Find my iPhone Qs (iOS5)

[AnneCA]

Left my iPhone in the back seat of someone's car this morning. :-( I take a "casual carpool" so I don't know the driver.

Find my iPhone tells me where it is; my guess is the driver has parked for the day oblivious to the fact that some idiot left a phone in her back seat.

Does the map page refresh on its own, or do I have to refresh the browser? When I do that (obsessively....) am I running down the phone's battery? I assume there's no way to get notification of when it starts moving again, so I just need to keep checking so I know when she's in her car again, and I'll send the noise then.

Most important question: if I remote-lock the phone now, can I still also send a noise? I'd certainly like to remote-lock it with an "if found please call" message. But I'm worried she either won't notice it in her backseat, or it's slid under the front seat. So being able to send a noise once I see it moving again is critical.

Anyone know?

 

[r2shyyou]

Left my iPhone in the back seat of someone's car this morning. :-( I take a "casual carpool" so I don't know the driver.

Find my iPhone tells me where it is; my guess is the driver has parked for the day oblivious to the fact that some idiot left a phone in her back seat.

Does the map page refresh on its own, or do I have to refresh the browser? When I do that (obsessively....) am I running down the phone's battery? I assume there's no way to get notification of when it starts moving again, so I just need to keep checking so I know when she's in her car again, and I'll send the noise then.

Most important question: if I remote-lock the phone now, can I still also send a noise? I'd certainly like to remote-lock it with an "if found please call" message. But I'm worried she either won't notice it in her backseat, or it's slid under the front seat. So being able to send a noise once I see it moving again is critical.

Anyone know?

The location of your phone does not refresh on its own, it only does so when you "request" or refresh it.

As for whether requesting its location repeatedly is running down its battery or not, I'd tend to think not...but I could be wrong.

I think your assumption that you can't be notified once it starts moving is correct.

As for the remote lock and whether or not it prevents you from being able to initiate a sound, I'm quite certain it won't prevent this so you shouldn't be worried about that.

This might seem like an obvious link but it's more helpful (aka less marketing-y) than some of the others:

http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/find-my-iphone.html

 

[AnneCA]

Thank you! I locked it, and, indeed, I can still click the "play sound" button.

The phone is still stationary in what appears to be a parking lot. It occurs to me that once I see it moving again (fingers crossed this afternoon some time), I shouldn't have it sound if the driver appears to be on the freeway. Operating on the assumption she has no idea the phone is in her car, I don't want her driving off the bridge wondering what that noise is!

 

[r2shyyou]

Thank you! I locked it, and, indeed, I can still click the "play sound" button.

The phone is still stationary in what appears to be a parking lot. It occurs to me that once I see it moving again (fingers crossed this afternoon some time), I shouldn't have it sound if the driver appears to be on the freeway. Operating on the assumption she has no idea the phone is in her car, I don't want her driving off the bridge wondering what that noise is!

Sounds reasonable. Probably best to just send a message that'll appear when she eventually finds the phone and presses either of its buttons.

Also, if you think it'd be worth it, you could try finding out what business that parking lot is for (or businesses) and try to find their main phone number and call them. If you don't know the driver's name (you wrote that you don't know the driver but maybe you know her name), you could try to describe the car and see if that leads to anything. For example, if you did that at my company, whoever got the message would likely send an email out to everyone with the details, which would probably get this squared away a bit sooner. Just a thought.

 

[AnneCA]

Success! I've been checking location periodically, and was getting discouraged, but I lucked out and hit refresh right as she got on the move, because she was suddenly a block away . . . refresh again, two blocks, and headed to the on-ramp . . . Play Sound! Play Sound! Refresh . . . still in same place . . . home phone rings -- it's her!! She said it was right on the seat and "started beeping as soon as I got in." She apologized that she hadn't found it sooner, as she'd had a very long day at work. I didn't have the nerve to tell her I knew that because I'd been monitoring her car all day, LOL.

So very nice of her, and it's me who owes her the apology for the inconvenience. She lives quite near, so we're doing a meet-up tomorrow morning.

My advice now is: Make sure you've got Find My Phone/Device installed and working!

Thanks you so much for the advice - I really wanted to lock it, and really wanted to still be able to play the sound, so it was reassuring to know I could do both.

Casual carpool is a unique creature of the East Bay/SF and, I'm told, DC. She is a complete stranger to me, and in keeping with the casual carpool customs, no one in the car spoke. She was parked in SF, so no possibility of identifying likely employers nearby, although I can see that might have worked certain places.

Thanks again!