[kristofferR]

This looks really nice. I recently switched to Android (which, in my mind, with version 4.1 finally is able to compete with iOS in smoothness/stability while vastly surpassing it in features and usability), so I'm hopeful for an Android version.

An Android version would also bring added benefits of smarter/less battery intensive background operation which could make this run all the time. Constant GPS-monitoring like Latitude or this seems to run way better on Android for some reason.

[MrScruff]

* An Android version would also bring added benefits of smarter/less battery intensive background operation which could make this run all the time. Constant GPS-monitoring like Latitude or this seems to run way better on Android for some reason. *

I'm curious, what makes you think this would more power efficient on Android?

[kristofferR]

This is purely speculative, but I think there are a couple of reasons why apps like this runs better on Android.

I think it mainly boils down to the fact that app developers on Android have much more freedom than on iOS, for example - instead of having to run the whole app in the background they can just run a small daemon. Android apps don't resort to weird workarounds, like in regular intervals doing something that requires some CPU power, in order to not get autokilled/paused like inactive apps often are on iOS.

On Android they can also do stuff like only using the GPS (which is very battery intensive) if they notice that the cell phone antenna/wifi reception is changing (indicating that you're not standing/sitting still) while GPS background logging on iOS requires constant GPS-logging.

Limits like that makes iOS use way more battery for background location tracking, in my experience at least. Another reason may be simply that Android phones tend to have larger batteries (in mAh) than iPhones do (the iPhone 5 has a 1440mAh battery, the Samsung Galaxy S3 has 2100mAh battery).

While the iPhone 5 is generally more power efficient than the S3 (due to slower CPU with less cores, smaller display and a more optimized OS), I'd imagine that their GPS chips uses approximately the same power, draining the iPhone battery faster since it simply has less power stored.

[jorgeortiz85]

Foursquare's experience developing apps that use background location has been the exact opposite.

The iOS background location APIs are so restrictive precisely so that you can't drain the battery. The OS, which is running anyway, can listen for major changes in location and start your app only if the location change is relevant to your application.

On Android, your app has to be running in the background always, to constantly check for such changes itself, which significantly drains the battery. If several such apps are running...

[nuclear_eclipse]

> On Android, your app has to be running in the background always, to constantly check for such changes itself, which significantly drains the battery. If several such apps are running...

Strictly false. Your app may still have a daemon in the "running" state in the background, but Android supports the exact same "sleep until significant changes are detected by the OS" method that iOS uses. I have multiple applications that can take action of some form or another based on changes to my location, and unless I have my phone screen turned on and actively running the UI for those apps, they never even appear in the list of applications using the most battery.

[pooriaazimi]

Unless I'm very much mistaken, almost everything you said regarding background apps using location services is possible in iOS 6 (or even iOS 5).

[chubs]

It's quite simple: most iPhone apps just leave the GPS turned on 100% of the time when in the background, as it's complicated to do otherwise (or you can use the borderline-useless 'significant change' cell-tower location api's).

Android gives you the option of leaving it turned off for 10 mins, fire your app up for a minute, turn the GPS on, then turn it off again and go to sleep for 10 mins again. Huge battery savings. You can technically do this on iOS, but it's a challenge and kinda-sorta breaking the background running rules so big companies like google don't tend to do it in their apps.

There you go :)

[miahi]

We should have hints on titles like "Apple only" so we don't have to read for 5 minutes and then see that it was a total waste of time, having no Android version.