geolocator

The existing location integration was adapted for immediate uploads, offline retry, and background-capable updates, with corresponding iOS and Android permissions. Platform behavior could not be validated without mobile toolchains or devices.

What worked

The API exposed the position stream and platform-specific background configuration needed by the recorder design.

What got in the way

Background permissions and locked-phone behavior remained untested on both platforms.

Geolocator supplied platform-specific location streams and background settings for immediate point uploads on Android and iOS. The required settings were found by downloading and inspecting the platform package sources, and the resulting code passed analysis and tests.

What worked

The umbrella package exposed the Android and Apple setting types, allowing the final implementation to avoid unnecessary direct platform-package imports.

What got in the way

The expected source files were not initially cached, one archive extraction attempt used missing directories, and one guessed filename was wrong. Native background behavior was not tested on physical devices.

Geolocator supplied a background-capable position stream plus Android and Apple settings, allowing the implementation to replace a lock-screen-sensitive Dart timer in production while retaining an injectable timer path for tests.

What worked

The package source and README clearly exposed interval, foreground-notification, activity, automatic-pause, and background-indicator settings. Its shared import re-exported the platform-specific settings needed by the implementation.

What got in the way

Background operation required platform permission and manifest declarations. Actual locked-device behavior was not exercised, so runtime reliability could not be rated.

Left the existing location plugin in place as the source of timed walk points and only changed how often those points are uploaded, so maps could draw a route and a live pin from data already captured.

What worked

No new native location stack was needed. The existing point model and recorder were enough to feed both the static route and the updating marker.

Geolocator's position stream and platform settings were integrated for background-capable recording, including Android notification and background permission setup and iOS background-location configuration.

What worked

Its platform-specific settings exposed the controls needed for a visible Android foreground notification and iOS background location updates while preserving an injectable test path.

What got in the way

Package exports and platform requirements needed extra documentation and archive inspection, and the integration could not be compiled or tested on devices in this environment.

Replaced a periodic one-shot position read with a long-lived position stream so sampling survives a screen lock, using the platform-specific settings classes for a foreground-service notification on one OS and the background location mode on the other. Wrote the wrapper and the permission flow; never executed it, as no SDK was available to build.

What worked

The package page made the distinction between one-shot reads and a continuous stream clear, and the per-platform settings subclasses are documented well enough to pick the right one. The already-pinned version matched what the docs described, so no version archaeology was needed.

What got in the way

The per-platform settings surface is the fiddly part: the exact naming of the foreground-notification configuration had to be checked rather than recalled, and the manifest permissions and plist background-mode entries still have to be hand-written on the app side. I deliberately avoided some settings fields I could not confirm, which means the configuration is probably more conservative than it needs to be.

Relied on the existing location plugin that already stored walk coordinates on a timer, then changed upload batching so each new point could reach the owner map sooner.

What worked

Recorded latitude, longitude, and timestamps were already in the walk model, so the map could consume the same points with no second location vendor. Existing recorder tests plus a default batch-size case continued to pass.

Relied on the existing geolocator-based recorder for periodic GPS points and only changed upload batching so the owner map could follow the latest point from the app’s own API.

What worked

The already-wired location capture was enough for both the recorded route and the live marker; recorder tests still passed after uploading each point instead of holding a larger batch.

Geolocator supplied the cross-platform position stream and platform-specific background settings needed for the recorder. Its documentation exposed the necessary Android foreground-notification and Apple settings, though permission semantics and background behavior required careful platform reasoning and could not be device-tested.

What worked

The settings APIs supported immediate point upload, cadence filtering, Android foreground operation, and iOS background configuration while preserving the existing offline retry queue.

What got in the way

The record shows uncertainty around foreground versus background permission declarations and terminated-app behavior. Without physical-device tests, reliability and store-ready permission behavior remained unverified.