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How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

manas.tech

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Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#131

Post by withinboredom »

megablast wrote: post #123
smortaz wrote: post #10

not directly relevant, but was riding my motorcycle in the boonies, and lost the phone which was on the handlebar (bumpy rocky path). Looked for it several times on the path with no luck. Then I remembered my old iPhone was in the backpack. Did a Find my phone on the backup phone and it showed exactly where it had lost touch with the primary phone. This is all without cell or Wi-Fi service. Saved me a $1000.

You had an old iphone you rarely used that still had a working sim in it? So you were paying for two phones every month?

He said no service at all. When traveling, and you have an old phone with eSIM support, carrying it with you in a backpack (with eSIM information ready to go) is a good idea. Especially when traveling alone, you never know what will happen. Your primary phone can be stolen, you drop it, or it simply dies and you need rescue.

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#132

Post by jojobas »

progman32 wrote: post #109
jojobas wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having anything to distract you on a motorcycle is a bad idea. Best to put your phone in DND, if you need directions have them in voice only.

Back when I rode, I made a little arrangement of LEDs around the speedometer in 3 concentric rings of ~32 lights. The blue LED closest to pointing North would light, the green LED would always point towards my home, and the red LED would point towards my destination (programmable before the trip). That's all I really needed. Basically a small version of a navigation arrow above video game characters. It meant that on…

Sounds cool, even if somewhat likely to get you into a dead-end now and then.

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#133

Post by eiiot »

chrischen wrote: post #118
semireg wrote: post #107

I had AirPods Max stolen from our car a few months ago. A week later they popped up on Find My a block away. I hopped on my bike and tracked to a small apartment building. Using Find My will show you a “warmer … warmer … colder” kind of UI and whenever I lifted my phone to a particular window (shades drawn) Find My would say “Nearby.” I called the police and they were genuinely excited to knock on the door. A guy ans…

Wasn’t expecting that. Was expecting an “even if you located them the cops won’t bother to help you recover just $XX dollars worth of stolen goods.

San Francisco

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#134

Post by AceJohnny2 »

hunter2_ wrote: post #108
ridgeguy wrote: post #99

Find My came to the rescue when my wife unknowingly dropped her phone during a pullover to take some pix. The turnout was on New Priest Grade, the best way to Yosemite from our home. Next morning, after the frenzied "Where's my phone" search petered out, we remembered Find My. No way, I thought. Rural road, many miles away, etc. Which new phone would you like, Dear? Find My immediately found it 43 miles away. My wife…

> infrastructure Imagine if anyone, not just Apple, could build on that, creating an automatic sneakernet. Populous areas without cell towers would come online, with ultra high latency. Throughput would also need to be throttled by the owner of each device to accommodate battery consumption preferences.

> Throughput would also need to be throttled by the owner of each device to accommodate battery consumption preferences.

Ay, there's the rub!

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#135

Post by petemir »

jffry wrote: post #51
lxgr wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're being nitpicky it was probably neither – multilateration requires taking multiple measurements, drawing circles/lines of equal signal strength (or timing advance) and then intersecting these. If you just want to home in on a transmitter, there's a much simpler algorithm: Try walking into various directions and keep heading into the one that makes the signal strength nunber go up :) Not sure if there's a name…

> Not sure if there's a name for that. Hill climbing! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_climbing Basically: Go in any direction that makes the number go up. Repeat.

Gradient ascent?

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#136

Post by tinus_hn »

hunter2_ wrote: post #108
ridgeguy wrote: post #99

Find My came to the rescue when my wife unknowingly dropped her phone during a pullover to take some pix. The turnout was on New Priest Grade, the best way to Yosemite from our home. Next morning, after the frenzied "Where's my phone" search petered out, we remembered Find My. No way, I thought. Rural road, many miles away, etc. Which new phone would you like, Dear? Find My immediately found it 43 miles away. My wife…

> infrastructure Imagine if anyone, not just Apple, could build on that, creating an automatic sneakernet. Populous areas without cell towers would come online, with ultra high latency. Throughput would also need to be throttled by the owner of each device to accommodate battery consumption preferences.

