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We just launched OpenSignal 2.0 for Android
- RyanZAG 14y agoFree with no ads? Curious to know why you're doing it. Do you somehow sell the uploaded data to interested parties?
- sinak 14y agoJust copyings James' response below here: That's the idea :) but a few things to note: 1. All data is anonymized 2. You can turn data-sharing off in the settings (as pointed out when you start the app) 3. Providing data to the networks is not only a funding source for our efforts to build coverage maps online (which will always be free and independent at opensignal.com) but it allows the networks to improve their service - showing them where their service is weak, or where they should focus their marketing.
- nakedrobot2 14y agoI enjoyed OpenSignal 1 on Android, but I also found that it was running in the background (and using up the very limited RAM on my Nexus S) even when I had not opened the app. So I uninstalled it. Are you able to explain why it was doing this, or was I somehow mistaken? Thank you!
- brendan_gill 14y agoIts user configurable. In the settings we allow users to choose how frequently the app will take signal readings and whether or not it will do so in the background. We also allow users to turn off data sharing completely if they are so inclined.
- nicholasjarnold 14y agoStill works well even with almost all permissions denied using LBE Privacy Guard. Want my Phone ID? Too bad!
- JamesCRR 14y agoHehe good to hear. We use a hashed version of phone IMEI as a unique identifier for proper weighting and cleaning of the data. You can also stop this without LBE by turning off data-sharing in the app, but then you won't be contributing to the world' largest and most open coverage maps.
- nicholasjarnold 14y agoYep, I'm still contributing my data. I was just a little bit leery of giving the unique ID of my handset. Will the data I share with my IMEI blocked still be useful?
- aw3c2 14y agoWhere "most open" means "you can look at it". By that definition pretty much everything is open.
- JamesCRR 14y ago@RyanZAG That's the idea :) but a few things to note: 1. All data is anonymized 2. You can turn data-sharing off in the settings (as pointed out when you start the app) 3. Providing data to the networks is not only a funding source for our efforts to build coverage maps online (which will always be free and independent at opensignal.com) but it allows the networks to improve their service - showing them where their service is weak, or where they should focus their marketing.
- RyanZAG 14y agoAh, interesting business model, thanks!
- th0ma5 14y agoWorking in a large downtown building, it would be great to have 3D view of what walls to be by to make a call. My brain sort of has a map like this, just from the punishment of a hanging browser session or dropped call.
- spwestwood 14y agoWith the new version of Google maps you can view nearby cell towers on a 3D map - you can see a screen shot on the android market: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.staircase3.opensignal&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.staircase3... It's very cool :)
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- stanleydrew 14y agoI would love to install and try this, but it wants access to my SMS messages and all my contacts. Why would a WiFi analyzer possibly need those two permissions? I've all but given up on rejecting apps that request my phone id since they all seem to do it now. But this seems excessive.
- sinak 14y agoThe SMS messages stuff is so we can run analysis on number of SMS's you send and receive to display to you. We don't read any of your SMS's, we just count them. Unfortunately Android permissions don't let us differentiate the two. You can just not allow that permission though and the app will still work.
- hayksaakian 14y agoLast I checked, you can't cherry pick permissions when you install an app, its all or nothing.
- sinak 14y agoHmm, I'm the iPhone user of the company so I wouldn't know :). But according to nicholasjarnold below LBE Privacy Guard might work for that?
- nickpresta 14y agoLBE Privacy Guard is only for rooted phones - i.e. most users won't have it.
- nicholasjarnold 14y agoYou can absolutely cherry pick permissions (and everyone should). You just can't do it during installation and without a 3rd party helper app. Please look into rooting your device and installing LBE Privacy Guard.
- cheald 14y ago
- dal 14y agoI don't know what you are referring to when you're talking about open. Where can I download the source code for your apps or a database dump?
- glogla 14y agoIs there way to simply get APK? Some people are not using google market, even if they are using Android.
- spwestwood 14y agoHi Glogla, You can get it here: http://opensignal.com/android_app/non-market-download.php http://opensignal.com/android_app/non-market-download.php
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- radley 14y agoReally? Why is that? I"m also an Android developer, so I'm curious why anyone would avoid the Play market.
- nickpresta 14y agoKindle, not available in their country, etc.
- radley 14y agoKindle isn't really Android and doesn't use most of these features. Countries that are not on Google Play usually have legal / export restrictions, do they not?
- r4vik 14y agoso what if they have legal / export restrictions, it shouldn't stop them from getting software
- brendan_gill 14y agoWe have a lot of demand from users who aren't able to access our app on Google Play. There's a lot of devices out there without market access e.g. Kindle Fire and we get a lot of demand in countries which don't have Google Play e.g. Iran & China.
