How can I check the current status of the GPS receiver

Question

How can I check the current status of the GPS receiver  I already checked the LocationListener onStatusChanged method but somehow it seems that is not working  or just the wrong possibility   Basically I just need to know if the GPS icon at the top of the screen is blinking  no actual fix  or solid  fix is available

User · Answer

Ok  so let s try a combination of all the answers and updates so far and do something like this    Add the ACCESS FINE LOCATION permission to your manifest Get an instance of the system LocationManager Create a GpsStatus Listener that reacts to GPS EVENT SATELLITE STATUS Register the listener with LocationManager with addGpsStatusListener   The GPS listener could be something like this   GpsStatus Listener listener   new GpsStatus Listener         void onGpsStatusChanged int event            if  event    GPS EVENT SATELLITE STATUS                GpsStatus status   mLocManager getGpsStatus null               Iterable lt GpsSatellite gt  sats   status getSatellites                   Check number of satellites in list to determine fix state                     The APIs are a bit unclear about when and what GPS and satellite information is given  but I think an idea would be to look at how many satellites are available   If it s below three  then you can t have a fix   If it s more  then you should have a fix   Trial and error is probably the way to go to determine how often Android reports satellite info  and what info each GpsSatellite object contains

User · Answer

Setting time interval to check for fix is not a good choice   i noticed that onLocationChanged is not called if you are not moving   what is understandable since location is not changing     Better way would be for example    check interval to last location received  in gpsStatusChanged  if that interval is more than 15s set variable  long interval   true remove the location listener and add it again  usually then you get updated position if location really is available  if not - you probably lost location in onLocationChanged you just set long interval to false

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get into similar problem while working on my MSc project  it seems that Daye s answer mistakenly reported  no fix  while the device stays in a static location  I ve modified the solution just a little bit which seems to work fine for me in a static location  I don t how would it affect the battery as it is not my main concern  but here s how i did it by re-requesting location updates when a fix has timed out   private class MyGPSListener implements GpsStatus Listener       public void onGpsStatusChanged int event            switch  event            case GpsStatus GPS EVENT SATELLITE STATUS              if  Global getInstance   currentGPSLocation    null                                if  SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt  20000                                        if   hasGPSFix                           Log i  GPS   Fix Acquired                        hasGPSFix   true                                     else                                       if  hasGPSFix                                                 Log i  GPS   Fix Lost  expired                             lm requestLocationUpdates LocationManager GPS PROVIDER  2000  10  locationListener                                             hasGPSFix   false                                              break          case GpsStatus GPS EVENT FIRST FIX              Log i  GPS    First Fix  Refix                hasGPSFix   true              break          case GpsStatus GPS EVENT STARTED              Log i  GPS    Started                 break          case GpsStatus GPS EVENT STOPPED              Log i  GPS    Stopped                break

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new member so unfortunately im unable to comment or vote up  however Stephen Daye s post above was the perfect solution to the exact same problem that i ve been looking for help with    a small alteration to the following line   isGPSFix    SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt  3000    to   isGPSFix    SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt   GPS UPDATE INTERVAL   2     basically as im building a slow paced game and my update interval is already set to 5 seconds  once the gps signal is out for 10  seconds  thats the right time to trigger off something   cheers mate  spent about 10 hours trying to solve this solution before i found your post

User · Answer

You say that you already tried onStatusChanged    but that does work for me   Here s the method I use  I let the class itself handle the onStatusChanged    private void startLocationTracking         final int updateTime   2000     ms     final int updateDistance   10     meter     final Criteria criteria   new Criteria        criteria setCostAllowed false       criteria setAccuracy Criteria ACCURACY FINE       final String p   locationManager getBestProvider criteria  true       locationManager requestLocationUpdates p  updateTime  updateDistance              this       And I handle the onStatusChanged as follows   void onStatusChanged final String provider  final int status          final Bundle extras        switch  status        case LocationProvider OUT OF SERVICE          if  location    null    location getProvider   equals provider                 statusString    No Service               location   null                    break      case LocationProvider TEMPORARILY UNAVAILABLE          if  location    null    location getProvider   equals provider                 statusString    no fix                     break      case LocationProvider AVAILABLE          statusString    fix           break            Note that the onProvider Dis En abled   methods are about enabling and disabling GPS tracking by the user  not what you re looking for

User · Answer

With LocationManager you can getLastKnownLocation   after you getBestProvider    This gives you a Location object  which has the methods getAccuracy   in meters and getTime   in UTC milliseconds  Does this give you enough info   Or perhaps you could iterate over the LocationProviders and find out if each one meetsCriteria  ACCURACY COARSE

