Do I need to Use an AlarmManager and WakeLock to periodically use a LocationClient?

Question

Posts from over a year ago suggest that it is necessary to use a WakeLock to reserve CPU to gather location information (CommonsWare in particular here Android Periodic GPS location updates with AlarmManager inside a Service). However I do not understand why I cannot simply call a Service every 28 minutes, connect the LocationClient, set a timer to wait 2 minutes, then get the most recent location, disconnect the client, and then stop the service.

Because Commonsware and the user who forked his example here (https://github.com/alexbirkett/cwac-locpoll/blob/master/src/com/commonsware/cwac/locpoll/LocationPollerService.java) use a LocationListener, and not a LocationClient, I was wondering whether his answer still aplies.

Thanks for your time!

EDIT: Is it this simple, where an AlarmManager calls a Service every 28 minutes > the Service acquires a WakeLock and a timer elapses for two minutes as the LocationClient is connect > once two minutes has elapsed, I can kill the service and release the WakeLock?

It would look something like this:

    PowerManager pm = (PowerManager) getBaseContext().getSystemService(Context.POWER_SERVICE);
    PowerManager.WakeLock wl = pm.newWakeLock(PowerManager.PARTIAL_WAKE_LOCK, "");
    wl.acquire();

    Timer theTimer = new Timer();
    theTimer.schedule(new TimerTask() {

        @Override
        public void run() {
            if(checkIfGooglePlay()) {
                getPostLocation();
                w1.release();
                stopSelf(); 
            }
        }
    }, TWO_MINUTES);

    return Service.START_NOT_STICKY;

Answer 1

However I do not understand why I cannot simply call a Service every 28 minutes, connect the LocationClient, set a timer to wait 2 minutes, then get the most recent location, disconnect the client, and then stop the service.

You probably can poll the LocationClient. However, you will still need a WakeLock, as the device will fall asleep during those two minutes otherwise, you will still need AlarmManager for the "every 28 minutes" part, and I don't know if LocationClient will impose other requirements beyond those.