• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

Please help with Google's Navigation app Issue

P

pookieguy

Well-Known Member
Hey all,
I originally posted this issue via the link below...

http://androidforums.com/samsung-ga...very-strange-issue-when-navigating-today.html

I have not been able to resolve this, despite much effort and trying just about everything to fix it.

I just tried Navigation tonight and encountered this very issue again. Basically, after about 40 seconds navigating to a destination, the phone goes crazy and a female voice starts dictating a bunch of garbage web url's and this continues until you actually end the task/app. I can't figure out why this is happening. The only voice recognition software I have installed is the standard Voice Search app. That works fine. It is when you navigate that this starts happening.

Some of you here and elsewhere stated it can be an issue when installing a new voice recognition tool. However, that doe not apply to me here, as I have not installed any other app specific to this feature.

Any help is appreciated!

Thanks,
 
Thanks for quick reply!

I have plenty of apps installed. My phone is a rooted Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket. Phone was not plugged in any way during navigation, not even charging. I have no other app I can think of that uses voice recognition other than what came with the phone.
 
pookieguy said:
Thanks for quick reply!

I have plenty of apps installed. My phone is a rooted Samsung Galaxy S2 Skyrocket. Phone was not plugged in any way during navigation, not even charging. I have no other app I can think of that uses voice recognition other than what came with the phone.
Click to expand...

Rooted with stock or rooted with custom ROM?

If stock, I know it is a pain, but could you please list your apps.
 
Hey there,

I'm rooted with stock ROM but have flashed a Kernel that supports Boot Animations. It is the "stock-ish" Kernel for the Skyrocket.

Trust me, it's not a pain. LOL I'll gladly list all apps I have installed. Will make post in few minutes with full list, a majority of which I have froze with Titanium Backup.

Thank you for the replies. I hope to resolve this soon. I spent way too much time online trying to do so!
 
pookieguy said:
Hey there,

I'm rooted with stock ROM but have flashed a Kernel that supports Boot Animations. It is the "stock-ish" Kernel for the Skyrocket.

Trust me, it's not a pain. LOL I'll gladly list all apps I have installed. Will make post in few minutes with full list, a majority of which I have froze with Titanium Backup.

Thank you for the replies. I hope to resolve this soon. I spent way too much time online trying to do so!
Click to expand...

Please specify which ones are frozen in that list as well please.

Also, just though of this, are there any error messages on the screen when the navigation goes crazy?
 
Actually, there isn't! In fact, the Google Nav app continues running properly as if nothing is wrong and routing is accurate. There is just this overlay with all this crap being repeated constantly. As I stated in that first post I made, it is also NOT the same female voice from the NAV app. It is somewhat of a "mean" sounding voice. lol Yeah, strange.

Anyways,

Posting full app dump list in 5 minutes!

Thanks!
 
OK...
Here's my full app dump.

Again, a majority of these apps are frozen, as I do not use them and have done so to tweak performance and battery life.

I know it is a bit long, but if you can take the time to review it, that would be great!

Thanks,
 

Attachments

Reading and re-reading the list I don't see anything that jumps out as a culprit. My first instinct is that something you have installed or something you have frozen is causing the issue. Even though I can't see it, it doesn't mean there isn't a connection in there someplace. It is a bit of testing and trial and error, but here are a few different things to look at and/or try:

1) Do you have talkback turned on to read your text messages to you or announce your caller ID?

2) Go into setting to see if there is a second text to speech engine installed maybe by Samsung.

3) Try uninstalling the updates for Google Nav and see if it is still an issue. If not, then you could try updating again and test again.

4) Test to see if anything else is running or starting when you use Nav.

a) Restart your phone so that your recent app list is completely clear. Then try to use Google Nav and after the "mean voice" comes in to read you gibberish shut Google Nav down or simply mute it. Then you can go into your recent app list and see what was running. If it only shows Google Nav then try b.

b) Restart the phone and see what is in your running app list and write them down. Now try Google Nav and wait for Miss Meany. Once that starts go into your running app list and see what is new in the list. The new apps may be your culprit. You can then try uninstalling them and do the test again.

5) Unfreeze all your apps and try Google Nav again. Now, I'm not saying that a frozen app is the problem, but when you start messing around with stuff like that sometimes other things get messed up. The main problem with freezing apps is that sometimes the frozen apps are apart of a larger picture in the way Android is running as a whole. This can especially be an issue with a custom UI like TouchWiz. A frozen app may need to be used at a certain point and since it isn't allowed to run it causes a problem. It is a lot like killing off apps with a task killer. People who don't use gtalk used to kill off anything that showed gtalk in their app list, but couldn't figure out why they weren't receiving email. They didn't understand that the part of gtalk that they killed was also a part of the mail sync client. If you unfreeze everything and the problem still occurs then you can move on to #6.

