Location awareness is a common feature for mobile application that enhance the user experience by providing context-specific services.

Why is this an issue?

The location awareness feature can significantly drain the device’s battery.

The recommended way to maximize the battery life is to use the fused location provider which combines signals from GPS, Wi-Fi, and cell networks, as well as accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer and other sensors. The FusedLocationProviderClient automatically chooses the best method to retrieve a device’s location based on the device’s context.

The rule flags an issue when android.location.LocationManager or com.google.android.gms.location.LocationClient is used instead of com.google.android.gms.location.FusedLocationProviderClient.

What is the potential impact?

Usability: the non-optimized location API consumer more battery.
Sustainability: the extra energy required has a negative impact on the environment.

How to fix it

Replace the usages of android.location.LocationManager or com.google.android.gms.location.LocationClient with com.google.android.gms.location.FusedLocationProviderClient.

Code examples

Noncompliant code example

public class LocationsActivity extends Activity {

    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        // ...

        LocationManager locationManager = (LocationManager) this.getSystemService(Context.LOCATION_SERVICE); // Noncompliant

        LocationListener locationListener = new LocationListener() {
            public void onLocationChanged(Location location) {
                // Use the location object as needed
            }
        };

        locationManager.requestLocationUpdates(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER, 0, 0, locationListener);
    }
}

Compliant solution

public class LocationsActivity extends Activity {

    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        // ...

        FusedLocationProviderClient fusedLocationClient = LocationServices.getFusedLocationProviderClient(this); // Compliant

        fusedLocationClient.getLastLocation()
            .addOnSuccessListener(this, location -> {
                // Use the location object as needed
            });
    }
}