Tracks not showing after update

[kmsmikrud]

Hi,

Today a coworker that has been using tracker within Field Maps for the last 2 months was not able to collect any tracks despite having tracks enabled. I think this could in part be due to the update and they have not installed the latest release. However even if they don't have the latest functionality it seems not right to lose the ability altogether? Another coworker who is planning to survey tomorrow updated their Field Maps app, said that when connected to their external GPS device they kept getting a message that the GPS was not providing accuracy information, so it was using an estimate instead. They said in their testing of the app before today they never received this message and the tracks just showed up on the map.

If folks haven't updated their Field Maps app because they are offline, will they now not be able to use the tracks? I do not have a tracker extension but set up projects for others that do and it seems that at least two people today that have tried to use tracks are having difficulty where it just easily worked before within Field Maps.

Also with the new line feature, if I currently have created track views with the 'Tracks' point layer and 'Last Known Locations' point layer, how do I get the new line layer? Do I have to delete those views and create new ones to get the line? Is there a way to just update the view to include the line? I a good number of views set up in projects.

I appreciate any insight on the changes and the message about GPS not providing accuracy information above so I can better help our staff.

Thanks,

Kathy

[Anonymous User]

Hi @kmsmikrud can you clarify a few things:

1. Are these issues occurring on Android or iOS?

2. Are the tracks not collected locally? Or are they not being uploaded to the server?

I would not expect any issues with collecting tracks after updating the app. It's possible there's a bug. Any additional information would be helpful.

Regarding the lines layer. Unfortunately at that last minute we had to postpone updating the location tracking service backend to sort through some performance issues. This under active development  and we aim to push out an update as soon as possible but estimated date is unknown at this time. So the track lines functionality is currently not available.

When it is available, any existing views will automatically be updated to have the new layer and will have lines generated for previous tracks. Additionally, any new views that are created will have the new layer.

I am assuming you are seeing the GPS message on Android devices. This was an intentional change. On many Android devices the integrated receiver supports NMEA strings and the if the string does not contain a GST sentence then you will see the messaging saying that accuracy is estimated and a true accuracy is not available.

[kmsmikrud]

Hi @Anonymous User ,

1. These issues are all on iOS (iPad Pro)

2. Yesterday when the one surveyor synced no tracks uploaded to AGOL. They haven't had an issue prior to yesterday. They hadn't updated their app, but had tracks enabled outside and inside the map.

3. The GPS message was also on iOS and seen on both the integrated GPS and when connected to bluetooth GPS.

I will see if I can find out more information today from the users. Thanks for the response!

[Anonymous User]

Thanks, for the tracking issue, if the surveyor could open the "Troubleshooting" menu in Field Maps (on the profile page) there likely are logs related to track uploads failing. If you could provide those it'd be really helpful.

Can you share which GPS receiver is being used when the estimated accuracy message is presented?

[kmsmikrud]

Hi @Anonymous User ,

Currently there have been 3 users that are having tracking issues all using iPad Pros. I've included the log from one of the users. This person has been using the same device for the past few months and for the last weeks using tracks daily. They haven't changed any of the accuracy settings within Field Maps. However it wasn't until last week that the surveyor was unable to get the tracks to work. What's really strange is the tracks worked on a morning survey, but then the surveyor could not get the tracks to work for the afternoon survey. The troubleshooting log is included and at the very end/earliest time you can find info on the tracks. They were just trying to use the integrated iPad Pro GPS but had been also using Garmin Glo.

I will be sending info from another surveyor that has been getting those accuracy messages consistently since the update. They also have an iPad Pro and Garmin Glo 2 I believe, but will confirm.  In their testing prior using both the integrated GPS and external they did not receive those errors. They officially started surveying late last week/weekend just in time for the tracks to be very inconsistent which is unfortunate on the timing. More info from those logs soon.

Thanks in advance for your help in solving this,

Kathy

[kmsmikrud]

Hello @Anonymous User ,

I'm sending troubleshooting logs from Field Maps from one of the users that continues to have issues with the tracks. They are using an iPad Pro and Garmin Glo 2. They have had the tracks work but inconsistent and yesterday they didn't work at all.

Could you also explain how ArcGIS Tracker and my tracks within Field Maps coordinate? Would it be more reliable for a user to enable/disable tracks using ArcGIS Tracker than just within Field Maps? The reason I ask is another user also using iPad Pro and external GPS had turned their tracks off within Field Maps, but then forgot they had initially enabled the tracks in the ArcGIS Tracker app. That particularly user has had great success lately with consistent tracks. However this has not been the case for a couple other users who are having difficulties.

Hopefully the troubleshooting logs help identify the issue.

Looking forward to your response,
Kathy

[Anonymous User]

Hi @kmsmikrud I looked at the three logs.

For 0423 log.txt file it seems like the user if offline for most the day. In the logs it looks like sometime around 4pm the tracks all get uplooaded in several batches of 500 points each.

There is an entry here:

4/20/21, 6:03 PM Failed to upload tracks: Upload tracks error: The operation couldn’t be completed. (Tracks.TrackingManager.TrackingManagerUploadTracksError error 1.)
4/20/21, 6:03 PM Failed to upload tracks
4/20/21, 6:03 PM ↓ additional info: apply edits to tracks table failed: The request timed out.

