On-demand Rides and Deliveries Solution is currently available only to select partners.

Getting Started with the Driver SDK for iOS

You can use the Driver SDK to provide enhanced navigation and tracking to your Trip and Order Progress application. The Driver SDK provides vehicle location and task updates to the On-demand Rides and Deliveries Solution Fleet Engine.

The Driver SDK keeps the Fleet Engine services and your custom services aware of the vehicle’s location and state. For example, the vehicle can be ONLINE or OFFLINE, and the vehicle location changes as a trip progresses.

Minimum system requirements

  • The mobile device must be running iOS 12 or later.
  • Xcode version 13 or later.

    • Prerequisites

    This guide assumes your app already implements the Navigation SDK and that the Fleet Engine backend is set up and available. However, the example code provides a sample of how to set up the Navigation SDK.

    You must also enable the Maps SDK for iOS in your Google Cloud Project and Get an API Key.

    Project Configuration

    You can configure the Driver SDK using CocoaPods.

    Use CocoaPods

    To configure the Driver SDK using CocoaPods, you need the following items:

    • The CocoaPods tool: To install this tool, open the Terminal and run the following command. shell sudo gem install cocoapods Refer to the CocoaPods Getting Started guide for more details.

    1. Create a Podfile for the Driver SDK and use it to install the API and its dependencies: Create a file named Podfile in your project directory. This file defines your project's dependencies. Edit the Podfile and add your dependencies. Here is an example which includes the dependencies:

      source "https://github.com/CocoaPods/Specs.git"

target 'YOUR_APPLICATION_TARGET_NAME_HERE' do
  pod 'GoogleRidesharingDriver'
end

      Here is an example which includes the Alpha and Beta pods for the Driver SDK as dependencies:

      source "https://cpdc-eap.googlesource.com/ridesharing-driver-sdk.git"
source "https://github.com/CocoaPods/Specs.git"

target 'YOUR_APPLICATION_TARGET_NAME_HERE' do
  pod 'GoogleRidesharingDriver'
end

    2. Save the Podfile. Open a terminal and go to the directory containing the Podfile:

      cd <path-to-project>

    3. Run the pod install command. This will install the APIs specified in the Podfile, along with any dependencies they may have.

      pod install

    4. Close Xcode, and then open (double-click) your project's .xcworkspace file to launch Xcode. From this time onwards, you must use the .xcworkspace file to open the project.

    Install the XCFramework

    An XCFramework is a binary package that you use to install the Driver SDK. You can use this package on multiple platforms, including machines using the M1 chipset. This guide shows how to manually add the XCFramework containing the Driver SDK to your project and configure your build settings in Xcode.

    1. Unpack the source files that you received from Google.

    2. Start Xcode and either open an existing project, or create a new project. If you're new to iOS, create a new project and select the iOS App template.

    3. Create a Frameworks group under your project group if one does not exist already.

    4. Drag the gRPCCertificates.bundle file included in the Resources directory of the zip containing the XCFramework into the top level directory of your Xcode project. When prompted, select Copy items if needed.

    5. To install the Driver SDK, drag the GoogleRidesharingDriver.xcframework file into your project under Frameworks, Libraries, and Embedded Content. When prompted, select Copy items if needed.

    6. Select your project from the Project Navigator, and choose your application's target.

    7. Open the Build Phases tab, and in Link Binary with Libraries, add the following frameworks and libraries if they are not already present:

      • Accelerate.framework
      • AudioToolbox.framework
      • AVFoundation.framework
      • CoreData.framework
      • CoreGraphics.framework
      • CoreLocation.framework
      • CoreTelephony.framework
      • CoreText.framework
      • GLKit.framework
      • ImageIO.framework
      • libc++.tbd
      • libxml2.tbd
      • libz.tbd
      • OpenGLES.framework
      • QuartzCore.framework
      • SystemConfiguration.framework
      • UIKit.framework
      • LocalAuthentication.framework
      • WebKit.framework

    8. Choose your project, rather than a specific target, and open the Build Settings tab. In the Other Linker Flags section, add ‑ObjC for both debug and release. If these settings are not visible, change the filter in the Build Settings bar from Basic to All.

    Alpha/Beta SDK versions

    To configure the Alpha or Beta versions of the Driver SDK for iOS you need the following items:

    • The CocoaPods tool: To install this tool, open the Terminal and run the following command.

      sudo gem install cocoapods

      Refer to the CocoaPods Getting Started guide for more details.