- radley 14y agoWhere do you (HN) guys draw the line between good app & bad app? There seems to be a lot of "tin foil hat" responses here regarding permissions and personal information. I'm an Android developer with a top selling app that uses a TON of permissions (it features a bunch of system utility switches & stats). There's nothing I see about OpenSignal being a malicious app, but a lot of responses seem to presume otherwise despite OpenSignal team members being present and responsive here. What justifies the hard, negative position? I'm really very curious. What's the deal, please?
- nicholasjarnold 14y agoAs a technically inclined member of the HN community I am acutely aware of the implications of leaking my personally identifiable information out into the world and having it be stored/analysed/sold/copied for eternity. I think many of us are. Simply inquiring about how/why this information is used/asked for does not imply that we're having a 'hard negative reaction'. It just means that we're aware of our right to privacy and are actively trying to assert and protect it. Personally, I applaud the OpenSignal developers being active here and answering questions. Also, just because you might not be using the information you collect in your apps for nefarious purposes doesn't mean that nobody does. Finally, I don't expect you or anyone else to be the guardians of my privacy. Only I can be charged with that task.
- brendan_gill 14y agoWe posted on HN for exactly this type of constructive criticism (though we do hope that there are a few quiet users who are enjoying our app and don't feel the need to post a plain back slapping comment that isn't really part of the spirit of HN anyway). Privacy is something we take very seriously at OpenSignal. For one, we watched CarrierIQ get torn apart[1] after it came to light the types of data that they were collecting of their users. Its obvious to us that if we ever abused our user's privacy the same thing would happen to us, so not only do we consider ourselves moral people there are clear market forces from preventing us from using your private data, which might be more reassuring to some. We also only look at data related to your wireless service e.g. signal strength, data speeds etc and always anonymize it. It's worth remembering that not too long ago studies found that 50% of top android apps were tracking and collecting personal data[2] such as IMEIs, phone numbers, sms etc and these are not crowd-sourced data gathering apps, this was a random sample of the top 30 android apps at the time of the study. With that in mind, we don't begrudge anyone who wants to check our privacy standards are up to scratch. [1] http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/01/carrier-iq-how-to-find-it-and-how-to-deal-with-it/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/01/carrier-iq-how-to-find-it-a... [2] http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/30/study-select-android-apps-sharing-data-without-user-notificatio/ http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/30/study-select-android-apps...
- yock 14y agoI love the idea behind this. I seem to recall that the previous version wasn't terribly stable on my Galaxy Nexus. I'm eager to give the new version a try.
- donniezazen 14y agoOpenSignal 1.0 crashed evrytime I opened it on my Nexus 4. I hope you guys have fixed all those issues and I also hope the refresh is now automatic in-app and not manual.
- brendan_gill 14y agoWe're always interested in bug reports. Its most helpful if you can provide a detailed description so that we can try and recreate it. For example, you said it crashes on start but is it immediate or does it occur consistently after a particular element loads? Anything else that you notice? Also, detailed breakdown of carrier, device & software version always helps. In terms of updates we use the standard Google Play system, so you'll receive a notification when you open the Google Play app & the app will update automatically if you select the automatica updates checkbox. Thanks for the feedback.
- donniezazen 14y agoI have previously submitted bug reports when the crash happened through regular Android bug reporter. I just gave it a try and now it doesn't crash and start time has gone down too. It feels much more smooth now. Good work. Two other things that I want to say are as follows. 1. The app allows you to swipe among screens (Dashboard, Test, Stats, Coverage, and report) but once you are in coverage/map section swipe among screens doesn't work, instead it pans the map. May be a lock should be placed in map screen to have a consistent swipe experience. 2. I am not sure how stat settings work. I use Nexus 4 with Straight Talk/ATT. It is a prepaid with $45 for everything unlimited. I pay on 7th of each month. Allowances and Traffic settings in both Contract and pre-paid revert back to default settings. I can't change top-up date in pre-paid settings. Data/Call/SMS monitoring settings can be more intuitive. Thanks for coming over here and answering questions.
- brendan_gill 14y agoThanks - glad the new version is working better. We've squashed a large number of bugs. 1. The map screen will swipe but due to the map extending to the sides of the screen, a bezel swipe is required to switch to tabs adjacent to the map tab. This was recommended to us by Google employees on the Android team, so I imagine it's relatively standard practice. 2. We'll take a look at this. When you look into the different types of contract and pre-paid plans out there the functionality and settings rapidly became very complex. Once we get a bit more feedback from users we'll do some work to simplify them.
- derobert 14y agoTwo things: 1) I'm unclear what I'm supposed to enter on the plan details screen's "billing date". My last bill covered 2012-12-10 through 2013-01-09. Do I enter 9 or 10 there? Experimenting, it looks like you want the first day in the next bill, so 10. 2) The time on network graph is showing a lot of time on 3g, but that's because the phone is on WiFi so it dropped the HSDPA+ connection, probably to save power. Would be nice if you could exclude when on WiFi from that chart.