One weakness in the whole system is that the design is based on recording entry to 'public' places whereas for many people, most contact with other people will be at private addresses, etc.

Similarly open spaces like parks, kids playgrounds etc.  One place I do go (less regularly than I should!) is around Orewa Estuary for a run.  In the age of Delta perhaps locations like these need QR codes though not certain how it would work with almost unlimited entry point (not going to stop and scan partway through a timed run).

Better still (& at the risk of a hostile reception), why not just make the system more secure and turn on location tracking in the app?  All data simplified to the min required and properly secured.

The moment there is a hint of 'track'. There is distrust.

It's bad enough still when people are know-alls and continue to 1* rate or comment on the Social Platforms each time there is a covid app re-boost

jonherries: Always open to suggestions. That exact feature is in the add manual entry screen - might be a bit deep for easy navigation if that is what you are doing regularly (it works ok for me a couple of days a week).

The reason it is important is it saves a contact tracer time when the speed and accuracy of contact tracing are generally in opposition (hard to do both at once).

An “I stayed home” entry means you don’t get asked in a variety of ways whether you did anything that day -often done by combing through bank records, emails and your calendar.

I think they used to say: no news is good news - in this case that goes double for you and the contact tracer.

Jon

Yes, but as you say, it's buried a few layers into the app.  Opening the app each day and digging down to that maybe 10 days on end ...  not so likely.  Too many other distractions.

And Google Timeline will quickly provide a contact tracer with the info needed.

And probably half the days I do go out, it will be to a private address.  No button or QR code to scan for that.  GT has that covered too.  And can even identify durations.

And, yes I am happy to provide info from GT to a contact tracer (boring life I guess).  Of course, not perfect, some locations in GT are a bit off.  But higher risk locations such as restaurants are mostly handled with precision!  

Tell them to print one?. Print one yourself and have a number of them for ease. There are means to address that don't call for an app re-code to suit.

Also those of us here don't represent the population. There are those that claim google track it so there is no need. Then there are the majority of them that wouldn't even know how to extract that information or lookup the history.

Then when you have a device such as mine. Although GPS is enabled, the location history and location accuracy permissions are strict by default to help with the battery optimization and don't actually log them. Unless you explicitly enable 

Oblivian: I was just replying with 'You may be missing something..'

If there is an 'I stayed home' button, then yes I am missing it.  Is that a standard feature or something you added?  Or is it iOS only?

Not on my 'Add Diary Entry' screen (Android).  Not that it alters the situation.  Making it easier will get a higher response, if that is what is wanted.

In my personal situation where I am reasonably confident I have recorded all visits to places with QR codes and most days would be 'I stayed home', the lack of entries for those days should not slow contact tracers by more that a few seconds - no entry == I stayed home (or on occasion, visited one of a small number of private premises).  Much bigger problems will be those who haven't been scanning, or those out and about MUCH more than me.

DS248:

 

Oblivian: I was just replying with 'You may be missing something..'

... (screen shots)

 

If there is an 'I stayed home' button, then yes I am missing it.  Is that a standard feature or something you added?  Or is it iOS only?

 

Not on my 'Add Diary Entry' screen (Android).  Not that it alters the situation.  Making it easier will get a higher response, if that is what is wanted.

 

In my personal situation where I am reasonably confident I have recorded all visits to places with QR codes and most days would be 'I stayed home', the lack of entries for those days should not slow contact tracers by more that a few seconds - no entry == I stayed home (or on occasion, visited one of a small number of private premises).  Much bigger problems will be those who haven't been scanning, or those out and about MUCH more than me.

 

Ah, meant to add my images of my equivalent screens.

On Android, at least, when you select the Add diary entry, you then tap in the box labelled "Place or activity (required)" and you should see the "I stayed at home" button.

Stu:

 

On Android, at least, when you select the Add diary entry, you then tap in the box labelled "Place or activity (required)" and you should see the "I stayed at home" button.

 

Thanks.  Never been down that track as in the very large majority of cases I have scanned into premises (it is a few screens down)

jonherries: A quick additional observation is that one of the main benefits of the QR codes over gps (beyond the limitations of gps in cities and indoors) is the consistency of identifying locations of interest.

We had a number occasions in the original outbreak where the same location of interest was being labelled as different places, and given the limitations with addressing, …

Jon

Yes, the codes do have that advantage.  But there will be similar issues with manual entries. The descriptions for some places must often vary.  Or be incomplete; eg. just say 'Paper Plus' without a location.

NFS or Bluetooth tagging should ensure a higher proportion of 'scanned' entries, with a lot less friction for the user.  Yes, a bit more required for the premise than printing off a QR code, but we have had over a year to refine the system.

To give one example where there may be issues even with scanned QR codes:

Our local Paper Plus is also the local Post Shop.  But the PO Box lobby is in a separate area, around the back of the (relatively large) building.  Typically people going into the lobby will go nowhere near the entrance to the Paper Plus shop / Post Shop.

Scanning the QR code on the lobby door brings up what appears to be the identical place location as the one on the entrance to the main shop - just 'Paper Plus XXXXXXXX' where XXXXXXXX is the suburb.  To be fair, I have not checked to see it the GLN's are the same (rarely go into the shop, so cannot check at this point).  However, the street address given for the box lobby is that of the shop so I suspect exactly the same QR code is being used in both cases.

But I would imagine there would be a world of difference between going into the box lobby for probably less than a minute to pick up mail vs going into the shop

Still potential risks though.  Occasionally someone else in the lobby at the same time, and of course touching the door handles and keypad to get in.

Where is the diary data stored on the phone for the Android version? I lost it all at the last update as the update failed and I had to do a fresh install. I'd like to try and make a copy before I try the update again just in case I have this issue again.

panther2: Cam you have the covid app logged into 2 devices? Say work and personal phone?

There is no synchronicity or forced acct login requirement anymore. So I don't see why not. But they will be independent of each other and not share diary scans

As for the diary history storage - buried. And not in the standard android or cloud storage locations. So when you remove app, it's zapped. Official word - take screenshots (believe it or not)

Think some IOS models are able to save to the apple acct.