PearCircle

Most issues fall into one of three buckets: two devices can't find each other, a required location or motion permission was declined or the OS is killing PearCircle in the background to save battery. Walk through the sections below in order.

Invite links are single use and expire quickly. If joining fails:

• Ask the circle owner to generate a fresh invite and try again.
• Make sure both devices have internet access. Joining needs both devices online at the same time.
• If you are on a corporate or school Wi-Fi network that blocks peer to peer traffic, try mobile data instead.
• Restart PearCircle on both devices and retry.

• Raise screen brightness on the device showing the code so the scanner can see it clearly.
• Clean the scanning device's camera lens.
• If scanning still fails, tap Share Link and send the invite URL by any channel. Opening the link on the other device completes the join without the camera.

If your circle members see a stale pin for you:

• Confirm sharing is not paused. Check the pause control on the main map screen.
• Open PearCircle on your device. If location updates resume as soon as the app is foregrounded, the OS is killing the background service. See Background location setup.
• Check that location permission is set to "Allow all the time" on Android or "Always" on iOS. PearCircle cannot share in the background with "Only while using the app".
• Confirm both devices have internet. Updates sync the next time both devices are reachable.
• If only one network blocks peer to peer connections, switching one device to mobile data often fixes it.

• Confirm the other person is actually sharing. If their pin reads "Sharing paused", they have silenced their location.
• Both devices need to be online at the same time for a fresh update to arrive. Last-seen time on the pin shows when the most recent update was received.
• If you just joined the circle, allow a few seconds for the initial sync.
• Pull to refresh on the map. PearCircle reconnects and pulls the latest state.

Place transitions are computed locally on each device. If notifications are missing:

• Check that notifications are enabled for PearCircle. On iOS, Settings, Notifications, PearCircle. On Android, Settings, Apps, PearCircle, Notifications.
• Confirm location permission is set to "Allow all the time" or "Always". Geofences cannot fire while the app is in the background without it.
• Make sure the Place exists in the circle you expect. Places are per circle. A Home Place in your family circle does not exist in your friends circle.
• The geofence has a small radius for accuracy. Walk a few extra meters past the edge to confirm transition.

• Trips are recorded only for movements longer than about one minute or 100 meters. Short walks indoors are deliberately ignored.
• Your trips are private by default. To let other circle members see them, open the circle settings and opt in to trip sharing for that circle.
• Motion permission must be granted so PearCircle can detect whether you are walking, driving, flying or stationary.

Many Android phones aggressively stop background apps to save battery. iOS occasionally suspends apps after long idle periods too. If your location stops updating whenever you leave the app, follow the dedicated Background location setup guide to whitelist PearCircle on your device.

• The map uses tiles fetched from a public provider. The first time you view an area, you need a network connection.
• Once tiles have been viewed, they are cached on your device and work offline.
• For trips into dead zones, use the "Download area" control to cache tiles for a region in advance.
• If tiles still won't load with a working connection, the public tile provider may be temporarily down. Try again later.

• Background location sharing has a real battery cost. PearCircle batches updates and lowers polling frequency when you are stationary to keep this as low as possible.
• If drain is excessive, check that no other location app is also running in the background.
• You can pause sharing at any time. When paused, PearCircle uses essentially no battery.

Email peerloomllc@proton.me or open a GitHub issue. Include your device model, OS version and what you have already tried.