Can a background service be created in WP7 which uses GeoCoordinateWatcher to send data at a specific interval given. What I need exactly is to develop a lightweight WP7 background service that sends latitude and longititude to a wcf server after given MovementThreshold is passed. From what I read, this is not totally achievable in WP7. Is there any workaround that can help me?
It's possible to do a service which does this every 30 minutes - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh202941(v=VS.92).aspx
But if you need more frequent access than that, then the only current possibility is for the user to run your app under their lockscreen.
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I want to develop an app that has a background task that checks email servers (POP, IMAP, etc) for new email.
From what I can tell of background task, it is only allowed to run for a short time, and can be started only every 15 minutes if it is a timertrigger.
Since I want this app to run on all Windows devices, what is that proper approach to having a background task that can do this? It doesn't seem possible at this point.
But since Windows devices are able to check email in the background, there must be a way. Does anyone have any insights?
What you wish to achieve is a near real time notification of user about a mail he received . You are right that Windows doesn't allow a background task to run at intervals lesser than 15 minutes . What you are looking for is Windows Push Notification Service which can be used to send notifications from your own cloud service onto the device
It is not possible to use a background task working all time to get in real time the new emails in your case.
You must implement another approach may be using your own backend to implement push notifications to send a new notification when a new email is received.
If your provider has an API you can use it.
We are developing an app(iOS) in appcelerator which has a sync contact feature in it. This calls an API which syncs contacts with server. I want this to run in background of the app. It should not make the user stop on a screen. Can anyone help me on this?
If you use the iOS background it's only when the app goes to the background and has limitation set by the OS - so if, for example it takes too long to process, or if the OS needs memory - it will shut it down.
I'm guessing (correct me if I'm wrong) that you want to do the sync while the app is running, yet not compromise the user experience by freezing the app?
First of, know the the request to the server is made async - only processing the response is made on the js thread - so to make better use of your single thread I suggest you view the following presentation: http://www.slideshare.net/ronaldtreur/titanium-making-the-most-of-your-single-thread
If you truly want a background thread to do the job, currently you would have to write your own native module to do that.
Also, this is something to look forward to in future versions: https://github.com/appcelerator/cspec-titanium-multithreading
You can use the background service for that.
But be aware, that this services will stop after a few minutes
In my windows phone 8 application, I would like to refresh/load some data periodically (less than 10 minutes) from server, while application running in background (ie, in dormant and tombstoned). I tried scheduled task agent and resource intensive task agent, but they are called at rate of 30 minutes gap. Please let me know is there any other solution for implementing the above said requirement.
Thanks and Regards
#nish
If you need to get data more frequently than the default available in Windows Phone, you should think about using push notifications. This won't be suitable for a full data push, but if you use it correctly, you can get a user experience that you can live with.
One common approach to this is to set up your server to send a notification to the device when there is something new to report instead of pushing a "nothing has changed" message every 10 minutes or so. If you push out a tile update notification to say, for example, "You have x unread items", the user may then click on the tile for your app and you can poll the server for new items on launch/resume. If you want a more intrusive option, you can send a toast notification as well, but in most cases the tile update will be sufficient.
This method has a few advantages.
You won't be burning through battery power polling every 10 minutes while the user is asleep
Your server will have significantly less load since it is not having to process full data requests every 10 minutes per client.
This fits in with the design philosophy of Phone apps - you are surfacing the required data to the user, while at the same time preserving battery life.
Do I understand correctly that your primary goal is to keep some host session alive by having the phone make a query periodically? If so...
I would not recommend this approach: 1) you cannot count on the phone having network connectivity when it tries to send its query. If the user puts the phone away in a pocket or purse, the odds worsen. 2) it's probably bad from a security perspective, and wasteful from a host resources perspective.
You might instead add logic to your app to resume a timed-out host session as seamlessly as possible. This would add real utility value to the mobile app value proposition over raw HTTP access to the same host.
I am planning to write WP7 app, which needs to send to server phones GPS position every 5 minutes. Data must be sent to server even if app is not running. One way to do that is to use Background agents (I am using 7.5 Mango), but in that case app will send data only every 30 minutes, which is not acceptable in my case.
Is there any other solution?
Thanks in advice.
No, this is not a supported usecase for WP7 apps on Mango. Also, it's important to mention that the location you'll get for GeoCoordinateWatcher on a background agent is a cached geolocation from approximately the last 15 minutes and not the real-time geolocation.
What exactly are you trying to build if you don't mind me asking? This sounds oddly close to spyware. Even if it's innocuous and meant for a good purpose, I'd be careful walking in any direction that constantly shares GeoLoc with a remote server.
Your only choices are sending the data every 5 minutes while application is running (even when the phone is locked) and/or send the data once every 30 minutes by registering a PeriodicTask.
Having said that, I agree with Justin in that what you are describing sounds nefarious.
I am working on an application that is receiving XMPP notifications using the Matrix SDK. As well I am using async web service calls to receive an initial set of data from the server.
Now, I am aware that with Mango I can close the app or move it to the background and have a background task that is able to be run every 30 mins (or so) for 15sec max which obviosuly means the XMPP push isn't going to work in this scenario. Is there any way to get background apps to execute more frequently than this?
Failing that for the syncing process all I can do is every 30 mins use a web service call to get any updates and store into Isolated storage for my app to pick up when it's next run. But I believe I cannot use any UI from a background task so cannot tell the user of updates?
So, if I get an important message can I somehow override the slowness here and force my app to run and inform the user visibly that something has happened and he needs to look at it? Is this where push notifications come in?
You can use the ShellTile API to update the application's tile on the Start screen, or use the ShellToast API to show a toast to the user. Both of these can be configured to launch into a specific part of your application (deep-linking) when tapped.
If you need a constant monitoring/update/notification system for your application when it's not running, then using push notifications is probably the more appropriate approach.