Android user should be prompted to enable background battery usage

[holmesworcester]

Quiet networks will be more reliable if Android apps can run continuously in the background. To do this, users need to give the app permission. (We might choose not to run in the background when the user is on mobile data and is using QSS, to save battery, but that's another issue!)

A user can trigger the dialog asking them to allow background battery use, but we need to prompt the user to do this.

We could do this with a notification in the settings, or with a prompt on first run.

"Would you like to enable background battery usage? This will make your notifications more reliable, and improve reliability for others in your community."

One thing that's tricky about this is that it's a global setting for Quiet, not a setting specific to any one community. We might need to make some section for global settings within the community settings. Or it could be another settings area in the community switcher... but this might be confusing.

[jgaylor]

@holmesworcester, I dug it a little on this and it seems that Android has two separate concepts for this: Background activity and Battery Optimization.

On iOS it's all rolled into a single toggle: Background app refresh

So on Android, the first time flow might be something like this:

1. App Launch
   • The user opens the app for the first time.

2. Request Background Activity Permission
   • The app explains why background activity is needed (e.g., for reliable notifications or syncing).
   • The user is prompted to grant permission for Background Activity.

3. Detect Battery Optimization
   • The app checks if Battery Optimization is enabled for it.
   • If enabled, the app explains why disabling it is important (e.g., for consistent notifications).

4. Request to Disable Battery Optimization
   • The app directs the user to the system settings to disable Battery Optimization for the app.
   • The user makes the change and returns to the app.

Is the requirement for both concepts? Are we only doing this on Android?

[jgaylor]

@holmesworcester this is ready for review.

I shared some thoughts/questions above ☝. We'll need to make some decisions and then I can do another pass to clean it up.

Some of my questions at this point:

1. Is this only for Android? (iPhone has similar, but not the same, concepts with Background App Refresh and Low Power Mode)
2. Should we consider the Background Activity/Data permission on Android too?

Research and explorations in the Figma

[holmesworcester]

Yes, let's consider the background activity/data permission. I just saw a prompt from signal about this in a recent version.

[jgaylor]

Here's the latest Loom & Figma

What's the best way to find out if we can enable these functions without bringing up the android settings screens or native dialogs? I'm not sure of a good way to find out, as Android isn't my wheelhouse.

[jgaylor]

This is updated to draft 2 (Figma) cleaning up some of the noise from decisions we made. Still questions on when and how to show the first run prompts, mocked up some options.