CODEWITHSUNDEEP
androidtiminggsm
hotips
hotips

Reputation: 2631

Get mobile cell tower timing advance on Android 2.3

I need to get the mobile cell tower timing advance.
Is it possible on Android 2.3+ ?

[edit] It seems that it's not possible to retreive the timing advance... Is it possible to know the distance between the mobile and the cell and the bearing otherwise ? I suppose I can't use the Google hidden geolocation api in commercial application ;-) [/edit]

Thanks

Upvotes: 3

Views: 3874

Answers (4)

Masaharta
Masaharta

Reputation: 104

For LTE technology there is already an access to Timing Advance values: see http://developer.android.com/reference/android/telephony/CellSignalStrengthLte.html#getTimingAdvance()

Upvotes: 5

Dalmas
Dalmas

Reputation: 26547

This is currently not implemented, and it will be a hard task because it is device-dependent.

The actual timing advance is only known by the modem, also called the baseband processor (BP). The modem is coded by the device's constructor and thus cannot be modified, and can differ between constructors and devices.

Android runs on the application processor (AP) and uses AT commands to communicate with the BP (modem). For example, Android internally sends AT commands to the modem to send SMS, receive calls, ...

The only way to get the actual timing advance would be to query the BP (with an AT command), but whether the constructors implement a specific AT command to get it is up to them. Unfortunately almost no devices implement it (only very old ones), so there is no way to get this information.

Upvotes: 3

not2qubit
not2qubit

Reputation: 17027

If you need Antenna location you don't need Timing Advance. Then you need LAC, CID etc. which are all part of the public AOS API, and then you can query some public database for the location of these. There are dozens of Android apps that already does this. Perhaps even as an example app for Android developers. Google it.

However, GSM Timing Advance (TA) knowledge is definitely still of interest for several other reasons. So if someone know how to extract this info from the Android vendor RIL, please let us know.

Upvotes: 0

Hank
Hank

Reputation: 4716

I don't think it's a good idea to use timing advance for geolocation, since it is only relevant on GSM networks. Once the device hands over to UMTS networks, no more timing advance.

Why not use http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/location/obtaining-user-location.html ?

Upvotes: 0

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