mikejeep

I guess you are your own special Spark.. Sometimes these engineering screens make me wonder.. Samsung especially.. they can't even correctly spell engineering! Next time you see 311490, hit About > Send Diagnostics if you don't mind. I feel like you've sent me a report already but I can't seem to find it. -Mike

Hmm... that pretty much makes the icons & widget useless, sorry it's misbehaving! It does sound like there is still something outside of the app killing off the background service.. is your widget showing stale values, or is it a blank gray square? Just to confirm one more time, you are not clearing SignalCheck from the Recent Apps list, correct? The Android system is only supposed to kill services like SignalCheck when system resources get low, and should restart them automatically once enough resources are available again. Turning off the screen should not trigger this. And the N5 has plenty of memory to handle my relatively puny service. I've been using ART on my N5 for a few weeks and have not seen any adverse affects on SignalCheck. But, if you are bored and have a chunk of spare time to wait for the cache to rebuild and want to try switching back to dalvik to see if it helps, let me know what happens. Right now, I do not believe ART is the culprit. I am working on an update for you to try out, hopefully it will provide some more insight into what's causing this. I will keep you posted. -Mike

The 4.4.1 and 4.4.2 updates include several nice fixes including a huge speaker volume improvement. Update to 4.4.2 before rooting, because you will have to do it over again anyway. -Mike

How long were you offline between your old and new G2's? It could have been a bad device, but keep in mind it might also be a result of NV upgrade progress in your area. -Mike

Well that's certainly annoying! Until AJ mentioned it the other day, nobody had reported this. Do either of you know how long this has been happening? Do you use the widget as well, and if so, does that disappear too? Any custom launchers in play? So far I have been unable to find anything on my end that would cause that. I found a vague uncredited reference mentioning that if an app is running while it is updated, the icon may disappear, but I am always running it, and have never seen this behavior on any of the devices I use for testing. -Mike

I think Android 4.4+ has some memory management quirks they need to work out, it appears to be killing services too aggressively in some situations. But have you seen this on pre-4.4 ROMs? Any task killers or memory managers? Outside of the Recent Apps glitch, SignalCheck should automatically restart its background service shortly after it is killed off by the system. It will not restart if manually killed by the user or a third-party app. -Mike

Yes, any task killer or memory management apps will cause problems for any apps that rely on a background service, possibly on versions of Android prior to 4.4 as well. I'm don't want to get on a soapbox here, but I'm going to for a moment: apps like that are, in general, a terrible idea. Especially on a powerful device like the Nexus 5. Android handles resource management very well on its own. Don't be fooled into thinking that you need to see a lot of RAM available on an Android device -- the OS frees up resources as it needs it. But if you prefer to use the app, certainly do so.. just keep this in mind if certain apps don't seem to perform properly. That is very odd.. there is nothing in the app that has the capability to lock the screen. Perhaps that's being caused by the reboot app trying to wipe out the newly starting SignalCheck service. Try disabling auto launch on boot and see if it still happens. -Mike

Yep. But 1X 800 has been live in many areas for several months.. they just hadn't been officially accepted for some reason. I rarely catch a PCS signal anywhere in Eastern MA these days. -Mike

I'm guessing that you are clearing SignalCheck out of the Recent Apps list (right soft button on N5)? On Android 4.4+, that kills the SignalCheck background service that keeps everything updated. It's a bug affecting a lot of apps; myself and many other developers have been trying to get it acknowledged. Launching the app will get everything going again; don't clear it from Recent Apps and it will continue updating as it should. I meant to post a note about it here but I forgot.. my bad. -Mike

Nice job, appreciate the effort! Just curious.. were you comparing LTE signals or something else? What were you using to view the signal readings? -Mike

Sure! I will add the release date to the About screen. FYI, I also include it on the Google Play "What's New" field and the full changelog on the website: http://www.bluelinepc.com/signalcheck/change-log/. Google would allow it, but I think I would prefer to stay consistent with the format I have been using. If there is significant demand for it though, I can reconsider. I have just found that using the date makes people far more antsy (demanding) for updates.. I don't need extra pressure -Mike

Could have just been the holiday overloading the network.. my N5 was fine, but my wife's iPhone 5s didn't receive a couple of MMS messages for 12+ hours.. we really enjoyed being woken up at 4am when they finally arrived! -Mike

I believe the need/ability to open/close notifications with the two finger swipe is dynamically handled by Android and depends on the size of the notification as well as the amount of other notifications you have at the time. There are no options on my end to control that. As far as the BSL, right now that isn't possible because it is only generated when the app is in the foreground. I'll have to do some testing to see if it can reasonably work on the background service. Before I implemented the cache, I felt it used too much data and CPU, which was pointless because you couldn't see it unless the app was in the foreground anyway. Thanks for the cookies! I hope everyone has a great holiday. -Mike

