Is it possible to check whether the location services are active?

Question

is it possible to check whether the location services are active?

I mean Settings > Location > Location services

There is probably no direct API for calling, but could it work with the GeoCoordinateWatcher?

Answer 1

            GeoCoordinateWatcher g = new GeoCoordinateWatcher();
            g.Start();
            if (g.Permission.Equals(GeoPositionPermission.Granted))
            {
                //Your location services is enabled. Go ahead.
                //Your codes goes here.
            }
            else if (g.Permission.Equals(GeoPositionPermission.Denied) || g.Permission.Equals(GeoPositionPermission.Unknown))
            {                    
                MessageBox.Show("Location services are disabled. To enable them, Goto Settings - Location - Enable Location Services.", "Location services", MessageBoxButton.OK);
            }

Answer 2

You can use the following code to determine the status of the Location service:

var watcher = new GeoCoordinateWatcher();
if (GeoPositionStatus.Disabled == watcher.Status)
{
    // Watcher is disabled.
}

More realistically, you'll want to pay more attention to change to the status (just because the service isn't disabled doesn't mean you've got location data), so you shoudl take a look at the MSDN Documentation for working with the Location service.

There's also a good post on filtering and emulating location data using the Reactive extensions, which is perfect for that pre-device testing, though to save you time on that front the Widnows Phone Team have released the Windows Phone GPS Emulator.