phonegap: how to check if gps is enabled

Question

I want to show an alert saying that "Please turn on your GPS".

How can I get GPS status using phonegap?

I have used following code but I don't get any alert message if GPS is turned off. Instead nothing happens.

<!DOCTYPE html>
  <html>
  <head>
   <title>Device Properties Example</title>

<script type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8" src="cordova.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" charset="utf-8">

// Wait for device API libraries to load
//
document.addEventListener("deviceready", onDeviceReady, false);

// device APIs are available
//
function onDeviceReady() {

   var test= navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(onSuccess, onError);

}

// onSuccess Geolocation
//
function onSuccess(position) {
    var element = document.getElementById('geolocation');
    element.innerHTML = 'Latitude: '           + position.coords.latitude              + '<br />' +
                        'Longitude: '          + position.coords.longitude             + '<br />' +
                        'Altitude: '           + position.coords.altitude              + '<br />' +
                        'Accuracy: '           + position.coords.accuracy              + '<br />' +
                        'Altitude Accuracy: '  + position.coords.altitudeAccuracy      + '<br />' +
                        'Heading: '            + position.coords.heading               + '<br />' +
                        'Speed: '              + position.coords.speed                 + '<br />' +
                        'Timestamp: '          + position.timestamp                    + '<br />';
}

// onError Callback receives a PositionError object
//
function onError(error) {
    alert('code: '    + error.code    + '\n' +
          'message: ' + error.message + '\n');
}

</script>
</head>
<body>
  <p id="geolocation">   Finding geolocation...</p>
</body>
</html>

score 27 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:09

27

Assuming we're talking just about Android platform only, as @Joerg rightly says, you can use cordova.plugins.diagnostic to check if GPS is enabled using isGpsLocationEnabled():

cordova.plugins.diagnostic.isGpsLocationEnabled(function(enabled){
    console.log("GPS location is " + (enabled ? "enabled" : "disabled"));
}, function(error){
    console.error("The following error occurred: "+error);
});

If the result is that GPS is switched off, you can either switch the user to the location settings page to manually enable GPS:

cordova.plugins.diagnostic.switchToLocationSettings();

Or, in addition, you could use cordova-plugin-request-location-accuracy to request high accuracy location mode (i.e. GPS) directly from within the app. This will show a native confirm dialog and if user agrees, GPS will be enabled automatically:

function onRequestSuccess(success){
    console.log("Successfully requested accuracy: "+success.message);
}

function onRequestFailure(error){
    console.error("Accuracy request failed: error code="+error.code+"; error message="+error.message);
    if(error.code !== cordova.plugins.locationAccuracy.ERROR_USER_DISAGREED){
        if(window.confirm("Failed to automatically set Location Mode to 'High Accuracy'. Would you like to switch to the Location Settings page and do this manually?")){
            cordova.plugins.diagnostic.switchToLocationSettings();
        }
    }
}

cordova.plugins.locationAccuracy.request(onRequestSuccess, onRequestFailure, cordova.plugins.locationAccuracy.REQUEST_PRIORITY_HIGH_ACCURACY);

edited May 23 '17 at 12:09

Community

1
1

answered Feb 10 '16 at 08:46

DaveAlden

30,083
11
93
155

Thanks for great answer. But unfortunately this plugin does not work in Phonegap Build. Whenever I include plugin in config.xml it fails with error for android. – user2899728 Feb 12 '16 at 09:49
1

I don't use Phonegap Build (I build locally), but I'd be interested to know what the error is and if I can fix it. I'd be grateful if you could open an issue on the [plugin's github repo](https://github.com/dpa99c/cordova-plugin-request-location-accuracy) and paste the log output from Phonegap Build containing the error details. – DaveAlden Feb 12 '16 at 09:53
Please review issue from https://github.com/dpa99c/cordova-plugin-request-location-accuracy/issues/3 – user2899728 Feb 12 '16 at 10:07
I accepted your answer. What about ios? How can we trigger this kind of popup or how can we at least chck gps for ios as well? – user2899728 Feb 12 '16 at 10:54
2

iOS doesn't distinguish between high-accuracy (GPS) or low-accuracy(Network) - it's simply "Location". You can use the diagnostic plugin to check [isLocationEnabled()](https://github.com/dpa99c/cordova-diagnostic-plugin#https://github.com/dpa99c/cordova-diagnostic-plugin#islocationenabled) and if not, the best we can do is [switchToSettings](https://github.com/dpa99c/cordova-diagnostic-plugin#switchtosettings) to allow user to manually enable it. – DaveAlden Feb 12 '16 at 11:02
1

Note it's possible to natively invoke such a dialog on iOS by requesting a location, but this is something cordova-plugin-geolocation doesn't currently support - see [this issue](https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/CB-10478) – DaveAlden Feb 12 '16 at 11:04
Let us [continue this discussion in chat](http://chat.stackoverflow.com/rooms/103289/discussion-between-user2899728-and-davealden). – user2899728 Feb 12 '16 at 11:23

score 3 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

3

The answer to your question is below.

You cannot check *if gps is enabled*

You can set a timeout and get the timeout. You can do this by setting the timeout parameter in the geolocationoptions parameter. (which you did not use)

From the documentation

timeout: The maximum length of time (milliseconds) that is allowed to pass from the call to navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition or geolocation.watchPosition until the corresponding geolocationSuccess callback executes. If the geolocationSuccess callback is not invoked within this time, the geolocationError callback is passed a PositionError.TIMEOUT error code. (Note that when used in conjunction with geolocation.watchPosition, the geolocationError callback could be called on an interval every timeout milliseconds!) (Number)

WAIT I WAS WRONG

There is now a plugin that checks to see if the GPS is turned on.

In fact, more than one.

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

1
1

answered Feb 10 '16 at 00:55

Thanks for response. Can we trigger to turn gps on in android using phonegap? – user2899728 Feb 10 '16 at 01:15
@user2899728 if the answer resolved your issue, could you check mark the answer 'accepted'. – Feb 12 '16 at 04:58
can you please suggest that how can I trigger a gps setting popup so that user can turn it on within app ? – user2899728 Feb 12 '16 at 10:12
Have you tested both plugins? They didn't work for me. So i am trying to get the right way to use Diagnostic plugin. – sonseiya Feb 25 '16 at 18:11

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 10 '16 at 06:37

2

The best way to check if GPS, Wifi, … is enabled, is to use this plugin:

https://www.npmjs.com/package/cordova.plugins.diagnostic

Using this plugin you can check a lot of features and you can switch the user to the settings.

answered Feb 10 '16 at 06:37

Joerg

3,102
2
24
30

I had being using isLocationEnabled() from Diagnostic Plugin, but if my Gps is Off, the function goes to the success callback. Do i must use isGpsLocationEnabled() and isNetworkLocationEnabled() instead of? What is the difference? – sonseiya Feb 25 '16 at 18:25

phonegap: how to check if gps is enabled

3 Answers3

WAIT I WAS WRONG

Linked