Merry Christmas, everyone.. Santa has delivered a SignalCheck update, just in time to use with any new gadgets you might find under the tree! Version 4.21 should be available on Google Play shortly. This is a nice update because it fixes some bugs, adds some features, and has some significant code optimizations I have been trying to finish for awhile. Here are the highlights: Resolved issue with CDMA 1X provider names failing to display. The bug causing the 1X provider names to be replaced with the SID has been resolved thanks to a ton of help from @Flompholph.. much appreciated! Added support for more devices to system shortcuts. (Pro) Thanks to some awesome work by @DaQue and @mrrogers1, the Data and Debug screens now work on more devices, including the LG G2 and some Samsung phones. Thanks guys! Added LTE cell information and mobile data connection status to the expandable notification on Android 4.1+ devices. (Pro) Depending on how full your notification tray is, you may need to use a two-finger pulldown to see the extra information. Changed some Sprint LTE connections to appear as “Sprint*” as a temporary indicator of likely Band 26 or Band 41 “Spark” connections. Evaluation and testing of this feature is ongoing and likely to change in the future. I am working with Sprint to try determining the best way to indicate LTE Band 26 or 41 connections, but it will be a few weeks before I will have all the information needed. In the meantime, the provider label will add an asterisk to draw your attention to the fact that you might be on one of these new bands based on the MCC-MNC. This is not a guarantee, but the best effort possible at the moment. Added display of last known LTE cell information when Show Hidden Data is enabled and LTE connection is lost. (Pro) Some users are seeing quick glimpses of LTE they want to track. Enabling the feature under Preferences > General Settings > Show Hidden Data will show the GCI/PCI/TAC of the last LTE connection, if available. Added option to include logcat output from the app when sending a diagnostic report. This helps me handle support requests much better. Only logcat output related to the currently running SignalCheck process is included. Overhauled provider database functions, drastically reducing the number of queries needed; this results in less CPU, memory, and battery usage by the app. Not very visible on the front end, but a solid behind-the-scenes improvement. System resources will be saved, which is always a good thing. Changed mobile location services warning prompt to clarify that location services may only be needed if the app does not perform as expected. Fielded some complaints from users that did not like being told that mobile location services were required, so I changed the wording to be more technically correct. Some devices require mobile location services in order to gather the SID/NID/BID data, and some don't. If your device requires these services, the app will not work properly if they are disabled. If your device does not require these services, this setting does not matter. The only way to know if they are needed is to see what happens when you run the app with these services disabled. Despite some claims to the contrary, the app is not showing stale signal data based on your location. Resolved issue with display layout on non-CDMA devices when connected to LTE. The display was shifted downward a bit, this has been fixed. Resolved issue with errors when changing alert tone selections. (Pro) Changing some alert tones was causing crashes, this has been fixed. Resolved issue with incorrect LTE MCC-MNC on some newer devices. Some European devices were showing incorrect MCC-MNC values, this should be fixed. Resolved issue with LTE CQI display. Display label and valid range has been corrected. Updated a small number of Verizon entries in the CDMA provider database. Some former Alltel entries were updated. SignalCheck Lite (free) is overdue for an update; I held off on 4.19 because of the CDMA 1X provider name bug. That update should be released within 48 hours. Sorry for the delay. Thanks to everyone for their support. Happy holidays! -Mike

Yes, it's a beta tester thing.. the public Pro release hasn't been updated in over 2 weeks, and Lite in over a month. There were numerous beta updates over the past few days because I had a handful of testers working out some bugs for me, and I was trying to make as much progress as I could while I had time to work on the app. I don't typically update the betas this frequently, as I tend to work on it a lot myself before reaching a point where I'd like to push it out to you guys. I also try not to over-update the public version so it doesn't seem like a nuisance. I try to balance the frequency of the public updates so that new features and fixes are in users' hands in a timely manner, unless there is a significant bug which requires immediate action. By nature, beta updates are going to be more frequent. Why do you have to recreate the home screen shortcut? I use the widget on some devices, and the shortcut on others, and I've never had to re-create anything. It shouldn't affect your device any more than any other app update does. -Mike EDIT: FYI, the 4.21 update pushed out tonight will be the last "fast" update for awhile.. the bugs are squashed and I'm working on things that will take awhile before they are ready.

