You don't need to be an 'investor' to invest in Singletrack: 6 days left: 95% of target - Find out more
Should I give everyone £100? It would have been for the greater good, but I’d have been bankrupt by the time I left the fruit and veg isle.
But this isn't costing you anything, OK maybe a few minutes of your time. It's just helping the situation. But, thankfully we're in the UK, it is optional, and entirely up to you...
You evil, heartless bastard!
I was threatening people with the contact tracing app, not a U2 album...I wouldn't wish that on anyone
Ok, so I'm guessing the one on Google Play is the old version or such?
I'll uninstall and see if the current one is downloaded via an NHS site perhaps?
i installed from Google Play - NHS Covid-19
I have a reasonable chance of getting Covid but it will come via my daughter and her school movements which are not covered by this system.
So if you had the app installed you could enter your test results. Obviously you would self-isolate for the 14 days, but the data it gets may start to inform it better (ie, people you have been in contact with outside of the 14 days may show symptoms and you could be the cause which, given enough evidence of this, might make the Government revise its advice). It's all just big data - they aren't bothered about Dave from Croydon spending an evening in Lapland with Luscious Lucy and selling the data on, they just want to be more informed about the virus.
That seems odd when a large percentage of phones that are in common usage aren’t compatible with the app.
How large a percentage? My Android phone (S7) is on the cusp of that sort of obsolescence.
Is this actually the case?
BLE was a standard feature of Android somewhere around 4 or 5 I just looked it up, Jelly Bean 4.3. See API 18 here. There must be very few Android handsets out there now that don't support it, they'd have to be several years old. Dunno about iPhones but I'd expect a similar timescale.
The S7 deffo supports BLE, I looked that up as well.
I was threatening people with the contact tracing app, not a U2 album…I wouldn’t wish that on anyone
Ok, so I’m guessing the one on Google Play is the old version or such?
I’ll uninstall and see if the current one is downloaded via an NHS site perhaps?
You still haven't found what you're looking for?
Sorted now thanks Cougar. Followed the link from the NHS webby and it took me to the same app on Play and updated it. Odd, but now it works.👍
I had to uninstall it then install it again to get rid of the code thing. Seems to work fine, no noticeable impact on battery life over last four hours.
So, if I were honest, my remaining reluctance to download is due to my enormous mistrust of this government and anything its even remotely connected with. As above, not really very grown up.
Is there any other reason not to DL? I'm thinking significant bugs that may emerge...
Downloaded, as has the wife. I can't see a reason not to when I'm using Google maps etc. on a regular basis. And I've nothing to hide.
@MoreCashThanDash is assume the same two that flew over here about an hour ago. Leicestershire by the way.
So if you had the app installed you could enter your test results. Obviously you would self-isolate for the 14 days, but the data it gets may start to inform it better (ie, people you have been in contact with outside of the 14 days may show symptoms and you could be the cause which, given enough evidence of this, might make the Government revise its advice). It’s all just big data – they aren’t bothered about Dave from Croydon spending an evening in Lapland with Luscious Lucy and selling the data on, they just want to be more informed about the virus.
The gov get no such data. They just get a notification that someone's had a positive test (edit: actually I'm not even convinced thy get that). That's the whole point of the Apple-google solution: there is no central database of your contacts/interactions. Cummings and his data goblins at Palantir have effectively been told to sling one. From a data protection perspective it's great. Probably not so good if you want to model things, or make judgements about interaction severity (or undo false or malicious positives).
@fadda I'm a proper "get off my data-ist" and was horrified at the original architecture. Even though it claimed to be anonymized, giving "them" the patterns of my interactions was a step too far. The new architecture based on the Apple-Google API is very different and makes it almost impossible for them to get anything out of you. I'm more than happy to have this running. The german, Irish, Swiss and Austrian apps use the same architecture. if you can get the swiss or Germans to download anything like this it has to be pretty private - they've only just started to allow streetview to take photos and dashcams are totally verboten!
