Could not invoke RNFusedLocation.startObserving

[Off2Race]

Environment

System:
OS: macOS 12.6.3
CPU: (10) arm64 Apple M1 Max
Memory: 108.56 MB / 32.00 GB
Shell: 3.2.57 - /bin/bash
Binaries:
Node: 16.14.2 - ~/.asdf/installs/nodejs/16.14.2/bin/node
Yarn: 1.22.18 - /opt/homebrew/bin/yarn
npm: 8.5.0 - ~/.asdf/plugins/nodejs/shims/npm
Watchman: 2022.03.21.00 - /opt/homebrew/bin/watchman
Managers:
CocoaPods: 1.14.3 - /Users/mikeloos/.asdf/shims/pod
SDKs:
iOS SDK:
Platforms: DriverKit 22.2, iOS 16.2, macOS 13.1, tvOS 16.1, watchOS 9.1
Android SDK: Not Found
IDEs:
Android Studio: 2022.1 AI-221.6008.13.2211.9514443
Xcode: 14.2/14C18 - /usr/bin/xcodebuild
Languages:
Java: 11.0.14.1 - /Users/mikeloos/.asdf/shims/javac
npmPackages:
@react-native-community/cli: Not Found
react: 17.0.2 => 17.0.2
react-native: 0.67.5 => 0.67.5
react-native-macos: Not Found
npmGlobalPackages:
react-native: Not Found

Platforms

Android

Versions

Please add the used versions/branches

• Android: 12
• react-native-geolocation-service: 5.3.1
• react-native: 0.67.5
• react: 17.0.2

Description

When I call geoLocation.watchPosition on Android, the app will crash with the error:

Could not invoke RNFusedLocation.startObserving

See below:

I've been able to reproduce the issue on the Android emulator but I first detected it when I got a Sentry log from a production user that was experiencing the same crash.

Here are some screenshots from the stack trace that Sentry captured:

No issues on iOS. The crash only occurs on Android. And, oddly enough, the issue appears to have just started occurring about 2 weeks ago. Before that, and for several months prior, the same code has been working without any problems.

Reproducible Demo

import Geolocation from 'react-native-geolocation-service';

const currentPositionOptions = { enableHighAccuracy: true, timeout: 20000, maximumAge: 0 };
const watchOptions = {
	...currentPositionOptions,
	maximumAge: 1000,
	distanceFilter: 1,
};

const onNewPosition = (position: GeoPosition) => {
	// save the position in redux
};

const onError = (functionName: string) => (error: GeoError) => {
	// write an error message to logging service
};

const newWatchId = Geolocation.watchPosition(
	onNewPosition,
	onError('watchPosition'),
	watchOptions,
);

Expected Results

Not crash

[Off2Race]

Ok, I did some investigation myself and it appears that this is a known issue with recent updates to Google Play services. See the link below for more details:

https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/256046114

Fortunately, there was a fix made last year in version 21.0.1 of the play-services-location library. To leverage this fix, I added the following line in my android > build.gradle:

buildscript {
  ext {
    ....
    playServicesLocationVersion = "21.0.1". <----- ADD THIS LINE
  }

Once I made this change and rebuilt the app, the crash went away.

@Agontuk – To avoid this issue for others, you might consider changing the default version for react-native-geolocation-service and kick out a new version.

[Off2Race]

And, of course, after I figured all this out, I found #424 which basically came to the same conclusion :)

Sorry for the noise...