Optimisation mode

Pinpoint version 3.1.1 and later now include an optional feature designed to reduce i.e. 'optimise' the use of the Google APIs and therefore reduce the potential bill use of these APIs might result in. Ideally use is kept to a level within the 'free' allowance Google give you.

This feature was written by Ofir Gal and thanks are therefore extended to him for this contribution.

The way this feature works is that it looks at the WiFi SSID scan results and uses fuzzy matching to judge whether the device in question has moved location sufficiently to justify doing a full lookup via the Google APIs to determine a new address. If the change is considered sufficiently minor then the new lookup via Google is skipped thereby saving calls to Google. As an example if several laptops are in the same office all day long then they will not need to do full blown Google lookups and this adds up to saving a significant number of calls to the Google APIs.

This feature is only accessible if you call the main Pinpoint script with command line options included as follows.

pinpoint -o -k <yourapikeyhere>

The -o flag tells the program to use these optimisation routines and since the use of any option flags disables looking at the preference file you also need to explicitly specify the Google API key as well by using the -k flag.

If you still want the use of Pinpoint to be automated then you can modify the LaunchDaemon located at /Library/LaunchDaemons/com.jelockwood.pinpoint.plist to include these flags