How can I check the current status of the GPS receiver?

Question

How can I check the current status of the GPS receiver? I already checked the LocationListener onStatusChanged method but somehow it seems that is not working,

Answer 1

I may be wrong but it seems people seem to be going way off-topic for

i just need to know if the gps icon at the top of the screen is blinking (no actual fix)

That is easily done with

LocationManager lm = (LocationManager) getSystemService(LOCATION_SERVICE);
boolean gps_on = lm.isProviderEnabled(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER);

To see if you have a solid fix, things get a little trickier:

public class whatever extends Activity {
    LocationManager lm;
    Location loc;
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.main);        
        lm = (LocationManager) getSystemService(LOCATION_SERVICE);
        loc = null;
        request_updates();        
    }

    private void request_updates() {
        if (lm.isProviderEnabled(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER)) {
            // GPS is enabled on device so lets add a loopback for this locationmanager
            lm.requestLocationUpdates(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER,0, 0, locationListener);
        }      
    }

    LocationListener locationListener = new LocationListener() {
        public void onLocationChanged(Location location) {
            // Each time the location is changed we assign loc
            loc = location;
        }

         // Need these even if they do nothing. Can't remember why.
         public void onProviderDisabled(String arg0) {}
         public void onProviderEnabled(String provider) {}
         public void onStatusChanged(String provider, int status, Bundle extras) {}
    };

Now whenever you want to see if you have fix?

if (loc != null){
    // Our location has changed at least once
    blah.....
}

If you want to be fancy you can always have a timeout using System.currentTimeMillis() and loc.getTime()

Works reliably, at least on an N1 since 2.1.