6) Start uninstalling apps. Pick the apps you aren't using on a regular basis and start removing them. Restart after each removal and test Nav again. If it is one of the apps you have installed you will get to it eventually. If this sounds like a pain or you don't want to mess with it then you can move on to #7.

7) Last resort and obviously the one you don't want to do, but a factory data reset may be the final solution. It will wipe everything, but since you have everything backed up it will be easy to restore them. When you do go to restore the apps though, do them one at a time and test the phone, along with Nav, out for issues.

I hope you can find the problem without getting to step 6 or 7, but one of those should resolve it.

Good luck and let me know how it goes.
 
Wow,
Thanks for taking so much time to look at list and also for long reply.

OK, I'll try and cover a few of these main points you mention above.

First off, I don't have talkback. In fact, I have always had a problem with the Accessibility menu where it states that I have no such apps installed and directs me to the market. When I installed what was directed, it didn't really play any role. Right now though, I seem to have lost Accessibility apps again. I just went into it in settings and it once again says I have no such apps installed. I don't use anything here anyways.

Now, about Text-to-Speech, I'm glad you brought that up because I always wondered about something here. If I go into the settings, I have to Engines listed...Samsung TTS and Pico TTS. I have absolutely no idea what Pico TTS is! It has always been there as far as I know. With that said, could there be a problem here then? What the hell is Pico?? LOL

Now, what you mention in 4a and 4b, I've already done that! lol Trust me, I've tried everything and yes, have tried to see what was running at the time after clearing all. Couldn't find anything out of the ordinary here.

Anyways, this was a quick response back because I obviously have tried most of what you stated. However, what I really would like to avoid is anything you stated afterwards! I have no problem unfreezing all apps and testing this further. However, I do have a problem uninstalling apps and restoring to factory defaults. You have no idea how much time I spent over the past month customizing this phone the way I want it. It is absolutely perfect...except for this one issue!

BTW, I just tried the navigation twice a few minutes ago and still encountered the same issue! My phone is possessed! LOL

Based on what I provide above, what do you recommend?

Oh, would disabling everything related to Bluetooth have some kind of impact? I don't use bluetooth at all for any reason and hate bluetooth headsets as well. I disabled all these using Titanium Backup and have not encountered any issue whatsoever.

Looking forward to reply. Thanks!!
 
Sorry, stupid me. Was too quick to respond because I really want to solve this.

Anyways,

The Accessibility issue is because I do have Talkback frozen. I have no use for this.

Also,
the only thing that just came to mind that may not be the issue is that I recently had a minor issue with the soft touch search key on the phone itself. I love the long press of this key, which brings up the voice rec app. However, for some reason, it go replaced and would launch Go SMS. I tried everything to get it back to launching the voice app without success. In the end, I had to go in setting and clear defaults a few times before it eventually let me reset it to the voice app rather than Go SMS.

I don't think this is the cause though. In fact, the voice search tool still works flawlessly. Whether I launch it separately or in an app or even a custom keyboard. Works fine.
 
pookieguy said:
Now, about Text-to-Speech, I'm glad you brought that up because I always wondered about something here. If I go into the settings, I have to Engines listed...Samsung TTS and Pico TTS. I have absolutely no idea what Pico TTS is! It has always been there as far as I know. With that said, could there be a problem here then? What the hell is Pico?? LOL

Now, what you mention in 4a and 4b, I've already done that! lol Trust me, I've tried everything and yes, have tried to see what was running at the time after clearing all. Couldn't find anything out of the ordinary here.

Anyways, this was a quick response back because I obviously have tried most of what you stated. However, what I really would like to avoid is anything you stated afterwards! I have no problem unfreezing all apps and testing this further. However, I do have a problem uninstalling apps and restoring to factory defaults. You have no idea how much time I spent over the past month customizing this phone the way I want it. It is absolutely perfect...except for this one issue!

BTW, I just tried the navigation twice a few minutes ago and still encountered the same issue! My phone is possessed! LOL

Based on what I provide above, what do you recommend?

Oh, would disabling everything related to Bluetooth have some kind of impact? I don't use bluetooth at all for any reason and hate bluetooth headsets as well. I disabled all these using Titanium Backup and have not encountered any issue whatsoever.

Looking forward to reply. Thanks!!
Click to expand...



First and what may in fact be the key to the problem. You have two different TTS engines on the phone. Pico is Google's default engine (for Gingerbread on down I believe). Obviously the Samsung engine is apart of TouchWiz. You should have an option to set one as default in settings. You are probably set for Samsung right now. This is where I talked about freezing something having an effect on something else in Android. Having Talkback frozen may be the source of the problem here because I know that that and Pico are from the same source and use some of the same features. Try unfreezing talkback and see how things are going from there (you may need to restart the phone before it functions properly). In any event, there is no reason to really have talkback frozen and it may be the reason you aren't seeing things in the accessories menu.

