locale on droid

[mikedageek]

I like it and it works for me I'm hoping for 2 feature requests

With Calendar based changes ... If I have a calendar event with a status/category of BUSY then switch to profile X (for me this would be a meeting profile with notifications off except TXT) TXT & Calls set to Vibrate only.

#2
Account specific controls ...

While in the office sitting at my desk I really don't need to know when I receive an email in that account ... so If I could silence THAT account alone and still get notifications on the personal accounts .. that would rock ... especially since I can use the GPS to re-enable the work email notifications as soon as I leave the building ...

 

[holee]

So here's a question for Local Power users.

I'm willing to take another stab at locale. I want to set up a profile that will:

Turn my Bluetooth off, GPS off, WiFi on whenever I arrive home.

Turn my Bluetooth on, GPS on, WiFi off whenever I leave home.

I don't have a set workplace, so I can't do something like turn this feature on/off when I'm at the office. I always go a specific route up to 2 blocks, then I'll go off wherever.

I thought of something that was like:

Turn Bluetooth off, WiFi on when I'm in driveway. But the problem is that I want Bluetooth on when I'm leaving. I only want it off when I get home. That and if I'm in the middle of a call, I don't want to drop the call.

So basically, the only constant place on my drive will be my driveway. I can't think of a locale profile that would be smart enough to figure out if I'm coming home or leaving.

What stumped me initially was the poor geopositioning. If that ever gets fixed, I'm not sure how I would set it up though.

 

[imaROBOT]

This app is an awesome idea.. I think I have it working on location, but I still need to do more testing. I'm going to hold off on buying the plugins until it gets updated because the location still seems off.

 

[ScooberJake]

So here's a question for Local Power users.

I'm willing to take another stab at locale. I want to set up a profile that will:

Turn my Bluetooth off, GPS off, WiFi on whenever I arrive home.

Turn my Bluetooth on, GPS on, WiFi off whenever I leave home.

I don't have a set workplace, so I can't do something like turn this feature on/off when I'm at the office. I always go a specific route up to 2 blocks, then I'll go off wherever.

I thought of something that was like:

Turn Bluetooth off, WiFi on when I'm in driveway. But the problem is that I want Bluetooth on when I'm leaving. I only want it off when I get home. That and if I'm in the middle of a call, I don't want to drop the call.

So basically, the only constant place on my drive will be my driveway. I can't think of a locale profile that would be smart enough to figure out if I'm coming home or leaving.

What stumped me initially was the poor geopositioning. If that ever gets fixed, I'm not sure how I would set it up though.

Well, Locale only checks your location once every 10 minutes. I haven't come across a way to change that. So Locale can't know whether you are coming or going, it just knows where you are. Just set one profile for Home with the settings you want, and set the others to the default. When you are out and about your Bluetooth will be on, GPS on, and Wifi off. Then once Locale notices you are home it will switch them.

You seem to want Locale to make adjustments immediately, like when you pull out of your driveway. It really can't do that (at least not unless we can find a way to increase the frequency at which it checks location). So you just risk that for up to 10 minutes after you leave home, your Bluetooth will not be on. If that won't work for you, then I think you will just have to change the settings manually.

One feature request I have for Locale (that would help you too) would be a way to go into a location based setting manually. If that were possible, you could, say make all those "away" settings with a single click on your way out the front door, but let Locale change you back to "home" automatically if that isn't as critical.

 

[SpeedsterZ28]

Funny, mine just switched from work to default while sitting in my office. A nice loud DROOOIIIID rang out across the building.

Mine has done this multiple times--just switches between Work and Default while sitting in my office. I'm just setting mine to time-based conditions until the location issues are fixed.

 

[Odysseus]

Funny, mine just switched from work to default while sitting in my office. A nice loud DROOOIIIID rang out across the building.

Mine has done this multiple times--just switches between Work and Default while sitting in my office. I'm just setting mine to time-based conditions until the location issues are fixed.

GPS inside a building is always going to be a problem. You are surrounded by metal and machines. It kills the GPS signal. When your phone can't get a GPS signal, it defaults to your default GPS home. Soooo if you are at work, and you have a profile set for home, and your phones signal gets blocked by all the electronics around you, of course that will happen.

