Feature description

The Location API for J2ME (JSR-179) allows you to develop applications based on the physical location of a device. Starting from S60 3rd Edition, the Java platform includes an implementation of the Location API as specified in the JSR-179 specification.

Supported features

The implementation of the API contains all mandatory, and the following optional parts, of the Location API (JSR-179).

  • Multiple landmark stores that can be shared with native applications are supported. It is possible to access landmark stores on different drives and external media, but stores can only be created on the default drive.

  • A terminal may have support for different types of positioning technology. The implementation will return all the optional information that the used positioning technology supports, such as:

    • Altitude

    • Speed and course

    • Address info

  • For positioning technology that support the National Marine Electronics Association (NMEA) format (i.e. Global Positioning System (GPS)) this information can be obtained with the Location.getExtraInfo() method. The specific NMEA sentences depend on what the location technology supports, but no sentences are filtered out.

  • From S60 3rd Edition FP 2 onwards, the API implementation supports the Mobile Service Architecture (MSA) as defined in JSR-248 Mobile Service Architecture.

Excluded features

The following optional features are not supported in the implementation of the Location API:

  • There is no orientation support, which is used to query the orientation of the terminal.

  • There is no proximity listener support, which is used to receive notifications of when the terminal enters an area (specified by coordinates and a radius).

  • It is not possible to select where landmark stores should be created.