    • Your development account on the Google access list. The pod repository of the Alpha and Beta versions of the SDK are not public source. To access those versions, contact the Google Customer Engineer. The engineer adds your development account to the access list and then sets a cookie for authentication.

    After your project is on the access list, you can access the pod.

    1. Create a Podfile for the Delivery SDK for iOS and use it to install the API and its dependencies: Create a file named Podfile in your project directory. This file defines your project's dependencies. Edit the Podfile and add your dependencies. Here is an example which includes the dependencies:

      source "https://cpdc-eap.googlesource.com/ridesharing-driver-sdk.git"
source "https://github.com/CocoaPods/Specs.git"

target 'YOUR_APPLICATION_TARGET_NAME_HERE' do
  pod 'GoogleRidesharingDriver'
end

    2. Save the Podfile. Open a terminal and go to the directory containing the Podfile:

      cd <path-to-project>

    3. Run the pod install command. This command installs the APIs specified in the Podfile, along with any dependencies they may have.

      pod install

    4. Close Xcode, and then open (double-click) your project's .xcworkspace file to launch Xcode. From this time onwards, you must use the .xcworkspace file to open the project.

    Implement authorization and authentication

    When your Driver app generates and sends updates to the Fleet Engine backend, the requests must include valid access tokens. To authorize and authenticate these requests, the Driver SDK calls your object conforming to the GMTDAuthorization protocol. The object is responsible for providing the required access token.

    As the app developer, you choose how tokens are generated. Your implementation should provide the ability to do the following:

    • Fetch an access token, possibly in JSON format, from an HTTPS server.
    • Parse and cache the token.
    • Refresh the token when it expires.

    For details of the tokens expected by the Fleet Engine server, see Creating a JSON Web Token (JWT) for authorization.

    The provider ID is the same as Google Cloud Project ID. See Fleet Engine Quickstart Guide for more information.

    The following example implements an access token provider:

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerURL = "INSERT_YOUR_TOKEN_PROVIDER_URL"

class SampleAccessTokenProvider: NSObject, GMTDAuthorization {
  private struct AuthToken {
    // The cached vehicle token.
    let token: String
    // Keep track of when the token expires for caching.
    let expiration: TimeInterval
    // Keep track of the vehicle ID the cached token is for.
    let vehicleID: String
  }

  enum AccessTokenError: Error {
    case missingAuthorizationContext
    case missingData
  }

  private var authToken: AuthToken?

  func fetchToken(
    with authorizationContext: GMTDAuthorizationContext?,
    completion: @escaping GMTDAuthTokenFetchCompletionHandler
  ) {
    // Get the vehicle ID from the authorizationContext. This is set by the Driver SDK.
    guard let authorizationContext = authorizationContext else {
      completion(nil, AccessTokenError.missingAuthorizationContext)
      return
    }
    let vehicleID = authorizationContext.vehicleID

    // If appropriate, use the cached token.
    if let authToken = authToken,
      authToken.expiration > Date.now.timeIntervalSince1970 && authToken.vehicleID == vehicleID
    {
      completion(authToken.token, nil)
      return
    }

    // Otherwise, try to fetch a new token from your server.
    let request = URLRequest(url: URL(string: providerURL))
    let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: request) { [weak self] data, _, error in
      guard let strongSelf = self else { return }
      guard error == nil else {
        completion(nil, error)
        return
      }

      // Replace the following key values with the appropriate keys based on your
      // server's expected response.
      let vehicleTokenKey = "VEHICLE_TOKEN_KEY"
      let tokenExpirationKey = "TOKEN_EXPIRATION"
      guard let data = data,
        let fetchData = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data) as? [String: Any],
        let token = fetchData[vehicleTokenKey] as? String,
        let expiration = fetchData[tokenExpirationKey] as? Double
      else {
        completion(nil, AccessTokenError.missingData)
        return
      }

      strongSelf.authToken = AuthToken(
        token: token, expiration: expiration, vehicleID: vehicleID)
      completion(token, nil)
    }
    task.resume()
  }
}

    Objective-C

    #import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

// SampleAccessTokenProvider.h
@interface SampleAccessTokenProvider : NSObject<GMTDAuthorization>
@end

static NSString *const PROVIDER_URL = @"INSERT_YOUR_TOKEN_PROVIDER_URL";

// SampleAccessTokenProvider.m
@implementation SampleAccessTokenProvider{
  // The cached vehicle token.
  NSString *_cachedVehicleToken;
  // Keep track of the vehicle ID the cached token is for.
  NSString *_lastKnownVehicleID;
  // Keep track of when tokens expire for caching.
  NSTimeInterval _tokenExpiration;
}

