AutoLocation geofence vs Tasker net-only location

[UncleMike]

I'm setting up a few profiles that may benefit from a location context. Is geofencing really that much less power hungry then Tasker's net-only location when used as the only context? Are there any benefits of one over the other with regard to how quickly they recognize entering or leaving the designated area?

[Rich D]

> I'm setting up a few profiles that may benefit from a location context.  Is geofencing really that much less power hungry then Tasker's net-only location when used as the only context?  Are there any benefits of one over the other with regard to how quickly they recognize entering or leaving the designated area?
>

Great topic, I just started playing around with geo fences and so far I am unimpressed. I live in a very rural area and only have wifi on at my house intermittently. For my home context I usually use just a cell near (I only have 2 towers that register) but I thought I would try geofences, not expecting much figuring it would really need the wifi's to work well. Apparently I was correct. I am still testing but so far it will toggle on / off for at least 4 to 5 times a night much too unreliable.  I have not tried making a much larger fence area yet but if it gets too big I am better off with the cell near anyway. I have not tried taskers net- only location context  for fear of bad battery life. Burt perhaps I will give that a try..

[Marta Hintz]

I think that is user dependent.

[UncleMike]

As a test last night I setup my son's phone with 2 profiles - one with a Wifi Near context and one with a net-only Location (600m radius) context, and both intended to detect him being at school.  I set the Enter and Exit tasks on each to send me an SMS.  Not surprisingly, both activated and deactivated at the same time - at Tasker's default 10 minute screen off check interval - but this was about 20 minutes after he left school (normal for Wifi Near, but not so good for Location).  I also set my phone up with a net-only Location context to detect being at another school.  When I dropped my other son off earlier, I was in and out of the prescribed location (circle) within just a few minutes, and Tasker never realized I was there.

During a brief test of AutoLocation geofencing the other day, it almost immediately alerted me that I was within the circle, and within a minute of leaving it.  Unfortunately I had installed Tasker 4.3b10 just prior to installing AutoLocation, and removed AutoLocation shortly thereafter in an effort to resolve the weird Tasker behavior in b10 (which I now know as unrelated to AutoLocation).

I'll be doing some more testing over the next few days, but so far it looks like AutoLocation is far more responsive.  Unfortunately, AutoLocation is unaware of the status of other Tasker contexts that may be being used in conjunction with AutoLocation geofencing, so the geofence is being monitored even when less power hungry contexts would have Tasker NOT monitoring the location.

[Matt R]

Could you work around the ignorance of autolocation by disabling and enabling the profile using a second profile with your other contexts?

Matt

[Pent]

You can of course increase the off-check time if you want more responsiveness.

Also if I remember right you're using that Moto phone with the hardware sensor processing, possibly there's a low-power-and-frequent location check there.

Pent

[UncleMike]

I don't think disabling profiles in Tasker would affect power usage of geofence monitoring, since the actual monitoring is performed by Android, then reported to the plugin, which then reports it to Tasker. But it is possible to start/stop the monitoring from with Tasker using the plugin, though this could require additional profiles to do what Tasker does by itself for its own Location context.

[UncleMike]

I know I *can* do that, but I'd prefer not to wake the device more frequently just for that.

And yes, I am using "that" phone (Moto X - thanks for remembering!).  I'm hoping that Motorola was smart enough to have Google's "fuse" geofencing and location montoring run on the low-power, always-awake core.  In a recent wish list survey for a Moto X successor, my main request was to allow apps like Tasker to run on the same low-power core, and have access to all the built-in contextual awareness.  Tasker never shows up on my battery usage list anyway, but that's likely because I purposely don't use any power-hungry contexts.

[Scott]

I have my Geofence monitoring turn off whenever I have a "WiFi connected" profile active and I just handle it in the enter and exit tasks for those profiles.  Truthfully, I'm not sure how much battery it really buys me.  I have Google Now checking my location, anyway, and AutoLocation seems to piggyback off of that, so the Geofence monitor doesn't use very much extra battery.