Which seems to imply the device became disconnected from ArcGIS Online and the tracks stopped uploading. There were still 15860 tracks to upload that were collected on 4/20.
Then on 4/21 a similar thing happens where the app is not able to upload all of the tracks are there still 35181 tracks that are un-uploaded. It seems like the device went offline or the app was closed at 4:49pm.

4/22/21, 10:42 AM Found an Exploded Map Package at: file:///private/var/mobile/Containers/Data/Application/71389428-CF02-4303-82C8-249FB2D8D467/Documents/christopher.shepherd_adfg@VdkVOAHovLuozJG4/mapareas/1e61298bd3e1489fa2d1f9f5ea520b08/d792345124ca4786ba26cd98e4b368f0/
4/21/21, 4:49 PM Pending features: 35181
4/21/21, 4:49 PM Uploaded 500 features (6 sec)

Then the same thing happens again on 4/22 where the app simply isn't connected to AGOL long enough to upload all the tracks.

In summary it seems like the app is collecting more tracks per day than can be uploaed over the period of time the app is connected to AGOL. The app uploads tracks in batches of 500 at a time when connected and for some days all of the days tracks are not uploaded. This continues on day after day and the problem gets worse and worse.

For the PWSHerring_0005_logs.txt. For couple days it was working but then the same issue happens here as in the previous log file:

4/20/21, 10:33 AM Found an Exploded Map Package at: file:///private/var/mobile/Containers/Data/Application/71389428-CF02-4303-82C8-249FB2D8D467/Documents/christopher.shepherd_adfg@VdkVOAHovLuozJG4/mapareas/1e61298bd3e1489fa2d1f9f5ea520b08/d792345124ca4786ba26cd98e4b368f0/
4/19/21, 4:08 PM Failed to upload tracks: Upload tracks error: The operation couldn’t be completed. (Tracks.TrackingManager.TrackingManagerUploadTracksError error 1.)
4/19/21, 4:08 PM ↓ additional info: host unreachable
4/19/21, 4:08 PM Failed to upload tracks
4/19/21, 4:04 PM Uploading 500 features
4/19/21, 4:04 PM Pending features: 16879

So all of those 16879 tracks were not uploaded.

For the PWSHerring_0006_logs I don't really see any issues. It seems like tracking is started and stopped a lot though and not many tracks are collected.

We do have an issue in our backlog to added a status indicating when there are tracks that are pending upload. I think this might help at least inform your workers that all the tracks are not uploaded.

Could you explain what the operating procedure is at the end of day? Are the devices turned off? Is the app closed? Are the devices plugged in to charge?

The same logic and even most of the code is the same between Tracker and Field Maps so the recommendation is to use Field Maps for location tracking. We are putting all of our current and future tracking enhancements into Field Maps. On iOS when an external receiver is paired, all locations flow through CoreLocation so Tracker and Field Maps will get the same information if both were running.

[Shane_Shepherd]

Hi Aaron,

I'm the user who created the 0423, 0005 and 0006 logs.

To answer your question:

When I come in from a survey, I manually tell my offline map in Field Maps to sync once I am back in WiFi range and keep the device active until the sync progress wheel completes. Then the device is left powered on and plugged in to charge, and the Field Maps app is typically left open, however the screen usually locks fairly quickly after I finish syncing.

I have a few questions - how long should it take to upload the remaining tracks?

How will I know there is still an upload in progress, or how much remains?

Is there something I should be doing differently to ensure the tracks upload?

Will having tracks to be uploaded in the queue prevent tracks from appearing on the offline map during the survey? That is the issue I am commonly having.

Thank you for your assistance!

- Shane

[Anonymous User]

Hi Shane,

Thanks for those details. We looked into this a bit more and think you have run into a scenario that the app doesn't handle well.

From your logs it looks like you stopped tracking, then got to the office, when you entered the office it connected to the WiFi and tracks automatically started uploading. Tracks are uploaded in batches of 500 features at a time. They are not sync'd like other map data. Anyway, so one of those batches failed to upload for some network or server related issue. This caused any remained uploads to stop (which is the bug).

After this failure the app should have re-tried to upload tracks after 1 minute but it didn't. I'm going to log a bug for us to look into it more and hopefully address this issue.

We do have a design proposed that would show if there are tracks that are pending upload. I imagine this will be implemented some time later this year. I think it would have helped in this case.

The uploading of tracks is completely independent from the tracks appearing in the map. In Field Maps or Tracker try turning off the "smart rendering" option. In Field Maps, you can do this on by tapping the options button on the My Tracks layer. If you are getting locations on the iPad that are not from the external receiver they may not meet the criteria to be displayed. We have seen that in the past with iPads that do not have an integrated GPS.

[Shane_Shepherd]

Hi Aaron,

I've tried turning off the "smart rendering" option, and the tracks do not appear. Disabling smart rendering did cause some tracks to display during some tests when I was using the internal GPS while indoors, so I tried that while using the Garmin GLO 2 during my surveys to see if that was the issue and it was not. Since the latest patch of Tracker, Field Maps has been displaying a message that my Garmin GLO 2 was not providing accuracy information, and that accuracy would be estimated, which typically shows up at 3.6m or so and is within the threshold I set in my profile. Could this be related?