Tile did exactly that. Except of course according to the privacy policy they track where everything and everyone is.

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#137

Post by petemir »

ornornor wrote: post #104
Guest71022 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://a.aliexpress.com/_mrvl4Xq

Interesting. Although your link is 11.70$ with 50% off for me, but if you search for “find my Apple” you get many more results with lots of options around 5$

That link is less than 2usd (1.62chf) for me. I’ll never understand Ali’s pricing.

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#138

Post by Someone »

askvictor wrote: post #28

What's the difference in signal strength between bluetooth and wifi? I had assumed since they use the same frequency, and usually the same chip and antenna, they would be much the same (perhaps there are regulatory differences between them?) If anything, I'd guess that BLE would be more useful in this case as there is less handshaking, which means on a very poor connection you've got more of a chance of getting some…

> I had assumed since they use the same frequency, and usually the same chip and antenna

Yes and no. Bluetooth is 2.4GHz, WiFi has many bands, including one around 2.4GHz. Those can share an antenna, but I think that means only one can be sending at a time (they could mix the signals, but I guess that would mean connection would fail for the less powerful Bluetooth signal)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth:

“It employs UHF radio waves in the ISM bands, from 2.402 GHz to 2.48 GHz”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WLAN_channels:

“The 802.11 standard provides several distinct radio frequency bands for use in Wi-Fi communications: 860/900 MHz, 2.4 GHz, 3.6 GHz, 4.9 GHz, 5 GHz, 5.9 GHz, 6 GHz, 45 GHz and 60 GHz. Each range is divided into a multitude of channels. In the standards, channels are numbered at 5 MHz spacing within a band (except in the 45/60 GHz band, where they are 0.54/1.08/2.16 GHz apart), and the number linearly relates to the centre frequency of the channel. Although channels are numbered at 5 MHz spacing, transmitters generally occupy at least 20 MHz, and standards allow for channels to be bonded together to form wider channels for faster throughput.

Countries apply their own regulations to allowable channels, allowed users and maximum power levels within these frequency ranges. The ISM band ranges are also often used.”

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#139

Post by baz00 »

semireg wrote: post #107

I had AirPods Max stolen from our car a few months ago. A week later they popped up on Find My a block away. I hopped on my bike and tracked to a small apartment building. Using Find My will show you a “warmer … warmer … colder” kind of UI and whenever I lifted my phone to a particular window (shades drawn) Find My would say “Nearby.” I called the police and they were genuinely excited to knock on the door. A guy ans…

Lucky there. UK here. A couple of years back I had a macbook pro delivered to me. It was delivered to the correct number on a different road. The POD had a photo of the front door and the person. I recognised the front door as it was on a local estate. Phoned delivery company up (DPD) and they said that they delivered it to the correct location and wouldn't do anything about it. Went round there and the guy said "um, it's mine now. Finders keepers. What are you going to do about it?".

So I phoned the police. They never turned up.

I opened up a credit card chargeback. But I was complaining about this to someone in the school playground and someone else overheard it. Turns out she was his next door neighbour. Said "I'll get it back for you". Sure enough that afternoon she turned up with it! Turns out the guy was a convicted paedophile and she knew that and said if he didn't give it back she'd tell everyone on the estate.

You need leverage or a good police force against criminals. The latter is rare so I suspect that taking matters in to your own hands is sometimes required.

Re: How to find a lost phone in a no-cell-coverage camping site?

#140

Post by mdpye »

teekert wrote: post #125
progman32 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back when I rode, I made a little arrangement of LEDs around the speedometer in 3 concentric rings of ~32 lights. The blue LED closest to pointing North would light, the green LED would always point towards my home, and the red LED would point towards my destination (programmable before the trip). That's all I really needed. Basically a small version of a navigation arrow above video game characters. It meant that on…

Sounds like a business idea.

Here you go (2015): https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ridebeeline/beeline-sma...

I thought it looked fun, but no way to justify the price.

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