This will never ever get fixed btw. Try to acquire satellites with your garmin or tomtom indoors, it wont happen or it won't work well.

Now what locale SHOULD do is, if it can't acquire gps signal, realize that and don't change settings. But the phone might not be able to make that distinction.

 

[SpeedsterZ28]

This will never ever get fixed btw. Try to acquire satellites with your garmin or tomtom indoors, it wont happen or it won't work well.

Yeah, I figured it the GPS locate attempt was throwing it back into default. My hope was that it would use cellular triangulation as a backup to leverage the positioning.

For the time being, I've changed the settings to be time-based, and that works fine.

Now what locale SHOULD do is, if it can't acquire gps signal, realize that and don't change settings. But the phone might not be able to make that distinction.

This would be ideal...because my phone changes to work settings when I get into my office parking lot--it'd be nice if it stayed there until it got an update when I exited the parking lot, and until then, remained in work mode despite the loss of GPS.

 

[ajs410]

Do you have Wifi at your office? The Droid should be able to determine your location based on the names/BSSIDs of the access points around you. There are a few settings that control whether it will do this, including whether Wifi is on and whether it's set to use Wifi to determine your location.

There's even a "Train Wifi Location" menu option in Locale, hit menu while the map is up when you're adding a Location situation. I trained my home and work Wifi and I have absolutely no problems at all with profiles, even though it can't use the GPS in either place.

 

[shugknight]

Any new updates to this app? I had it and then uninstalled it when I kept getting FCs with Home++. I miss it..

 

[holee]

The Train WiFi hasn't worked for me yet.

What would be a good option is if you could add network connections as conditions.

E.g., If WiFi connected to LINKSY252, then turn on HOME profile. If BT connection is on, then turn on car profile. If WiFi hotspots are up, but not connected, then turn on something else. ETc.

 

[furiousDingo]

The Train WiFi hasn't worked for me yet.

What would be a good option is if you could add network connections as conditions.

E.g., If WiFi connected to LINKSY252, then turn on HOME profile. If BT connection is on, then turn on car profile. If WiFi hotspots are up, but not connected, then turn on something else. ETc.

I agree with the WiFi hotspots in range. At work we have secured WiFi hotspots that broadcast their SSIDs, but I can't connect to them for security reasons, but the phone obviously sees these networks present and that's a definitive indication that I'm at work.

 

[kiwiguy]

I came across this interesting tidbit on another forum - and it may be the cause of some people's issues: Locale works through its "situations" in order from the top down - so as soon as it comes across a set of conditions that are true it sets the phone to that profile.

This means you should create your "situations"with the most restrictive at the top of the list

For example I have:
Night - time based - (11pm - 7am) --> turn wifi and all sounds and vibration off
Home - location based - wifi on, gps off, sounds up, vibrations off, autolock off
Work - location based - wifi off, gps off, sounds low, vibration on, autolock on
Default - every other situation - wifi off, gps on, sounds medium, autolock on

These have worked perfectly for me for the past 2 weeks. My location "circles" are about a 2 (New York) block radius. It takes about 5-10 minutes after I have arrived at home or work for the location situations to change.

 

[jdubbs23]

Locale has been working perfectly for me for a couple weeks now. Today though I cannot get it to recognize my Work situation (vibrate mode) no matter what I do.

I've been at work for a couple hours, and it hasn't picked it up. I've also tried opening Locale and waiting a few minutes to see if it updates. I then tried unchecking the green indicator for the work situation, waiting, then rechecking it.

I've also restarted the phone and repeated. It just stays in Default situation.

 

[bodean]

How do I rename a location with locale? I set a location, says "Unknown location" for name.

Also, do I need to be at a location (aka my home) to set up the profile, or can I do it if im on the road....if so how?

Also, since I am flying a lot, what's the best way to set up locale so when I'm up flying, I have the radios turned off on the droid, but the phone can still operate?

 

[mrredskin]

anyone having issues with the GPS staying on after a while when using Locale?

at certain times when updating my location, the GPS will just stay on. this happens even when i'm just at home or the office and haven't moved for an hour.

i end up having to close the app, and then go in and disable the gps from my main settings menu to turn it off.