- (void)fetchTokenWithContext:(nullable GMTDAuthorizationContext *)authorizationContext
                   completion:(nonnull GMTDAuthTokenFetchCompletionHandler)completion {
  // Get the vehicle ID from the authorizationContext. This is set by the Driver SDK.
  NSString *vehicleID = authorizationContext.vehicleID;
  if (!vehicleID) {
    NSAssert(NO, @"Vehicle ID is missing from authorizationContext.");
    return;
  }

  // Clear cached vehicle token if vehicle ID has changed.
  if (![_lastKnownVehicleID isEqual:vehicleID]) {
    _tokenExpiration = 0.0;
    _cachedVehicleToken = nil;
  }
  _lastKnownVehicleID = vehicleID;

  // Clear cached vehicletoken if it has expired.
  if ([[NSDate date] timeIntervalSince1970] > _tokenExpiration) {
    _cachedVehicleToken = nil;
  }

  // If appropriate, use the cached token.
  if (_cachedVehicleToken) {
    completion(_cachedVehicleToken, nil);
    return;
  }
  // Otherwise, try to fetch a new token from your server.
  NSURL *requestURL = [NSURL URLWithString:PROVIDER_URL];
  NSMutableURLRequest *request =
      [[NSMutableURLRequest alloc] initWithURL:requestURL];
  request.HTTPMethod = @"GET";
  // Replace the following key values with the appropriate keys based on your
  // server's expected response.
  NSString *vehicleTokenKey = @"VEHICLE_TOKEN_KEY";
  NSString *tokenExpirationKey = @"TOKEN_EXPIRATION";
  __weak typeof(self) weakSelf = self;
  void (^handler)(NSData *_Nullable data, NSURLResponse *_Nullable response,
                  NSError *_Nullable error) =
      ^(NSData *_Nullable data, NSURLResponse *_Nullable response, NSError *_Nullable error) {
        typeof(self) strongSelf = weakSelf;
        if (error) {
          completion(nil, error);
          return;
        }

        NSError *JSONError;
        NSMutableDictionary *JSONResponse =
            [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:data options:kNilOptions error:&JSONError];

        if (JSONError) {
          completion(nil, JSONError);
          return;
        } else {
          // Sample code only. No validation logic.
          id expirationData = JSONResponse[tokenExpirationKey];
          if ([expirationData isKindOfClass:[NSNumber class]]) {
            NSTimeInterval expirationTime = ((NSNumber *)expirationData).doubleValue;
            strongSelf->_tokenExpiration = [[NSDate date] timeIntervalSince1970] + expirationTime;
          }
          strongSelf->_cachedVehicleToken = JSONResponse[vehicleTokenKey];
          completion(JSONResponse[vehicleTokenKey], nil);
        }
      };
  NSURLSessionConfiguration *config = [NSURLSessionConfiguration defaultSessionConfiguration];
  NSURLSession *mainQueueURLSession =
      [NSURLSession sessionWithConfiguration:config delegate:nil
                               delegateQueue:[NSOperationQueue mainQueue]];
  NSURLSessionDataTask *task = [mainQueueURLSession dataTaskWithRequest:request completionHandler:handler];
  [task resume];
}

@end

    Create a RidesharingDriverAPI instance

    To get a GMTDVehicleReporter instance, you first need to create a GMTDRidesharingDriverAPI instance using the providerID, vehicleID, driverContext and accessTokenProvider. The providerID is the same as Google Cloud Project ID. And you can access the GMTDVehicleReporter instance from the driver API directly.

    The following example creates a GMTDRidesharingDriverAPI instance:

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerID = "INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID"

class SampleViewController: UIViewController {
  private let mapView: GMSMapView

  override func viewDidLoad() {
    super.viewDidLoad()

    let vehicleID = "INSERT_CREATED_VEHICLE_ID"
    let accessTokenProvider = SampleAccessTokenProvider()
    let driverContext = GMTDDriverContext(
      accessTokenProvider: accessTokenProvider,
      providerID: providerID,
      vehicleID: vehicleID,
      navigator: mapView.navigator)
    let ridesharingDriverAPI = GMTDRidesharingDriverAPI(driverContext: driverContext)
  }
}

    Objective-C

    #import "SampleViewController.h"
#import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

static NSString *const PROVIDER_ID = @"INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID";

