Why is reading HomeKit sensor data not possible in background

Question

Created Jun ’20

Replies 4

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Hi,

I have written an App which needs to access homekit sensors (temperature, humidity, air quality) at regular intervals. However, this is currently not allowed in background and there is also no permission I could ask for to enable that. Why is that?

Kind regards,
Alex

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Answer 1

Mcorey OP

Jun ’20

If this can be done in a battery sensitive way (I’m sure it can), I would welcome this as well.

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Answer 2

Mcorey OP

Jun ’20

I have filed a feedback for this feature (FB7805464) -- if any developers are interested in this as well, please do the same!

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Answer 3

Mcorey OP

Jul ’20

Got a response on my feedback - sadly, it’s not a feature that’s likely to come to HomeKit. The reason is to prevent third party apps from being able use this data to profile a users activity in their home. I do understand this, but hope that there’s eventually a way to do this, even if it means other restrictions are applied

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Answer 4

waynehend OP

Jul ’20

I went through this several years ago and came to the dead end that HomeKit activity is only available to an app that is active in the foreground. I had to develop some fairly elaborate ways to work around this. I submitted feedback at the time but the bottom line was the security edict that background entitlement was not possible.

Today I received a cryptic Feedback from Apple on that old request:

"After reviewing your feedback, we have some additional information for you:

The HomeKit entitlement is public now. Please close your feedback if this is no longer an issue for you. Thanks!"

I haven't been able to figure out yet what this means!

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