(howto-configure-geographic-location)=
# How to configure geographic location

Anbox Cloud allows specifying a geographic location for an Android container. This location can either be specified statically through a configuration file or dynamically through the HTTP API.

## Set a static location

To specify a static location for an Android container, configure it in the `/var/lib/anbox/static_gps_position` file within the instance.

The location data is constructed in the following format:

```
<Latitude>,<Latitude in hemisphere>,<Longitude>,<Longitude in hemisphere>
```

For example:

    4807.038,N,1131.001,E

You can find details about the different parts of the location in the following table.

Field                   | Value type | Description
------------------------|------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------
Latitude                | float      | In the format of `ddmm.mm` (d refers to degrees, m refers to minutes). For example: 4807.038 = 48 degrees 7.038 minutes
Latitude in hemisphere  | char       | Latitude hemisphere `N` (northern hemisphere) or `S` (southern hemisphere)
Longitude               | float      | In the format of `ddmm.mm` (d refers to degrees, m refers to minutes). For example: 1131.001 = 11 degrees 31.001 minutes
Longitude in hemisphere | char       | hemisphere `E` (east longitude) or `W` (west longitude)

To make the file `/var/lib/anbox/static_gps_position` available to the Android container, create a file that contains GPS data in the above format and move that file from `ADDON_DIR` to `/var/lib/anbox/static_gps_position` via an addon pre-start hook during the installation. When an Android container gets started and an application requests the current location information through the Android framework, the GPS data is then forwarded from the Anbox session to the application.

## Set the location dynamically

To update the geographic location of an Android container dynamically while the instance is running, use the location endpoint of the Anbox HTTP API.

See {ref}`sec-anbox-https-api-location` for information on the PATCH method and the specification of the data format.

## Related topics
* {ref}`howto-addons`