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After a few years of working with GPS on windows mobile  I realized that the concept of  losing  a GPS fix can be subjective  To simply listen to what the GPS tells you  adding a NMEAListener and parsing the sentence will tell you whether the fix was  valid  or not  See http   www gpsinformation org dale nmea htm GGA   Unfortunately with some GPSes this value will fluctuate back and forth even during the normal course of operation in a  good fix  area    So  the other solution is to compare the UTC time of the GPS location against the phone s time  converted to UTC   If they are a certain time difference apart  you can assume you lost the GPS position

User · Answer

You could try using LocationManager addGpsStatusListener to get updated when the GPS status changes   It looks like GPS EVENT STARTED and GPS EVENT STOPPED might be what you re looking for

User · Answer

The GPS icon seems to change its state according to received broadcast intents  You can change its state yourself with the following code samples   Notify that the GPS has been enabled   Intent intent   new Intent  android location GPS ENABLED CHANGE    intent putExtra  enabled   true   sendBroadcast intent     Notify that the GPS is receiving fixes   Intent intent   new Intent  android location GPS FIX CHANGE    intent putExtra  enabled   true   sendBroadcast intent     Notify that the GPS is no longer receiving fixes   Intent intent   new Intent  android location GPS FIX CHANGE    intent putExtra  enabled   false   sendBroadcast intent     Notify that the GPS has been disabled   Intent intent   new Intent  android location GPS ENABLED CHANGE    intent putExtra  enabled   false   sendBroadcast intent     Example code to register receiver to the intents      MyReceiver must extend BroadcastReceiver MyReceiver receiver   new MyReceiver    IntentFilter filter   new IntentFilter  android location GPS ENABLED CHANGE    filter addAction  android location GPS FIX CHANGE    registerReceiver receiver  filter     By receiving these broadcast intents you can notice the changes in GPS status  However  you will be notified only when the state changes  Thus it is not possible to determine the current state using these intents

User · Answer

If you just need to know if there s a fix  then check for the last known location provided by the GPS receiver and check the  getTime   value to know how old is that  If it s recent enough  like    a few seconds  you have a fix       LocationManager lm    LocationManager context getSystemService LOCATION SERVICE       Location loc   lm getLastKnownLocation LocationManager GPS PROVIDER          Get the time of the last fix    long lastFixTimeMillis   loc getTime           and finally compare that to current date time  In UTC    If it s recent enough you have a fix    I do that in my app and so far so good

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Well  putting together every working approach will result in this  also dealing with deprecated GpsStatus Listener    private GnssStatus Callback mGnssStatusCallback   Deprecated private GpsStatus Listener mStatusListener  private LocationManager mLocationManager    Override public void onCreate         mLocationManager    LocationManager  getSystemService LOCATION SERVICE        mLocationManager    LocationManager  this getSystemService Context LOCATION SERVICE       if  checkPermission             mLocationManager requestLocationUpdates LocationManager GPS PROVIDER  GPS UPDATE INTERVAL  MIN DISTANCE  this              if  Build VERSION SDK INT  gt   Build VERSION CODES N            mGnssStatusCallback   new GnssStatus Callback                  Override             public void onSatelliteStatusChanged GnssStatus status                    satelliteStatusChanged                                Override             public void onFirstFix int ttffMillis                    gpsFixAcquired                                      mLocationManager registerGnssStatusCallback mGnssStatusCallback         else           mStatusListener   new GpsStatus Listener                  Override             public void onGpsStatusChanged int event                    switch  event                        case GpsStatus GPS EVENT SATELLITE STATUS                          satelliteStatusChanged                            break                      case GpsStatus GPS EVENT FIRST FIX                             Do something                          gpsFixAcquired                            break                                                     mLocationManager addGpsStatusListener mStatusListener            private void gpsFixAcquired            Do something      isGPSFix   true     private void satelliteStatusChanged         if  mLastLocation    null          isGPSFix    SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt   GPS UPDATE INTERVAL   2        if  isGPSFix       A fix has been acquired             Do something        else      The fix has been lost             Do something            Override public void onLocationChanged Location location        if  location    null  return       mLastLocationMillis   SystemClock elapsedRealtime         mLastLocation   location      Override public void onStatusChanged String s  int i  Bundle bundle         Override public void onProviderEnabled String s         Override public void onProviderDisabled String s         Note  this answer is a combination of the answers above

User · Answer

I may be wrong but it seems people seem to be going way off-topic for     i just need to know if the gps icon at the top of the screen is blinking  no actual fix    That is easily done with   LocationManager lm    LocationManager  getSystemService LOCATION SERVICE   boolean gps on   lm isProviderEnabled LocationManager GPS PROVIDER     To see if you have a solid fix  things get a little trickier   public class whatever extends Activity       LocationManager lm      Location loc      public void onCreate Bundle savedInstanceState            super onCreate savedInstanceState           setContentView R layout main                   lm    LocationManager  getSystemService LOCATION SERVICE           loc   null          request updates                       private void request updates             if  lm isProviderEnabled LocationManager GPS PROVIDER                    GPS is enabled on device so lets add a loopback for this locationmanager             lm requestLocationUpdates LocationManager GPS PROVIDER 0  0  locationListener                              LocationListener locationListener   new LocationListener             public void onLocationChanged Location location                   Each time the location is changed we assign loc             loc   location                         Need these even if they do nothing  Can t remember why           public void onProviderDisabled String arg0              public void onProviderEnabled String provider              public void onStatusChanged String provider  int status  Bundle extras              Now whenever you want to see if you have fix   if  loc    null          Our location has changed at least once     blah          If you want to be fancy you can always have a timeout using System currentTimeMillis   and loc getTime    Works reliably  at least on an N1 since 2 1

