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neb

neb
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  #2540525 13-Aug-2020 20:27
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ronw:

I do not understand the reasoning behind not updating to a newer phone. If money is the problem there are plenty of newer phones like Nokia 1.3 for $100 runs Android 10 and works well. Stop expecting everyone to support years old Android 4 or 5 phones and hope they will much use today. upgrade

 

 

The point of the app isn't to support a bunch of technology-savvy geeks who buy a new phone every six months, it's to support as many people as possible. Just because it can be made to work, with some effort, for GZ people who are about five standard deviations away from normal doesn't mean it works well for anyone else. In particular, the most at-risk demographic is the one who'll be running the cheapest possible Android 4 phone that one of their children talked them into getting.



DS248
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  #2540573 13-Aug-2020 22:00
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djtOtago:

You could just use the Rippl app. It scans and records the official QR codes as well as custom ones.
https://www.paperkite.co.nz/rippl/


 



I just started issuing the Rippl app and find it simpler than my wife's experience with the MoH app. No registration or password involved, works well with the MoH QR codes, has 'Checkout' function so records duration of visit as well as Check in time.

However, does anyone know how this works in the event of an alert if someone scanned the MoH QR code using Rippl?

Do MoH send out an alert to phones that have Rippl installed as well as to registered phones with the Covid Tracer app installed?

Or do they get PaperKite to send out alerts even though the business involved is not registered with Paperkite?

tieke
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  #2540585 13-Aug-2020 22:29
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neb:

 

The point of the app isn't to support a bunch of technology-savvy geeks who buy a new phone every six months, it's to support as many people as possible. Just because it can be made to work, with some effort, for GZ people who are about five standard deviations away from normal doesn't mean it works well for anyone else. In particular, the most at-risk demographic is the one who'll be running the cheapest possible Android 4 phone that one of their children talked them into getting.

 

I agree that it would be good to support all android devices, but I don't think you're right that only cutting-edge geekzoner's phones support it: the "five standard deviations away from normal" is more applicable to Android 4 devices, with the link that xlinknz provided showing that Android 6+ devices account for over 92% of the market share.

 

Implementing the other requests that people have on this thread should probably be a higher priority for their resources than making the app work with the couple of percent of devices on Android 4, especially as requested items such as Google location integration would be so much more difficult on them.

 

 




Oblivian
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  #2540589 13-Aug-2020 22:55
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DS248: I just started issuing the Rippl app and find it simpler than my wife's experience with the MoH app. No registration or password involved, works well with the MoH QR codes, has 'Checkout' function so records duration of visit as well as Check in time.

However, does anyone know how this works in the event of an alert if someone scanned the MoH QR code using Rippl?

Do MoH send out an alert to phones that have Rippl installed as well as to registered phones with the Covid Tracer app installed?

Or do they get PaperKite to send out alerts even though the business involved is not registered with Paperkite?

 

It does not. Or at least not to the same extent. MoH Shut the door on them/made it 1 way.

 

While it was coded to read the government codes, paperkite may warn users if information was given to them by MoH via an alert to say 'contact MoH'. But they are not an approved partner to MoH and do not have access to the API or tracing team, so get the same alerts/info as media and rest of us do.


Beavis
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  #2540592 13-Aug-2020 23:36
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Well my experience with the MOH app was that it was useless. Both my wife and I had trouble reading the codes. (And yes it was the right one). However, since the last update, it reads things straight away. No need to fluff around trying to get to read or focus. 
100% read on 5 different posters today, including one we could never get to read!


mattwnz
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  #2540596 14-Aug-2020 00:20
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ronw:

 

I do not understand the reasoning behind not updating to a newer phone. If money is the problem there are plenty of newer phones like Nokia 1.3 for $100 runs Android 10 and works well. Stop expecting everyone to support years old Android 4 or 5 phones and hope they will much use today. upgrade

 

 

 

 

In the case I mentioned above, it was for an elderly person, who is perfectly happy with their phone, and it works perfectly well for them. They essentially just use it as a phone, txting, email,  and camera, and don't care about any other features. So why would they then want to buy another phone, and contribute to the pile of e-waste, just because they discover an app that the government wants people to install and use for our tracing system, doesn't work on their device? There must be many elderly people in that situation with older devices. I can't see there being any technical reason why a phone with Android 5.1.1, wouldn't be able to scan a QR code and save the details if the app was made to be compatible with it. I recall even 10 year old phones could do that with a QR code reader. .A $100 phone maybe already be sold with an old version of android anyway, or may not get any further updates, and cheaper nokias only tend to get a couple of years of updates anyway from my experience, plus they get laggy over time.The point is that I would say the many of the elderly don't keep up with the latest technology.


ronw
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  #2540618 14-Aug-2020 01:03
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Surely the question is should I purchase a new phone that will enable an app that will help save people's lives, then why would I not do it. As to the phones not getting updates many Nokia phones have Android One which guarantees three years of updates.




Nokia 7 Plus
Nexus 6P 32Gb
Nexus 6 Phone
Nexus 5 Phone
Nexus 7 2013 Tablet
Samsung TAB A 8"
Samsung TAB A 10"

 

& many Windows laptops, Desktops etc

 

 

 


 
 
 

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pvjones
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  #2540636 14-Aug-2020 07:28
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Nokia gives their phones updates really well, but according to forums they are doing a bad job at squashing bugs on Android version updates. For example cameras that worked perfectly on Android 8 are buggy on Android 9/10. HMD sales of phones are not looking good & phones such as the 7.2 & the multi camera flagship model have lots of serious issues. Maybe Samsung has the resources to fix bugs and HMD does not? And if cameras are dodgy it might be impacting ability to read the Covid posters.

dafman
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  #2540649 14-Aug-2020 08:16
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Beavis:

 

Well my experience with the MOH app was that it was useless. Both my wife and I had trouble reading the codes. (And yes it was the right one). However, since the last update, it reads things straight away. No need to fluff around trying to get to read or focus. 
100% read on 5 different posters today, including one we could never get to read!

