[nobody7290]

For the first time, my blackberry seems to reliable report its location to the server - this feature was introduced long ago, but, until now never worked.
I started to give up the hope RIM will fix it.
But since I have this OS on my 9700 it looks like something has been fixed.

There was a thread in the forum, where some nice guy had written a simple/sample code to extract the location data from the BES database, but I dont find it any more.

Anyone remembering where I find this ?

TIA

[JavaJunkee]

Try this -

select
Latitude,
Longitude,
UserConfigID,
DisplayName,
PIN
FROM SyncLBS JOIN UserConfig
ON SyncLBS.UserConfigID = UserConfig.Id

[nobody7290]

Thanks, i also found this after a little more research.
And built my own enterprise tracker.
See here:
http://www.blackberryforums.com/bes-...-new-post.html
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[JavaJunkee]

Over the last day, I've been testing an AT&T 9800 (Torch). My experience is exactly the same as with pre-6.0 devices.

I seem to get one or two (inaccurate locations), then it stops updating the database entirely. The inaccuracy, I blame on the device. But not updating the SyncLBS table, I'm not sure where the fault lies there.

Has anyone gotten this to work reliably?

[nobody7290]

I currently have one 9000 with 5.0.0.509 (Platform 5.2.0.50), which now reports its location properly since 3 days.
Also another 9000, 5.0.0.900 (5.2.0.89) which is completely unable to report the location.
My 9700 with 6.0.0.461 (6.6.0.137), worked for 3 days until yesterday.

So, my results are a little better then yours, but far from reliable for everyday use.

[knottyrope]

interesting, we use telenav for locating our tech and toss it up on google earth. Wonder why this app can do it fairly well and BES can not. Using 9700 and 9800 with latest AT&T released OS on all.

[nobody7290]

The only possible explanation for me is, that this feature once was a project for a large customer, but then, has been dropped before completion, and therefore RIM does not make any efforts to finish it - Third party Software does this better anyway.

Or, RIM decided to leave all the LBS stuff to third party developers to make them happier.

There was once a version of BBM which you could tell to alert you if a friend of yours is in range of 1mile. This worked nice, but has never made it to the release version.

[nobody7290]

Originally Posted by nobody7290

I currently have one 9000 with 5.0.0.509 (Platform 5.2.0.50), which now reports its location properly since 3 days.
Also another 9000, 5.0.0.900 (5.2.0.89) which is completely unable to report the location.
My 9700 with 6.0.0.461 (6.6.0.137), worked for 3 days until yesterday.

So, my results are a little better then yours, but far from reliable for everyday use.

The 9700 started reporting again after turning off an on the feature on the server:
KB14976-The BlackBerry smartphone does not send GPS location information when Enterprise Location Tracking is turned on

Quote KB:
This is a previously reported issue that has been escalated internally to our development team. No resolution time frame is currently available
(since 2 Years !)

[TargetIT]

Here's what I originally posted. It creates another table in SQL to track the changes, as opposed to taking a snapshot of where things right now. My original reasoning for going down this road was that when you're not in Sat range, it reports 0,0 as your location - so, really not useful at all if you lost your BB inside.

http://www.blackberryforums.com/bes-...-policies.html

I too abandoned it as the actual information being provided by the BB was sketchy at best (it seemed like it would report its position via the policy if I changed the policy WHILE I was in Sat range and then stop when I went indoors). I'm curious to see how well it works now.

[nobody7290]

For my few berries it works like you expect:
If the devices can report a reliable location using GPS they do, otherwise, they dont report a new location or 0,0. Reporting will start again when a GPS lock is aquired.
This is ok.

But, they do not report a location if location can be determined only by the cell towers. Even if you go manually in the GPS options of the device, and refresh the location sucessful based on Cell tower location, it will not be reported back to the server unless the number of sattelites is >0.

[nobody7290]

Followup:
Now, for the second time, I had to do the fix for the 9700 (deactivate enterprise location in the policy, and, the activate it again).
For me, this seems like if the server does not get location data within a time frame of about XX hours, it will stop collecting data.
The 9000 however still works fine.

Too bad, that in the BES 5.0.3 release notes nothing is mentioned about location tracking.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile

[TargetIT]

I would imagine it has little to do with BES and everything to do with the firmware of the BB.

[nobody7290]

mhm, but why then does a restart of the device not help if tracking stops ?

If reporting stops, this is in the first place a problem of the device, because, for some reason, my 9700 cannot get a GPS lock, either, because it is out of reach of a signal or, because there is a software problem.

If I restart the Blackberry by pulling the battery or have GPS again, I can see that location has beed updated sucessful.

But still, the BES will not put the updated record in the database (the other phone, the 9000 meanwhile is still working properly and does the updates).

The only way to enable location tracking is indeed to turn off location tracking off in the enterprise policy and reenable it.

I even tried just to send the IT policy to the device or restart the BES, but, this does not help.

So, from my point of view, there is a problem on the server also.

Of course only RIM can give a definite answer to this question, everything else is pure speculation.

I think, that RIMs behaviour about this problem is not acceptable. Enterprise location tracking is availible since a long time, and, it is advertised as a feature. How can a company like RIM just ignore a problem for years, which renders a complete feature useless (if you have more then a bunch of users, the probability that some phones will stop reporting is most likely 100%) ?

I favour the Enterprise location tracking because I do not have to give the location data to any third party. Everything is running on my server, and under my control.

Location services, which are free are simply not acceptable for me, because I do not want to be a guinea pig.
Paid services might have privacy policies, which will assure you, your data is safe, but, even If you believe them, there still is a probability that something can go wrong.

Enough rant. There is still a little hope that BES 5.0.3 will fix it.

[nobody7290]

Today, i was able to enable location tracking again by turning of location tracking in the BB control panel, then wait a little, then, turned it on again.

I am starting to believe, that the developers who implemented this feature at the beginning are a bunch of brainless *******.

The server talks about every minute to the handheld, Now, if enterprise location policy is set to on, it could add a request to every message to the handheld: "please send location if allowed by the user" - about a maximum of 8 bits for this message.

The BB then will check the local setting if enterprise location is enabled or not, and, if the local user has agreed to it, and then quue A job to locate itsef withing the defined time frame of the policy.
At the next communucation with the server it will submit the location data.
If it fails to get a location fix, it will behave like a mail server, trying to get a fix again, but waiting for a longer time+X for every unsucessfuld try.
The BB must not even remeber the job, because if enterprise location policy is set to "on" the server can add just one bit/byte in every datagram to the handheld, that it should try to submit its current location.

So, even if the handheld has other jobs to do, and, forgets about submitting its location to the server, it will remembered with every message it receives from the server.

This is not hard to implement, and, I think, there are not many better alternatives for an implementation.

Why is RIM unable to fix this rather simple problem ? Are other things more important, like trying to to waste $$$$$$$ for development efforts for a consumer touch phone platform, which looks nice, but, finally is just something like the iphone ?
It is more profitable to stay in a makrket nice and, to satisfy the nice customers then to try to satisfy everyone unsucessfull with a limited budget.
Posted via BlackBerryForums.com Mobile