31–39 of 39 posts
Let this be a lesson to anyone working on a product. I've been building an app that does exactly the same thing for the last couple of months. You have to be first to market.
I think this is a great idea. I would add one feature: send a 2nd text message when you're within 1 mile. (Or whatever distance you choose.) My girlfriend wants me to notify her before I actually get to her apartment. Having my smartphone do this for me automatically would be awesome! (This way I don't need to use my phone while I'm driving.)
Great article. His observations of location polling strategies and battery life are spot on, so if you are interested in location-based services, read them carefully. When developing Jaiku Mobile (always-on rich presence sharing with location and other data) we learned same things. There's actually two strategies that you've to manage: polling of the location (GPS usage) and sending it to the server (network usage).…
Great article. His observations of location polling strategies and battery life are spot on, so if you are interested in location-based services, read them carefully. When developing Jaiku Mobile (always-on rich presence sharing with location and other data) we learned same things. There's actually two strategies that you've to manage: polling of the location (GPS usage) and sending it to the server (network usage).…
Did you ever consider using CellID to detect whether location has changed, before checking more precisely from GPS? Haven't tested it in a real product myself, but found this strategy in an old Symbian app, and it seemed quite clever -- especially in a 3G (or 3.5/4/whatever) mobile network cell size should be small enough that if the user is really moving, the CellID will also change quite quickly. And energy consump…
But cell id can change quite a lot even if you stay in the same place, depending on your signal strength.
Btw. did that old Symbian app happened to be called ContextPhone? It was a precursor of Jaiku Mobile.
Awesome. You should partner with UberCab: www.uber.com
That's a great idea I'll email them. I've also thought about approaching delivery-type services like Dominos.
I think this is a great idea. I would add one feature: send a 2nd text message when you're within 1 mile. (Or whatever distance you choose.) My girlfriend wants me to notify her before I actually get to her apartment. Having my smartphone do this for me automatically would be awesome! (This way I don't need to use my phone while I'm driving.)
A text message can't be sent without confirmation from the user on iOS.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hey -- neither of us is first to market on this one. I found out of others even as I was building it. I almost gave up but then figured I might as well go for it. I address this in the post -- the market it young and is ripe for plenty of products.
glympse? Ish, would like to connect with you. we build geo apps, and work out of the mission (in the us bank building on 22nd and Mission).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you ever consider using CellID to detect whether location has changed, before checking more precisely from GPS? Haven't tested it in a real product myself, but found this strategy in an old Symbian app, and it seemed quite clever -- especially in a 3G (or 3.5/4/whatever) mobile network cell size should be small enough that if the user is really moving, the CellID will also change quite quickly. And energy consump…
Yes we used Cell ID and that was our main source of location data (GPS-enabled phones were quite rare back in 2006). But cell id can change quite a lot even if you stay in the same place, depending on your signal strength. Btw. did that old Symbian app happened to be called ContextPhone? It was a precursor of Jaiku Mobile.
Nope, it was not ContextPhone. Something for basic phone tracking.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes we used Cell ID and that was our main source of location data (GPS-enabled phones were quite rare back in 2006). But cell id can change quite a lot even if you stay in the same place, depending on your signal strength. Btw. did that old Symbian app happened to be called ContextPhone? It was a precursor of Jaiku Mobile.
Thanks for your response. Was this all on Symbian platform? Does that platform give you access just to the active cell, or also the neighboring ones? I wonder if using the full list of neighboring cells could help, that's available at least via Android API. Nope, it was not ContextPhone. Something for basic phone tracking.
I heard a story that back then this was required by operators, because with good access to neighbouring cells and their signal strengths, people could easily build tools to compare networks in different areas and "prove" that one operator is better than the other. I don't know if the story is true.
You can do very accurate locationing with neighbouring cells and cloud-based database and some simple Bayesian modelling. Google does something similar with their non-GPS locationing.