topic Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce in ArcGIS Workforce Questions

Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

EricS — Tue, 27 Nov 2018 16:50:27 GMT

Is there a way to completely turn off real time gps tracking? I know about location tracking in the advanced section of the workforce project but is there a way to not track at all real time movement when a worker is "Working"?

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

CraigGillgrass — Tue, 27 Nov 2018 16:59:32 GMT

Hi Eric,

You can do this on the device by disabling Location Services for Workforce.

There is no way to do this through a configuration within a Workforce Project.

Can you add some context for the requirement to disable GPS tracking for Worker locations? Assuming you still want to know the status of Workers.

Craig

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

EricS — Tue, 27 Nov 2018 17:03:33 GMT

It is a government requirement to not track workers

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

CraigGillgrass — Tue, 27 Nov 2018 17:15:35 GMT

Thanks Eric,

Does this apply to all Workers in your Workforce Projects? Or, are there some Workers, i.e. Field Crew Chiefs, whose location can be tracked?

One point to consider - we use the Worker's location update to determine whether the Worker information (i.e. status and location) are stale and not up to date. This can happen when a Worker force kills the app, Workforce does not have the opportunity to update the Worker's status in the service.

Providing a way to disable Worker location updates is something we could investigate adding to Workforce, but wouldn't be in the next release. If you can point me to any documentation or government regulations that a Worker's location cannot be tracked, that would help us to prioritize this work.

Craig

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

AllenSong2 — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 17:06:17 GMT

Yes, our team using workforce a lot; co-workers don't like sharing locations, especially when they are at home while workforce is still not turn off. In above message, you mentioned "You can do this on the device by disabling Location Services for Workforce", how to do this? I open my workforce app in mobile, don't know where the button to disable Location Services for Workforce", could you send me more detail instruction or screenshots. Thank you very much!

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

CraigGillgrass — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 21:13:09 GMT

@AllenSong2 this will be in the Settings app for your mobile OS; it depends if you're iOS or Android.

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

AllenSong2 — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 16:39:34 GMT

Thanks for quick reply, we all use iOS; do you have some detail steps? Thanks

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

CraigGillgrass — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 17:37:35 GMT

hello, here's some steps on how to do this:
Here's how: Go to Settings > Privacy, then select Location Services. Select an app, then turn Precise Location on or off.

This Apple support article will also help.

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

AllenSong2 — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 19:21:21 GMT

Thank you very much for the instruction; we are still need to clear all historical location data after the above steps..

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

PeterMilenkovic — Mon, 25 Oct 2021 02:45:22 GMT

One workaround which i am going to implement as a level of redundancy (incase the fieldworker accidently turns on location services), is to run a script to update the geometry of the worker. Will either run it every hour or maybe create a webhook...?

from arcgis.gis import * from arcgis.features import * from arcgis.geometry import * porta = "" user = "" password = "" gis = GIS(portal, user, password) workforce_item = gis.content.get('itemid') workforce_flc = FeatureLayerCollection.fromitem(workforce_item) worker_fl = workforce_flc.layers[1] worker_fs = workforce_fl.query() pt = Point({"x" : 0.0, "y" :0.0, "spatialReference" : {"wkid": 102100,"latestwkid" : 3857}}) for w in workers_fs: w.geometry = pt workers_fl.edit_features(updates=workers_fs)

Re: Turn off all GPS Tracking in Workforce

JonasRugtvedt_Geodata — Thu, 27 Apr 2023 14:06:40 GMT

Hi @CraigGillgrass,

Are there any updates concerning this issue? We have municipal customers who heavily rely on Workforce in their day-to-day operations, but where the location sharing is proving to be problematic.

I have turned off the worker layer in both the coordinator and work map, but this does not seem to have an effect. Turning of location sharing in the OS seems to cause trouble in the Workforce app and I still think the workers would like to see their location in relation to assignments.

It would therefore be great to have the ability to turn of location tracking within Workforce.