It is shown on the LTE Engineering screen. Dial *#*#33284#*#* to get to the menu you need, or grab an app that has a shortcut to it built in. SignalCheck Pro has the shortcut; hopefully soon it will show the band right in the app so you won't need it. The Nexus 5 Field Test app has the shortcut too. -Mike

To expand on what Flompholph said, Sprint also intentionally uses an offset in many markets, marking the location in the middle of a sector instead of the actual site location. See here: http://www.bluelinepc.com/signalcheck/help/#bslwrong -Mike

You are right, that tower down the road from you might not be completely finished.. in fact that's probably why you're not connecting to LTE. If you do go check out the tower, the equipment may already be installed but is waiting on backhaul or something else. Site upgrades require a lot of different things to happen. The shiniest new cabinets are not much good if there isn't any fiber hooked up to them, or if the equipment hasn't passed the necessary testing and inspections. There are dozens of sites near me that have all of the new equipment in place, but are not broadcasting LTE yet -- my guess (and that's all it is, a guess) is that the backhaul is not in place. An incomplete NV site and the CSFB issue are two totally different things. If you're not having problems connecting to other LTE sites nearby, it's a reasonable indicator that it's not an issue in your area. By the way, welcome to S4GRU! You seem interested in this stuff, so poke around and read up on all of the great information that has already been posted. There are some very informative articles on "The Wall". -Mike

Connecting to eHRPD does not have any correlation to the status of LTE at a site; many areas were seeing eHRPD long before LTE arrived. The CSFB issue is separate, eHRPD has nothing to do with it. The Sprint coverage maps are significantly optimistic and inaccurate. Unless you know you have connected to this specific site with other (non-triband) Sprint LTE devices, it's hard for you to know for sure if CSFB is causing a problem or not. -Mike

I have zero expectation that LG will be unable to "fix" the G2 to work with Sprint's new LTE bands. Sprint has been saying from the beginning that the update would not be released until early 2014, so nobody should be concerned yet. The Nexus 5 is in the same boat; I can't imagine two of the major tri-band device releases would fail to actually operate as tri-band phones. Patience! If we're having this same discussion in March, then it would be reasonable to be concerned. -Mike

Thanks. The report showed that the symptoms you are seeing are similar to what is popping up for other Sprint users as well, and I'm not exactly sure what is going on. The app is showing a live EV-DO signal, but nothing on 1X. Android reports there is no identifiable connection, yet the mobile data connection is showing active and it's usable. This is similar to what @dkyeager mentioned in this thread the other day, and I also replied to another similar post over here earlier. These seem to be network-side issues.. hopefully Sprint gets it resolved soon before it causes too many problems. -Mike

Thanks Robert! Now that I think of it, the editing problem probably goes back to summertime for my EVO LTE. It still works on XDA (non-IP Board), so I figured that IP Board changed something that didn't agree with Tapatalk. One very important piece of the puzzle I failed to mention is that I'm running the paid version of Tapatalk 2.4.13. I don't like v4 at all, but my refusal to update could be part of the problem. The Tapatalk folks hinted here that custom profile fields should be visible, but I know that isn't a guarantee. Keep up the great work Robert, I know running a board isn't easy, and you put a ridiculous amount of time into providing tremendous content as well! Much appreciated -Mike

I am suddenly getting a LOT of reports of this behavior from SignalCheck users -- behind the scenes, these devices appear to have a live EV-DO or LTE connection, but no 1X connection. Android is reporting no connection type at all, however the mobile data network is active and usable, and there is live signal information appearing behind the scenes (SignalCheck Pro users can go to Preferences > General Settings > Show Hidden Data to see it in the app). It is very strange, and just started within the past 3-4 days. I was hoping to find other reports on here about it, hopefully someone can determine what is going on, because I foresee this becoming quite an issue.. -Mike EDIT: This issue does not appear to be limited to just tri-band devices either.

A couple of things I keep meaning to ask about.. I am no longer able to edit my posts in Tapatalk. It used to work great, but for the past several weeks, it gets stuck on "Processing..." when I click modify. It still works on other sites, but I don't think any of them are running IP Board. Am I the only one having this issue? Happens on my EVO LTE and Nexus 5. Is it possible to add the 'Phones' and 'Location' fields to the user profile screen in Tapatalk? I find this information to be very useful when trying to help out other users. I know that custom fields can be added for other forum software, not sure about IP Board. Thanks! -Mike

That's odd.. I have been seeing "missing" info on some devices lately, but they have been LTE connections in areas having CSFB issues. Next time you see this, go to About SignalCheck > Send Diagnostics and send me a report. I might be able to give you some more insight as to what's going on. You will see live connections but your device will not authenticate or allow any data transfer over the mobile network when you disable mobile data. It comes in handy for me, I get to use old phones for app testing without activating them with a provider! -Mike