You still haven’t found what you’re looking for?
👏👏
assume the same two that flew over here about an hour ago. Leicestershire by the way.
Not far over the border in Derbyshire, as the Apache flies. Have you downloaded the app as well? 😱
fadda
Full Member
So, if I were honest, my remaining reluctance to download is due to my enormous mistrust of this government and anything its even remotely connected with.
I get it mate, genuinely but I see this app as being no more malignant than other apps I use and potentially much, much more important.
No point me giving the government crap about their Covid response when I won't even install an app.
Lol, I missed the joke cougar.😁
Downloaded it earlier. Now sat in the car waiting for my daughter at school. I wonder if the woman in the car next to me has it
No point me giving the government crap about their Covid response when I won’t even install an app.
End of thread.
No point me giving the government crap about their Covid response when I won’t even install an app.
Very good point, thanks Poopscoop
So, if I were honest, my remaining reluctance to download is due to my enormous mistrust of this government and anything its even remotely connected with
to quote Brian Cox (him of the big brain), it uses Apple and Google APIs not government. given that you've already installed their OS what's the problem?
I think Cougar has won the forum today and can go an sit down and put his feet up. Coffee on keyboard etc (not a euphemism)
I think Cougar has won the forum today and can go an sit down and put his feet up. Coffee on keyboard etc (not a euphemism)
he'd be nothing without my set up line 🙁
I thought cougar was expressing a genuine paternal concern for a forum member.... Instead he was using me for a U2 joke.
Bar steward.😁
But this isn’t costing you anything, OK maybe a few minutes of your time. It’s just helping the situation. But, thankfully we’re in the UK, it is optional, and entirely up to you…
My point was that I objected to the concept of being forced to do something.
I'd download the app, or give £100 to a friend. I'd object to being forced to do either.
Is this actually the case?
BLE was a standard feature of Android somewhere around 4 or 5 I just looked it up, Jelly Bean 4.3. See API 18 here. There must be very few Android handsets out there now that don’t support it, they’d have to be several years old. Dunno about iPhones but I’d expect a similar timescale.
The S7 deffo supports BLE, I looked that up as well.
It works, hence my comment that it's on the cusp of obsolescence. I was refuting the point "a large percentage" of people out there are using incompatible phones. My phones compatible and is old enough to be borderline unusable.
How many people are still using an iPhone 5 (I think that was mentioned as the newest iPhone that wouldn't run the app)?
Reading this thread wow! think the straps are too tight on some peoples tin foil hats its cutting off the circulation to their brains. Everything you do online is tracked Strava tracked, Spotify tracked, Youtube tracked, Tesco tracked, iplayer tracked, im guessing this forum is 3rd party so likely tracked for product dev too. The only difference between Strava tracking you and the NHS is this will actually help someone else and not just some company.
Messages from my Mum (who I haven’t mentioned this app to)…
I downloaded the Covid 19 app and used it at the hairdressers for track and trace
I can honestly say it was easy
She has to ask me how to use email… but she can do it… we can all do it…
My phones compatible and is old enough to be borderline unusable.
Plenty of phones will be ‘compatible’ but struggle to install or run it, for various reasons. Basically, if you can still update the OS via Google or Apple, you can install this and crack on. If you’re stuck on a real old OS, or some cut’n’shut custom version of Android… it’s time to a consider a more modern updatable secure phone anyway.
Roughly 25% of apple devices are running iOS 12 or earlier and the app needs iOS 13.5. Plenty of people will be still using iPhone 6's and others won't have updated more modern versions. Android phones should be better as anything post 2015 should work and there's less old ones still in use.
It hardly matters as plenty of people just won't install the app or interact with track & trace as the financial hit of being told to self isolate is very high and seems to get forgotten about on here.
You guys need to wander over to the "Easing Scottish Lockdown" thread and see how much discussion was had about our version of the tracing app.
Android phones should be better as anything post 2015 should work
Any Apple phone “post 2015” should also work. The iPhone 6 (the latest one not to work) was their 2014 model. iPhone 6s was 2015. iPhone 6 sold alongside the 6s for a good while, but was gone “post 2015”.
We've had such an app in Qatar for a while and it's legally mandatory with big fines for not complying.
Good points:
Your central COVID status is run through this. Your screen shows green for fine, yellow quarantining, red positive. You have to show it entering everywhere, literally any building. Life isn't possible without a green status. Being caught out with yellow or red is legally badges news. Works well.
Bad points:
The Bluetooth proximity thing was dodgy so essentially turned off. No one knows of anyone who's been pinged for it. Just a faulty concept.
For some reason the app wants access to everything on your phone. Doesn't affect me as there isn't anything sensitive on my phone but it is a massive civil liberties privacy issue. People like lawyers or those in big oil out here simply have a burner phone for the one app. Very authoritarian.
Will have it be kept on as a population monitoring thing? Quite possibly as governments love to monitor people as much as they can get away with and this has moved the Overton Window, hopefully temporarily.
Any Apple phone “post 2015” should also work.
Yep, seems to run fine on my 2016 iPhone SE.
You guys need to wander over to the “Easing Scottish Lockdown” thread and see how much discussion was had about our version of the tracing app.
It's lucky no-one from Scotland visits England or Wales...or vice versa...otherwise we'd have to have an app that worked across the UK 🙄
It’s lucky no-one from Scotland visits England or Wales…or vice versa…otherwise we’d have to have an app that worked across the UK
Or Ireland, or France, or Italy, or Germany, or Sweden, or Spain, or Australia, or Qatar etc etc etc. Is there a point you were trying to make?
This is not Qatar… although I had some of those worries about the app that was abandoned here in Southern Britain. New app installed and running here now. Should have had it to help with getting the virus properly dampened down over the summer, ready for the restart of education… but hey… let’s crack on with it now.
2 out of the three iPhones in our house are too old (iPhone 6 is the cut off point not the iPhone 5 as mentioned earlier).
While I get the greater good concept there is no way I am upgrading two perfectly good phones to do so.
I wonder if I am going to be banned from entering places without it, as per the previous posters comment about the Gym.
PS just realised my in-laws have one suitable phone and one not and my mums phone (iPhone 7) is only just suitable despite her only having had it a couple of months...
As for
I’m not going to download it as I think it will spend its whole time giving false positives. I work in a hospital so am temperature checked every time I enter the building. Patients who I don’t interact with pass within 2 metres of me all day everyday but there is a wall between us that the app won’t know about and we now have to wear masks which we didn’t have to bother with for the first 4 months of lockdown which I still can’t get my head round that rational for. Also my personal phone doesn’t stay with me all day as I have a work one that won’t have the app on as its not deemed safe by IT so my own phone won’t have an accurate picture of my movements either
I've downloaded it. It's compulsory for ordering a beer at the Mad Squirrel. If other pubs do the same we will have excellent coverage of beer drinkers!
Or Ireland, or France, or Italy, or Germany, or Sweden, or Spain, or Australia, or Qatar etc etc etc. Is there a point you were trying to make?
What, you actually think it's a good thing?! Wow 😂
I've downloaded it, seems very user friendly so far.
Like others on here, my view is that if it helps either by alerting me to exposure (and so allowing me to isolate early rather than risk spreading it) and/or inform a better data picture, then all good.
Sadly, there's people out there acting in an unbelievable way - heard from my wife tonight that one of the other mums (not a friend but we know her kid in the year group) has said online in some group that she's had symptoms for a couple of days and is waiting on a test result - all while taking the kid to school!!! If the app gives some level of protection against cretins like that, I'm all for it. I couldn't carry on my conscience if I was asymptomatic after contact with someone like that and passed it onto a vulnerable person - whether I knew them or not.
I'd be happy with compulsory check in to gain entry to shops, gyms, etc if it made it harder for non-compliant people to go about unencumbered.
You can turn it off quite easily in the work style situation if it really bothers you. Turn it back on once out and about
Also my personal phone doesn’t stay with me all day as I have a work one that won’t have the app on as its not deemed safe by IT so my own phone won’t have an accurate picture of my movements either
Err… use the app when not at work, don’t use it at work. Or am I missing something?
Edit: big switch in the app so you can turn it off when you get to the hospital [which will have all its own arrangements and controls] …
I wonder if I am going to be banned from entering places without it
App aside, it's hard to imagine "having a modern smartphone" as being a requirement to enter buildings. Not least when people are required to visibly wear masks and they are, on their chins, without challenge.
Also my personal phone doesn’t stay with me all day as I have a work one that won’t have the app on as its not deemed safe by IT so my own phone won’t have an accurate picture of my movements either
Jeez dude. Maybe you’re a corner case and it isn’t for you, or the land liners, or the ICU workers, or the tinfoil hatters, but for the majority of people I expect it’s fit for purpose, and will probably need some tweaks along the way. As Qatar correspondent said at least you have a choice. Tenner says your IT team will be taking a look at it from a security and risk perspective and will be keen to permit it for those that want it on work phones.
App aside, it’s hard to imagine “having a modern smartphone” as being a requirement to enter buildings. Not least when people are required to visibly wear masks and they are, on their chins, without challenge.
The problem with the current implementation is it seems like someone has gone yep lets make it an app and its limited their thinking. Singapore have developed a wearable for people without smartphones which is a good solution. If they extended how they can implement this app it really could become a thing you need to get in and out of buildings.
will probably need some tweaks along the way.
100% I can't remember the last time an initial launch didnt get hammered down to an MVP. Work wise I would love to be a product designer on this product.
The issue that still hasn't been addressed is accuracy. If the app can't know whether the other phone is the other side of a wall/floor it will produce inaccurate information.
The issue that still hasn’t been addressed is accuracy. If the app can’t know whether the other phone is the other side of a wall/floor it will produce inaccurate information.
I guess this is something we might not know. But as the product and tech gets better its accuracy will improve. The way I see it is its better than nothing and we are in a world of marginal gains. Its just another think they can use to help stop this thing.
@Cougar It wasn’t the concept of having a modern phone that I was raising. From earlier in this thread;
Nostrils; Mandatory in my gym to have the NHS app installed and scan the QR code before every session. This despite already having individual key fobs and a booking system.
Me; I wonder if I am going to be banned from entering places without it, as per the previous posters comment about the Gym.
If I was going to be a snowflake, I might raise the issue of my phone being modern in my eyes, shame it is not classed as modern in yours 😉
I'm genuinely not sure who is misunderstanding whom here. If you don't have a modern smartphone, you ipso facto cannot have the NHS app installed.
I got an excited message from a mate of mine a couple of weeks ago, he's got a new phone and it can send SMSes in lower case. He's going to fare well at his gym.
My comment was based around the fact that people may be bared from going into a building because they don't have a phone modern enough to get the necessary App. Nostrils post suggested that not having the App would prevent you getting into his Gym
In all fairness I don't 'have' a Gym and don't want to go to one, so I don't have an issue so far 😉
But what happens if my local corner shop decides to do the same 🙁
My comment was based around the fact that people may be bared from going into a building because they don’t have a phone modern enough to get the necessary App. Nostrils post suggested that not having the App would prevent you getting into his Gym
And my point was, isn't that the same thing? If you choose not to install the app, or are unable to install the app, the net result is still that you don't have the app. I had to do a bit of googling but I think my mum's mobile phone is a Nokia 6301, she's not got much use for the gym but should that mean she can't go into ASDA?
Some people are still writing cheques. My mum gave me one a few weeks ago to cover the shopping I was doing for her. Technology isn't the solution for everyone.
Some people are still writing cheques. My mum gave me one a few weeks ago to cover the shopping I was doing for her. Technology isn’t the solution for everyone.
Are you actually my secret brother?
Technology isn’t the solution for everyone.
I think we are arguing the same point, just from a different angle.
And my mum gave me a cheque last month 😀
Does it actually matter how it's implemented? Unless there's a wholesale change in people's views then they'll not get near the critical mass required to make it work. It's now just a box ticking exercise so that the press can stop asking 'wheres the app?'.
Those businesses that choose to make it mandatory will do so for as long as it takes for their revenues to drop off, then drop that policy.
Thanks Dom.
So lockdown restrictions were introduced and there was a vocal minority who were desperately trying to justify why it shouldn't apply to them.
Now the app is released, and we seem to have a vocal minority trying to justify why it shouldn't apply to them.
If you can, then download it and use it. It might help save the life of a loved one.
If you can, then download it and use it. It might help save the life of a loved one.
Perfectly put. Downloading and using it if you are able to has zero downsides but plenty of potential upside.
Anyone else having Bluetooth issues while the app is running? My phone (Galaxy S10) can usually connect to 2 different Bluetooth devices at the same time with no issues but since installing the NHS app last night it won't connect to anything unless I turn the NHS app off. Really annoying when I use it for music in my car, as a radio connected to a separate speaker at home and in the works van to play music and as a satnav.
Switch it off, all works fine. Switch it back on and all other Bluetooth connections cut out and can't be re-connected.
same here, albeit only tried in the car this am.
No issue here (as of yet!) but I’m using an iPhone so potentially an Android problem(?)
Only used BT headphones so far however since installing.
No BT problems here... using headphones and speakers fine (iPhone).
I think we are arguing the same point, just from a different angle.
That's what I was trying to say.
Er, oh.
I think I read somewhere but I don't remember where so I'm not swearing to it - establishments will retain the facility for people to leave details using pen and paper in the event that they are not able or willing to use the app for some reason.
It's their choice though... isn't it. Plenty of places now only taking payments via phone or contactless card at the moment... they simply won't serve you for cash or cheque... these times aren't normal, and alienating some potential customers/users is small fry compared to getting closed down.
Tuesday AM: Work colleague has child sent home from school with typical cold symptoms which are now obviously covid symptoms too. Wife leaves her job (teacher) to collect him and other child and my colleague leaves our workplace to protect me and customers. Wife spends several hours trying to book a test and eventually succeeds, drives an hour or so to get it and tests herself and 2 children as second is now also coughing away.
Friday PM: I've been at work all week on my own running around like a blue arsed fly, the school where my colleagues wife teaches has been down a teacher and 2 children have missed 4 days of school.
No result yet.
Its a circus
I'll download the flippin app when there is a testing system up and running. Right now its only function will be to cause even more needless slowdown.
I’ll download the flippin app when there is a testing system up and running. Right now its only function will be to cause even more needless slowdown.
not really, it'll still tell you if you've been in contact with someone with confirmed covid even if you're wife's test hasn't come back yet
Agree with that, testing is absolutley crucial to using the app. They need to sort their sht out!
We'll do our bit, install the app, GOV need to sort their end and get testing sorted asap.
No... the 'slowdown' is needed I'm afraid (even if the government aren't offering the required support people will need because of it)... the testing is now WAY behind the spread, which is why we need more people isolating if they've been working or living with someone with symptoms. The "test our way back to education/work" plan has utterly failed... forget it... it's not happening for a good while, and we need to stop the spread now. Use the app. Be prepared for more people isolating, including yourself. It's not going to be easy.
Perfectly put. Downloading and using it if you are able to has zero downsides but plenty of potential upside.
The downside is you may have to quarantine for 2 weeks, either correctly or through a false positive. Losing a couple of weeks wages is a big deal for most people.
Yes, it is, which is why the government needs to step up and make sure no one loses a couple of weeks wages. But without these periods of isolation, the country is going to be in a very expensive mess at the end of the year. If people don't isolate... or only isolate when a positive test has been obtained when we all know now that testing is way behind actual infections, we will be in a world of pain trying to put the genie back in the bottle.
"The downside is you may have to quarantine for 2 weeks, either correctly or through a false positive. Losing a couple of weeks wages is a big deal for most people."
yes, but more than that its also putting businesses under intollerable strain
"No… the ‘slowdown’ is needed I’m afraid"
Funny, I'm not hearing that from many businesses I speak to.
Huge swathes of the economy are taking collateral damage, not from the virus but directly as a result of its mismanagement. I'm absolutely furious that idiots like Dido Harding actually have the gall to stand up and say that they wern't expecting this level of demand for tests, whilst Hancock was telling us its our fault as there were too many people asking for tests who didn't need them.
Literally EVERYBODY was expecting the need for testing to expand hugely as the schools went back. ****tards the lot of them.
I can't disagree with a word of that.
I think Winston has it the nail firmly on the head. It’s just failed gimmick after failed gimmick rather than any semblance of a plan or strategy.
I’m not going to download it as I think it will spend its whole time giving false positives. I work in a hospital so am temperature checked every time I enter the building. Patients who I don’t interact with pass within 2 metres of me all day everyday but there is a wall between us that the app won’t know about and we now have to wear masks
I read the T&C's/Privacy blurb when installing this morning (2nd install as the first wanted a trial code)
I'm sure it said:
If you are wearing medical grade PPE in a medical setting, behind a permanent screen such as at a till, or leave your phone in a work/gym locker, you should pause the app to avoid false positives.
I think it also said that checking in simply gives the app the ability to warn you if the premises subsequently becomes high risk at the time of your visit...you should still leave your contact details with the premises, whether by pen and paper or their own QR code etc.
Edit: and it said if the app tells you to isolate, you then get negative test, you still need to isolate until the app gives you the all clear, due to the incubation period.
Yes, it is, which is why the government needs to step up and make sure no one loses a couple of weeks wages.
Where does the money come from for all this?
I won't be installing this app.
Where does the money come from for all this?
Not supporting people to isolate, so they don’t, will result in a full lockdown, and huge economic damage. But hey, we know that already, we’ve seen it once allready, but some people want to believe otherwise. If the government doesn’t put the money in the right places now, its tax take is about to take another dive.
It's hard not to agree with all of the comments here regarding the testing failure and all the other failures the government is responsible for regarding this virus.
That said it's also really depressing to see a kind of "they have f***** up so bad, the app is pointless so why should I bother with it?" kind of thought process going on.
It just leads me to think that we are heading into a terrible Winter. The government's utterly criminal incompetence shouldn't give us a reason, as individuals, to just amplify their mess. There's just no excusing that. If we try we are just as bad as those bastards.
I despise this government, utterly despise it but I'll be damned if I'll spite myself and others just to prove a point in my head.
We are just heading into a self fulfilling prophesy otherwise.
despise this government, utterly despise it but I’ll be damned if I’ll spite myself and others just to prove a point in my head.
If the head of the fish is rotten, it doesn't matter how hard the fins work, that fish is still going to finish floating along, belly up, with a stomach full of stinking gas.
I won’t be installing this app.
Run through your logic for me?
If you are infected and asymptomatic, you'd rather not know, even if that meant you then infected many others and they went on to be ill or die?
Come on, use the app and isolate if required. Any government would be giving you this tool (most would have provided it far sooner, but hey), just get on and use it, please. Don't use Dom and his donkeys to excuse us each not doing our own bit too help keep others safe.
Well said poop.
Oap, doing this in spite of what the ****s at the top are doing is appropriate.
Edit and Kelvin +1