Using the New Google Play Service API

I recently got to use the new FusedLocationApi from Google Play Services on Android. This is something I have tried in the past, but all of the Android documentation refers to the deprecated LocationClient. I wanted to figure out how to use the new API so I did not need to update this project again.

public class MainActivity extends Activity implements
  GoogleApiClient.ConnectionCallbacks,
  GoogleApiClient.OnConnectionFailedListener {

  private GoogleApiClient mGoogleApiClient;

  Button mLocationUpdates;

  @Override
  public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);

    mGoogleApiClient = new GoogleApiClient.Builder(this)
      .addApi(LocationServices.API)
      .addConnectionCallbacks(this)
      .addOnConnectionFailedListener(this)
      .build();

    mLocationUpdates = (Button) findViewById(R.id.location_updates);
    // Disable until connected to GoogleApiClient
    mLocationUpdates.setEnabled(false);
  }

  @Override
  public void onConnected(Bundle bundle) {
    mLocationUpdates.setEnabled(true);
    mLocationUpdates.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
      @Override
      public void onClick(View v) {
        locationRequest();
      }
    });
  }

  private void locationRequest() {
    LocationRequest request = new LocationRequest()
      .setInterval(1000) // Every 1 seconds
      .setExpirationDuration(60 * 1000) // Next 60 seconds
      .setPriority(LocationRequest.PRIORITY_HIGH_ACCURACY);

    Intent intent = new Intent(this, LocationUpdateService.class);
    PendingIntent pendingIntent = PendingIntent
      .getService(this, 0, intent, PendingIntent.FLAG_UPDATE_CURRENT);
    LocationServices.FusedLocationApi
      .requestLocationUpdates(mGoogleApiClient, request, pendingIntent);
  }
}

This starts by creating a GoogleApiClient and setting connection callbacks to the activity. Once the GoogleApiClient is connected it calls onConnected and we enable the button that will start tracking location. I used the IntentService of receiving updates for this as it was simpler and worked for what I wanted. We create a LocationRequest whenever the button is pressed and ask for updates every second for 60 seconds.

public class LocationUpdateService extends IntentService {
  public LocationUpdateService() {
    super("LocationUpdateService");
  }

  @Override
  protected void onHandleIntent(Intent intent) {
    Bundle bundle = intent.getExtras();

    if (bundle == null) {
      return;
    }

    Location location = bundle.getParcelable("com.google.android.location.LOCATION");

    if (location == null) {
      return;
    }

    // Deal with new location
  }
}

The LocationUpdateService is very simple and pulls the new updates out of the Intent it gets passed.

Take Aways

I liked doing the IntentService route since we didn’t have to worry about the activity being killed to keep receiving updates to location. It also got around the Android 5.1 “feature” of knocking all alarms to a 60 second interval no matter how small of a frequency you actually requested (to fetch getLastLocation() from the LocationClient as I had previously used.)

Eric Oestrich

Using the New Google Play Service API

Take Aways