User · Answer

so many posts     GpsStatus Listener gpsListener   new GpsStatus Listener                             public void onGpsStatusChanged int event                                if  event    GpsStatus GPS EVENT FIRST FIX                                   showMessageDialog  GPS fixed                                                                                  adding this code  with addGpsListener    showMessageDialog     just shows a standard dialog window with the string  did the job perfectly for me    thanks a lot      sry for this post  not yet able to vote

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Maybe it s the best possiblity to create a TimerTask that sets the received Location to a certain value  null   regularly  If a new value is received by the GPSListener it will update the location with the current data   I think that would be a working solution

User · Answer

As a developer of SpeedView  GPS speedometer for Android  I must have tried every possible solution to this problem  all with the same negative result  Let s reiterate what doesn t work    onStatusChanged   isn t getting called on Eclair and Froyo  Simply counting all available satellites is  of course  useless  Checking if any of the satellites return true for usedInFix   isn t very helpful also  The system clearly loses the fix but keeps reporting that there are still several sats that are used in it    So here s the only working solution I found  and the one that I actually use in my app  Let s say we have this simple class that implements the GpsStatus Listener   private class MyGPSListener implements GpsStatus Listener       public void onGpsStatusChanged int event            switch  event                case GpsStatus GPS EVENT SATELLITE STATUS                  if  mLastLocation    null                      isGPSFix    SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt  3000                   if  isGPSFix       A fix has been acquired                         Do something                    else      The fix has been lost                         Do something                                     break              case GpsStatus GPS EVENT FIRST FIX                     Do something                  isGPSFix   true                   break                      OK  now in onLocationChanged   we add the following    Override public void onLocationChanged Location location        if  location    null  return       mLastLocationMillis   SystemClock elapsedRealtime            Do something       mLastLocation   location      And that s it  Basically  this is the line that does it all   isGPSFix    SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - mLastLocationMillis   lt  3000    You can tweak the millis value of course  but I d suggest to set it around 3-5 seconds   This actually works and although I haven t looked at the source code that draws the native GPS icon  this comes close to replicating its behaviour  Hope this helps someone

User · Answer

If you do not need an update on the very instant the fix is lost  you can modify the solution of Stephen Daye in that way  that you have a method that checks if the fix is still present   So you can just check it whenever you need some GPS data and and you don t need that GpsStatus Listener   The  global  variables are   private Location lastKnownLocation  private long lastKnownLocationTimeMillis   0  private boolean isGpsFix   false    This is the method that is called within  onLocationChanged    to remember the update time and the current location  Beside that it updates  isGpsFix    private void handlePositionResults Location location            if location    null  return           lastKnownLocation   location          lastKnownLocationTimeMillis   SystemClock elapsedRealtime             checkGpsFix       optional         That method is called whenever I need to know if there is a GPS fix   private boolean checkGpsFix         if  SystemClock elapsedRealtime   - lastKnownLocationTimeMillis  lt  3000            isGpsFix   true         else           isGpsFix   false          lastKnownLocation   null            return isGpsFix      In my implementation I first run checkGpsFix   and if the result is true I use the variable  lastKnownLocation  as my current position

User · Answer

I know this is a little late  However why not use the NMEAListener if you want to know if you have a fix  From what I ve read  the NMEAListener will give you the NMEA sentences and from there you pick the correct sentence   The RMC sentence contains the fix status which is either A for OK or V for warning  The GGA sentence contains the Fix Quality  0 invalid  1 GPS or 2 DGPS     I can t offer you any java code as I m only just starting out with Android  but I have done a GPS library in C  for Windows apps  which I m looking to use with Xamarin  I only came across this thread because I was looking for provider information   From what I ve read so far about the Location object I m not all that comfortable about methods like getAccuracy   and hasAccuracy    I m used to extracting from the NMEA sentences HDOP and VDOP values to determine how accurate my fixes are  Its quite common to have a fix  but have a lousy HDOP which means your horizontal accuracy is not very good at all  For example sitting at your desk debugging with an external Bluetooth GPS device hard up against a window  you are quite likely to get a fix  but very poor HDOP and VDOP  Place your GPS device in a flower pot outside or something similar or add an external aerial to the GPS and immediately you get good HDOP and VDOP values

[android] How can I check the current status of the GPS receiver?

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