Enhancement Request - Report Battery Status

[mccljs]

I would like to see the device report its battery status (charge level) when it reports program status and when it reports its location.

The battery status would then show in the Security Info screen for the device on the website.

[reinhardholzner]

unfortunately we can just send an SMS upon LOW-BATTERY-EVENT (which is broadcasted into the system).
there is no programming interface (API) for 3rd party developers in android SDK that allows us to read the current battery level.

[Filip Havlicek]

Available from API 5 it seems: http://developer.android.com/training/monitoring-device-state/battery-monitoring.html

Filip

[reinhardholzner]

also broadcast based... will be expensive

[Filip Havlicek]

Well, you can always make it opt-in.

Filip

[mccljs]

Thanks for the replies. I see so many apps that report battery status so I thought it was easy information to get.

I did find information in the link that Filip posted that indicates you can get battery status without registering a receiver but I am not an Android programmer so I may be reading it wrong.  http://developer.android.com/training/monitoring-device-state/battery-monitoring.html

John

[Filip Havlicek]

Nah, it is a receiver and I agree that it might have an impact on battery, that really depends on how often the broadcast is being sent. If it would be, let's say, hundreds of times per charge, then I think it might be fine if coded properly. Thousands of invocations might cause some issues I imagine.

Filip

[mccljs]

Thanks for the reply Filip.

I was looking at the statement "Because it's a sticky intent, you don't need to register a BroadcastReceiver—by simply calling registerReceiver passing in null as the receiver as shown in the next snippet, the current battery status intent is returned."

I took that to mean that you can make a call whenever you want to get the status, without having to receive periodic broadcast information.

I am asking mainly out of curiosity. I am a programmer but I have never done any Android programming.

John

[Filip Havlicek]

Ye, it's possible, but you won't get realtime stats like that. If you want a rough information (for example an hourly report) then it's possible this way. If you want it to be precise (~ every change in the percentage for example), you need the receiver.

Filip

[mccljs]

My initial enhancement request was that the device report the battery status when it reports the program status (I have mine set to every 60 minutes) and also when it reports its location. So I thought that the battery status inquiry could just be made at the reporting time instead of monitoring the status continually.

Thanks for all of the information.

John

[Filip Havlicek]

Hi,

we agreed that it will be included in the program status.

Filip

[mccljs]

Thanks.

[REDACTED]

Going to MyAvast - Info Page, Communication with Device seems OK...
Last communication is changing, but Battery status always stays the same... the last few weeks...
It has been OK before, but now not updating any more... always at 88% now.
Is this a wrong setting somewhere? I don't remember to have changed something...

Maybe not working any more for other reasons?
THX for info.

[REDACTED]

It is a bug, thanks for the report.

[REDACTED]

OK, thanks for info about in-correct battery information, so waiting to be corrected...

Maybe there is also an other bug I found...

In Avast Account page, going to Reward/Badges and mouse-over, there is a white rectangular box poping up... "without any text in it"...
Some boxes show "install" in green, but no other text at all...

Could this be related to some minimal needed flash or java-version to be installed?
I beleve to have seen there was also text before last week... now this text is not showing any more.