Second, since you do have so much frozen on your phone you may want to look for a safe list of apps via Google, if there isn't a list on the forum someplace. Freezing is a good idea over uninstalling because you never know what you might need or what might not work when something is removed, but over doing it can lead to real problems. I think you went a little freeze happy. ;) Some of the stuff that you are talking about that is frozen may not be affecting apps, but they certainly aren't resource hogs or battery drainers. I know you said that you are looking for performance and battery life, but some of the stuff you are talking about in this thread will affect neither. You may also run into further issues with core features being frozen when installing apps later on down the road. The things you typically want to freeze are bloat apps or apps that are constantly running. Core android stuff is usually best left alone.
 
Ok, will test after unfreezing Talkback.

I do have one question based on what you said though. If I have the two engines, which should I use? Since I don't use the Touchwiz UI and use Go Launcher EX instead, should I set it to Pico?

Thanks!
 
pookieguy said:
Ok, will test after unfreezing Talkback.

I do have one question based on what you said though. If I have the two engines, which should I use? Since I don't use the Touchwiz UI and use Go Launcher EX instead, should I set it to Pico?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

That is really up to you. As you said, one of them sounded mean so I'd avoid that one. I get enough people yelling at me when I drive having my navigation do it too would just be too much. :D

Although freezing things may come into play here too. If you have elements of touchWiz frozen then it may affect the TTS engine as well. It is a tangled web.
 
Which is best though or which do you prefer? Should I just set it to Pico then since I don't use ? Defrosted talkback and now have no issue in accessibility menu. Will test back a few times now and see.
Thanks again by the way!!!
 
pookieguy said:
Which is best though or which do you prefer? Should I just set it to Pico then since I don't use ? Defrosted talkback and now have no issue in accessibility menu. Will test back a few times now and see.
Thanks again by the way!!!
Click to expand...

No problem, I'm glad things are getting resolved.

As far as TTS, ICS only has one option right now. It is a pretty natural voice so I like it. There are other options in the market that I played around with on my Galaxy S, but I noticed a bit of a delay in some of them. Honestly, I'd try each of the ones you have if they are working properly and see what you prefer. The main thing I ran into that bugged me was mispronouncing street names, but it is computer voice trying to read text so you can't expect it to work flawlessly.
 
I have noticed this issue as well. Whenever I turn voice navigation on, a female voice start the voice nicely for about 30 seconds or so, then it will turn to something like, "XML version equals 1.0, blah, blah, blah".

I am using Samsung Galaxy S II X (Telus). I also have both Samsung TTS and Pico TTS but I believe I had once uninstalled Pico TTS not knowing what it was.

Any help in solving this would be great as this is annoying..

Thanks
 
OfTheDamned,

I think I finally found the culprit! Man, this took quite some time!

Anyways,
About a week ago, I did download ONE app that is one of those Siri-like apps for Android. I actually wouldn't use this personally but downloaded just because I was curious as to how good it would work. I quickly uninstalled it though. That stupid app was Skyvi.

After you asked me if there were any other voice related apps that I installed, I was thinking and remembered I installed this one. Apparently, the uninstall did not go well because I found traces of the software everywhere. I used two different root file managers to find all traces and remove them safely. I then set Engine to Pico and everything SEEMS to be working perfectly now! Damn, that was a pain.

Anyways,

I'd seriously avoid installing crap like this. You don't need crap like this on this phone anyways. The stock Voice Search tool works great already. I only used Navigation twice today but did not get that scary voice during both! lol

OfTheDamned...
Thanks again dude for all the help. Really appreciated. Glad I don't have to restore this phone that I have modified heavily over the past month!
 
pookieguy said:
OfTheDamned,

I think I finally found the culprit! Man, this took quite some time!

Anyways,
About a week ago, I did download ONE app that is one of those Siri-like apps for Android. I actually wouldn't use this personally but downloaded just because I was curious as to how good it would work. I quickly uninstalled it though. That stupid app was Skyvi.

After you asked me if there were any other voice related apps that I installed, I was thinking and remembered I installed this one. Apparently, the uninstall did not go well because I found traces of the software everywhere. I used two different root file managers to find all traces and remove them safely. I then set Engine to Pico and everything SEEMS to be working perfectly now! Damn, that was a pain.

Anyways,

I'd seriously avoid installing crap like this. You don't need crap like this on this phone anyways. The stock Voice Search tool works great already. I only used Navigation twice today but did not get that scary voice during both! lol

OfTheDamned...
Thanks again dude for all the help. Really appreciated. Glad I don't have to restore this phone that I have modified heavily over the past month!
Click to expand...


Glad to hear that you have things sorted out. I've always hated having to resort to factory resets for anything so avoiding them is a big deal.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom