Patent ID: 8319685

Claim:
A battery-powered mobile computing device comprising: a battery to provide power; a processor; a Global Positioning System (GPS) component to obtain information about the geographic location of the device, wherein: the information about the geographic location of the device obtained using the GPS component has a first degree of accuracy, and obtaining information about the geographic location of the device using the GPS component consumes a first amount of battery power; a wireless communication interface to obtain information about the geographic location of the device, wherein: the information about the geographic location of the device obtained using the wireless communication interface has a second degree of accuracy that is less than the first degree of accuracy, and obtaining information about the geographic location of the device using the wireless communication interface consumes a second amount of battery power that is less than the first amount of battery power; and a memory storing instructions executable by the processor, the instructions including: first instructions corresponding to a first applications that utilize information about a geographic location of the device; second instructions corresponding to a location updater module, the location updater module to request either the GPS component or the wireless communication interface to obtain information about the geographic location of the device; and third instructions corresponding to a location services module, the location services module to: register the applications for access to information about the geographic location of the device; determine whether any of the applications is active or was active at any time during a previous specified period of predetermined length; and control the location updater module regarding whether to use the GPS component or the wireless communication interface to obtain the information about the geographic location of the device based, at least in part, on a determination as to whether any of the applications are active or were active at any time during a previous specified period, wherein the location services module controls the location updater module to use the GPS component to obtain the information about the geographic location of the device if any of the applications that utilize information about the current geographic location of the device are active or were active at any time during the previous specified period, and wherein the location services module controls the location updater module to use the wireless communication interface and not the GPS component to obtain the information about the geographic location of the device if no application on the battery-powered mobile computing device that utilizes information about the current geographic location of the device is active or was active at any time during the previous specified period.