 2009

If you start the app without enabling GPS first, it crashes right away.

rhornig · Apr 19, 2009

Karolis said:
If you start the app without enabling GPS first, it crashes right away.

Thanks, noted the issue.

koxx · Apr 19, 2009

Crash on 5.0.1Gr3.

I switch GPS ON before launching.

It shows the first screen, and "force close" ...

joeydsmith · Apr 19, 2009

i hope this works because GPStatus is my favorite app.

joeydsmith · Apr 19, 2009

g force registers at 1.00 as default... it doesnt seem to be as accurate as gps status was on 1.1, or its more sensitive i dunno.

joeydsmith · Apr 19, 2009

without moving, my heading goes frim 78-81deg.

rhornig · Apr 20, 2009

joeydsmith said:
g force registers at 1.00 as default... it doesnt seem to be as accurate as gps status was on 1.1, or its more sensitive i dunno.

Right, I've detected this too. It seems that the new formware is doing much less filtering than the 1.1 version. This gives a faster response with much more errors. Unfortunately I cannot do anything about it at the moment.

Having acceleration at 1.0 g is correct (at least GPS Stus 1.5 works the same way) as we are standing on the surface of the earth

Thats a different stiry whether it is correct to call it "acceleration" for ordinary people (I know Einstein would not mind it

)

joeydsmith · Apr 20, 2009

lol yeah cant u jsut make it x-1? or sumthing lol, but yeah you are right we exipreince 1 g all the time.

rhornig · Apr 21, 2009

joeydsmith said:
lol yeah cant u jsut make it x-1? or sumthing lol, but yeah you are right we exipreince 1 g all the time.

Version 1.4 did that, but that was not correct.
The problem is that acceleration is a vector not a scalar. I.e. I have to add/substract vectors not scalars...

example:
- If you would accelerate horizontally with 1g and in addition the earth has also 1g gravity, you would feel (and your phone would measure) approximately 1.41g (sqrt(1g^2+1g^2))

- on the other hand if you would accelerate vertically (upwards) with 1g, your body would feel 2g

The real problem: it is not possible to measure the direction of your acceleration (and according to Einstein its not even distinguishable from the gravity at all).

Maybe I will assume that the acceleration is horizontal (which is true for most ordinary people, moving on the surface of Earth). The rest (astronauts during launch, parachute jumpers) will get slightly wrong results, but I'm hoping they will have better equipment than relying on their G1

unicornio · Apr 21, 2009

Rudolf i am a fan of your gpsstatus.apk and since i load the 1.5 in my dev phone i wanting for your upgrade. really i do not understand what happens with this firmware but i think that the compass do not work anyway and all operations that in the past (and that work in my g1-not updated- phone) put to work the compass now is not responding...i have my compass pointing near the east!!!...

may be (that you says) is the automatic magnetic declination are actuating but the pointing i shure that is a mistake...

i am very fustrated and worried if this issue and if you can help me to understand this, it would be very appreciated...

meanwhile i thanks so much your work and hope gpsstaus.apk go to work in the future at least good that we have working in the past...

best regards and electronics greetings from spain

delta_foxtrot2 · Apr 22, 2009

I noticed a small problem with the magnetic declination, the mag declination here is - 6° 39' west according to ngdc.noaa.gov, anyway when the compass moves slightly west from north it shows -1 to -6 then jumps to 350...

delta_foxtrot2 · Apr 22, 2009

rhornig said:
Right, I've detected this too. It seems that the new formware is doing much less filtering than the 1.1 version. This gives a faster response with much more errors. Unfortunately I cannot do anything about it at the moment.

Running average of the last 5 results would smooth it out, but yea less responsive, if you hooked it into the accelerometer to notice a suden change to reset the smoothing should take care of responsiveness...

delta_foxtrot2 · Apr 22, 2009

unicornio said:
Rudolf i am a fan of your gpsstatus.apk and since i load the 1.5 in my dev phone i wanting for your upgrade. really i do not understand what happens with this firmware but i think that the compass do not work anyway and all operations that in the past (and that work in my g1-not updated- phone) put to work the compass now is not responding...i have my compass pointing near the east!!!...

That sounds like the compass is being influnced by a magnetic field, try waving the phone in a figure 8 to get it to reset itself.

rhornig · Apr 23, 2009

koxx said:
Crash on 5.0.1Gr3.

I switch GPS ON before launching.

It shows the first screen, and "force close" ...

Thanks. Fixed (hopefully) and updated the first post.

rhornig · Apr 24, 2009

delta_foxtrot2 said:
I noticed a small problem with the magnetic declination, the mag declination here is - 6° 39' west according to ngdc.noaa.gov, anyway when the compass moves slightly west from north it shows -1 to -6 then jumps to 350...

Yepp. Thats a bug. Thanks for finding

I will fix it for the next release.

rhornig · Apr 24, 2009

unicornio said:
Rudolf i am a fan of your gpsstatus.apk and since i load the 1.5 in my dev phone i wanting for your upgrade. really i do not understand what happens with this firmware but i think that the compass do not work anyway and all operations that in the past (and that work in my g1-not updated- phone) put to work the compass now is not responding...i have my compass pointing near the east!!!...

may be (that you says) is the automatic magnetic declination are actuating but the pointing i shure that is a mistake...

i am very fustrated and worried if this issue and if you can help me to understand this, it would be very appreciated...

After firmware upgrades or if you experience strong magnetic field the internal compass must be recalibrated. Check the heading reading in the upper left corner. If it contains ?, ?? or ??? after the number, then your compass is inaccurate and must be recalibrated.

As alsready mentioned, you should draw big 8s in the air with your phone for about a minute. If everything goes well, the ? marks should go away and your compass should be much more accurate.

koxx · Apr 24, 2009

rhornig said:
Thanks. Fixed (hopefully) and updated the first post.

It works now ! thank you !!!

rhornig · Apr 24, 2009

delta_foxtrot2 said:
Running average of the last 5 results would smooth it out, but yea less responsive, if you hooked it into the accelerometer to notice a suden change to reset the smoothing should take care of responsiveness...

Thanks. Good idea, however the android framework itself should do the filtering (i'm already using the slowest possible update frequency which means the highest filtering). I will wait until the final 1.5 firmware comes out, and then revisit the issue.

southsko · Apr 25, 2009

Yay. It works. The compass does look a little faster

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