[UncleMike]

I've been using AutoLocation to track my entering and leaving several GeoFenced areas during the past two weeks. I think the battery drain is negligible, but there can be significant lag in identifying that I'm within a GeoFence; I've remained stationary, well within an GeoFence, for up to 5 minutes without any recognition that I'm within the GeoFence.

For my purposes - seeing if I'm within a GeoFence when I stop driving, and have a calendar event (matching a filter) within the next 30 minutes. (If I stop driving, an near my doctor's office, and have an appointment within the next 30 minutes, turn on silent mode).

I may just stop using the GeoFences completely, as it doesn't seem to be responsive enough for my needs.

[Marta Hintz]

I experimented with the geofences. Same type of experience as you. However I noted if I go to google maps it instantaneously picked up where I was. It seemed like the geo fence need that trigger to push the info to tasker.

[PC]

Geofences are MUCH more responsive (at least in my testing) while driving IF the following 2 things are true:

1) GPS is on (in KitKat, this would be 'High Accuracy' Location settings instead of 'Battery Saving')

2) the AutoLocation monitor has a short update time for the 'Interval' setting for the monitor

I find, for example, before driving and launching my navigation profile, that I have to enable the 'High Accuracy' location settings, stop the monitor, wait 3 secs, and re-launch the AutoLocation monitor with the new settings to ensure that the GPS location co-ordinates are feeding into the Geofence monitor (which is also running, by the way).  I use pre-set geofences to close Waze and switch back to 'Battery Saving' location settings when I get to them, so you have to be able to get GPS to feed into the Geofence monitor.

This was absolutely not reliable on JellyBean for me, but I found that after I upgraded to KitKat, it's been much more responsive.

[Scott]

One issue with AutoLocation is that it depends heavily on how well Google is working at the time.  I've observed that it can be anywhere from much more accurate and responsive than Tasker's built in location monitor  to slightly less accurate and responsive.  For me it's normally as good or better so I use it.  Lately it seems like about every other update from Google makes it worse and then it's fixed in the next update.  Sort of like the Odd/Even Star Trek movie curse, pre Abrams.

[UncleMike]

If I'm using navigation for more than 5-10 minutes, I plug in my phone, since frequent GPS updates are required.  Other than that I rarely plug in my phone except for overnight charging.  The GeoFences I've setup are for places I visit with some predictability (doctor, dentist, school, etc), so I don't normally need navigation to find my way there, and don't want to plug in my phone to support frequent GPS updates just so my phone can auto-silence when I get to my destination.

Given the built-in driving detection in my Moto X, I had setup a profile that would check my calendar when I stopped driving, and if I had an appointment in the next 15-30 minutes it would enable silent mode.  This works rather well, but I was hoping to further refine it by using GeoFences.  The way they currently work (without GPS), I can easily be inside at my appointment before the GeoFence ever triggers, which is not what I'm looking for.

[PC]

I can completely understand that.

The way mine works is that I get into the car, and plug the phone into power, and then the NFC tag triggers a menu selection box, which allows me to launch Waze and it then turns on my GPS.  Even though I don't need navigation to get home, Waze will re-route me around bad traffic congestion, so I use it (and the menu box automatically picks 'Yes' after a few seconds so it's more or less an auto-launch).

Of course, I also have it set to specifically state PLUG IN POWER before it'll turn on GPS, so there you go.  No power, no GPS.

That way I can be sure that my battery won't be eaten alive either. ;)

[UncleMike]

I decided to try using am AutoLocation Location action to force recognition of my current location when I stop driving, and hopefully trigger any appropriate GeoFences in the process.

But, I'll be away for the next 6 days, so I won't have any testing opportunities during that time.

[Douglas Brown]

Just to add an observation...
My Geofences (all are 1500m radius) totally stopped working a few days ago; I seemd to be stuck inside one Geofence, even though I was commuting daily between 2 of them.
Now they "work" again. I fixed them by going through the list of Geofences and accepting each one without changes.

I hope this observation helps others.

PS - Though help gleaned from group discussions like this, my AutoLocation + Tasker set-up is steadily getting more relaible, though it's been harder than I expected.
Thanks guys!