WP7 GPS information broadcast

Question

Is there a way to get Windows Phone 7 to “broadcast” its physical location automatically?

I’m trying to work around the fact that the GPS data will only be available to my app when the app is actually running. Ideally, it would somehow be possible for the user to configure the phone to continuously broadcast the location at intervals to a webservice. This way it would be possible to create a basic GPS tracker, which works even when the app is not active. When the app is launched again, it queries the same webservice to find out where the phone has been since the last time.

Yes, it will be a battery drain, and yes, there’s going to be privacy issues and all sorts of other problems. But it’s up to the user to decide if he/she enables the service.

And finally, yes, I realize the answer to this question in all likelihood is going to be “no” – at least until we get some kind of multitasking support on WP7. :)

Answer 1

Hi Jakob, As you expected.

No :)

You can have your app running under lockscreen though. If you want info on this let me know and I'll edit the post.

The only other possibility is for your web service to issue toast notifications as requests for your user to tap and provide a location update. You may feel this is too cumbersome to your users to have them tap a toast everytime you want your app to get control.

edit:

PhoneApplicationService.ApplicationIdleDetectionMode Property (Microsoft.Phone.Shell)

Idle Detection for Windows Phone