 

 

Same here. Three successful scans out of three yesterday, versus three consecutive fails a few weeks back following which I gave up on the app at the time.


tanivula
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  #2540675 14-Aug-2020 08:44
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dafman:

 

Beavis:

 

Well my experience with the MOH app was that it was useless. Both my wife and I had trouble reading the codes. (And yes it was the right one). However, since the last update, it reads things straight away. No need to fluff around trying to get to read or focus. 
100% read on 5 different posters today, including one we could never get to read!

 

 

Same here. Three successful scans out of three yesterday, versus three consecutive fails a few weeks back following which I gave up on the app at the time.

 

 

Yep, kept having issues with 1 of the posters at work - think that was a lighting issue perhaps - didn't quite figure it out.   But now the scanning works similarly to 'normal' QR codes.  Can do it while walking from quite far out (has been like that the last week from memory).

 

 


Oblivian
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  #2540679 14-Aug-2020 08:50
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Yep, sure it's evident there was definite time constraints vs rushed development not leading to a polished product day 0. That was aware very early (and screen size, keyboard and activation key ones have reared their head again). But I don't think I've seen something that doesn't get at least a few 'undocumented features' on release.

 

Guess I'm just a sucker for punishment. Caring about having a bad memory I worked around most issues rather than throwing in the towel and bagging it, and kept on going.

 

 

 

Noted along with a popularity explosion, the signup complaint's are rolling in again. And people complaining about privacy etc etc. There shouldn't be the need for a visual counter-argument outlining what permissions it REALLY has, vs ticktok and facebook. But there is. Shuts up a percentage of the audience in stunned silence. Deflects off others who still have crackpot theories.

 

The PIA has been updated in Jul with the latest changes also. Including the password vault on the back of 'too hard requirements' complaints. And shots of the alerts etc

 

https://www.health.govt.nz/system/files/documents/pages/covid-19_contact_tracing_application_privacy_impact_assessment-30july2020.pdf 

 

Some may please a few more here despite the low uptake and any security holes they've been trying to avoid on the EoL OS

 

 

New features coming soon

 

Like all mobile apps, NZ COVID Tracer will be updated as new features are developed.

 

New features under consideration include:

 

  • Bluetooth functionality
  • the ability to edit or add notes to the entries in your digital diary
  • support for phones running Android 5 and iOS10
  • support for languages other than English

Dingbatt
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  #2540789 14-Aug-2020 10:41
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ronw: Surely the question is should I purchase a new phone that will enable an app that will help save people's lives, then why would I not do it..

 

The answer is no, unless previously you have given up driving a car to save lives, foregone medical treatment to allow others access to medical care to save lives, sold all your worldly possessions and donated the proceeds to Worldvision Save The Children etc to save lives, become a vegan to save lives,.......

 

You could stay home and have no human contact, ever, and that would save lives. Guilt tripping is pointless.





“We’ve arranged a society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. Carl Sagan 1996


concordnz
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  #2540887 14-Aug-2020 11:26
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xlinknz:

@Stephendnz and @mattwnz


I lobbied to get MoH to support older devices esp. as my own #1 handset was Android 6, I suggested they support if they could down to Kitkat (#2 phone)


They were very open to feedback including acknowledging feedback including posting they would to support older devices. This even including the Minister publicly stating a new release would support older devices and additional functionality. This manifested in supporting Android 6 and other functional improvements


I encourage all to send their feedback to MoH as they do take it on board. Why they didn't extend support to v5 and v4 of Android I do not know yet. I suspect there are security considerations for v6 and esp. older.


Note this link shows Android version market share in NZ. Version 6 was 3.24% but it doesn't show v5 or v4 which I assume is even smaller. I'm fairly sure there are other market share graphs including from Google.


 


 


 


 


 


These stats are totally useless and not representative of the true Android install base on MOBILE NETWORKS.
That statcounter link is best ignored.

The only ones who have accurate stats are Spark & Vodafone (& maybe Chorus).
It's a shame the media are not smart enough to ask these companies.

In today's financial environment with significant job losses - yes it is unreasonable to expect people to replace perfectly usable phones.

It's silly this App is not supporting right back to Gingerbread - which it could easily do - (I suspect Google might be the problems - not letting new apps use old api's.)

1101
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  #2540992 14-Aug-2020 13:40
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What the MOH could have done with old unsupported phones , is suggest those people download a QR scanner instead
Have a NZ MOH branded QR scanner as an alternative.

 

Thats what I did on my phone, used a QR scanner.  (Ive now replaced that phone with something newer, for other reasons )

 

 


  #2540998 14-Aug-2020 13:50
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1101:

 

What the MOH could have done with old unsupported phones , is suggest those people download a QR scanner instead
Have a NZ MOH branded QR scanner as an alternative.

 

Thats what I did on my phone, used a QR scanner.  (Ive now replaced that phone with something newer, for other reasons )

 

 

How does that help with contact tracing though? As if you don't have the app you can't save the info anyway?


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