This confused me. Open this setting will save energy?
How about accuracy? Open or close this option will affect accuracy or not?
Potentially, yes.
Apple made a really weird and dumb decision in iOS 16.4 to require apps to opt-in to showing that status bar / Dynamic Island indicator. If the app doesn’t opt-in, it will be terminated in the background when it uses very low energy location monitoring settings.
Aside: This change wasn’t documented, and I was only aware of it by burning one of my Apple Developer account tech support tickets. Uncool.
Back at that time I chose to go with the less energy efficient settings, because showing that indicator would confuse and annoy existing users, and put off potential new users. It wasn’t financially viable - it would cost big money in terms of lost subscribers.
But during some energy use profiling I did this week I saw that in some situations it’s possibly costing more energy than I expected. So I added the setting to the app, for people who want to see if they can get better battery life with the annoying indicator turned on.
It shouldn’t affect accuracy. It only changes how Arc behaves when in “sleep mode” while stationary. So it should only affect the times when your phone is in one place for an extended period of time (eg at home or work).
I just updated the app, and am thrilled to get rid of the Dynamic Island no matter the cost. Unfortunately, no matter whether I toggle the setting on or off, I still have the persistent Dynamic Island location bar. Any ideas on how I can fix that? I’ve tried all manner of quoting / relaunching the app to change the setting.
Hi @asop!
If that setting is toggled off in Arc, then it won’t be Arc (or Arc Mini) that’s causing the location indicator to appear in the Dynamic Island, it’ll be some other app.
Try tapping on the indicator to see which app it opens.
Oh I just thought of another possibility: If Arc (or Mini) is only granted “while using the app” location permission, then it’s likely that the indicator will show no matter what setting you use in Arc. In that case it’s unavoidable.
Arc (and Mini) should be granted “always” location permission, in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Location Services.
That condition is the same for all apps, I believe. If the app is only granted “while using the app” then iOS will show a location indicator in the Dynamic Island when that app is using location in the background. But if the app is granted “always” then the indicator will go away.
This new setting in Arc is something slightly different. While apps have no choice about that indicator when their permission is only “while using the app”, they do have a choice about whether to show it or not the rest of the time. And Apple are now (since iOS 16.4) requiring apps to opt-in to showing the indicator regardless of the app’s permissions. If the app doesn’t opt-in to the indicator, then it isn’t allowed to use the most energy efficient location monitoring when in the background. (A very weird decision on Apple’s part!)
So I tapped on the indicator and Arc is what opened. Any ideas?
Check that Arc definitely has “always” permission in iOS Settings → Privacy & Security → Location Services.
That was it, the island went away as soon as I changed that setting. Thanks for the help!
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Anecdotally, enabling blue bubble seems to have really helped my battery life
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That’s good to hear!
I’m not noticing any difference myself yet. But it is doing less work with the more efficient settings it can use when the indicator is enabled, so surely it has to be an improvement.