@implementation SampleViewController {
  GMSMapView *_mapView;
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  NSString *vehicleID = @"INSERT_CREATED_VEHICLE_ID";
  SampleAccessTokenProvider *accessTokenProvider =
                                [[SampleAccessTokenProvider alloc] init];
  GMTDDriverContext *driverContext =
    [[GMTDDriverContext alloc] initWithAccessTokenProvider:accessTokenProvider
                                                providerID:PROVIDER_ID
                                                 vehicleID:vehicleID
                                                 navigator:_mapView.navigator];

  GMTDRidesharingDriverAPI *ridesharingDriverAPI = [[GMTDRidesharingDriverAPI alloc] initWithDriverContext:driverContext];
}

    Optionally listen to VehicleReporter events

    GMTDVehicleReporter periodically updates the vehicle when locationTrackingEnabled is true. To respond to these periodic updates, any object can subscribe to GMTDVehicleReporter events by conforming to theGMTDVehicleReporterListener protocol.

    You can handle the following events:

    • vehicleReporter(_:didSucceed:)

      Informs the Driver app that the backend services successfully received the vehicle location and state update.

    • vehicleReporter(_:didFail:withError:)

      Informs the listener that a vehicle update failed. As long as location tracking is enabled, GMTDVehicleReporter continues to send the latest data to Fleet Engine backend.

    The following example handles these events:

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerID = "INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID"

class SampleViewController: UIViewController, GMTDVehicleReporterListener {
  private let mapView: GMSMapView

  override func viewDidLoad() {
    // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
    ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter.add(self)
  }

  func vehicleReporter(_ vehicleReporter: GMTDVehicleReporter, didSucceed vehicleUpdate: GMTDVehicleUpdate) {
    // Handle update succeeded.
  }

  func vehicleReporter(_ vehicleReporter: GMTDVehicleReporter, didFail vehicleUpdate: GMTDVehicleUpdate, withError error: Error) {
    // Handle update failed.
  }
}

    Objective-C

    /*
 * SampleViewController.h
 */
@interface SampleViewController : UIViewController<GMTDVehicleReporterListener>
@end

/*
 * SampleViewController.m
 */
#import "SampleViewController.h"
#import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

static NSString *const PROVIDER_ID = @"INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID";

@implementation SampleViewController {
  GMSMapView *_mapView;
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
  [ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter addListener:self];
}

- (void)vehicleReporter:(GMTDVehicleReporter *)vehicleReporter didSucceedVehicleUpdate:(GMTDVehicleUpdate *)vehicleUpdate {
  // Handle update succeeded.
}

- (void)vehicleReporter:(GMTDVehicleReporter *)vehicleReporter didFailVehicleUpdate:(GMTDVehicleUpdate *)vehicleUpdate withError:(NSError *)error {
  // Handle update failed.
}

@end

    Add GMTDVehicleReporter as a listener to GMSRoadSnappedLocationProvider

    In order to provide location updates to the Driver SDK, GMTDVehicleReporter must be set as a listener to the GMSRoadSnappedLocationProvider.

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerID = "INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID"

class SampleViewController: UIViewController, GMTDVehicleReporterListener {
  private let mapView: GMSMapView

  override func viewDidLoad() {
    // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
    if let roadSnappedLocationProvider = mapView.roadSnappedLocationProvider {
      roadSnappedLocationProvider.add(ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter)
      roadSnappedLocationProvider.startUpdatingLocation()
    }
  }
}

    Objective-C

    /*
 * SampleViewController.h
 */
@interface SampleViewController : UIViewController<GMTDVehicleReporterListener>
@end

/*
 * SampleViewController.m
 */
#import "SampleViewController.h"
#import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

static NSString *const PROVIDER_ID = @"INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID";

@implementation SampleViewController {
  GMSMapView *_mapView;
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
  [_mapView.roadSnappedLocationProvider addListener:ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter];
  [_mapView.roadSnappedLocationProvider startUpdatingLocation];
}

@end

    Enable location tracking

    To enable location tracking, your app can set locationTrackingEnabled to true on GMTDVehicleReporter. GMTDVehicleReporter automatically sends location updates. After the services match and assign the vehicle to a trip, GMTDVehicleReporter sends route updates automatically when the GMSNavigator is in navigation mode (when a destination is set through setDestinations).

    The route set during the trip update will be the same route the driver is navigating to during the navigation session. Thus, for journey sharing to work properly, the waypoint set through setDestinations should match the destination set in the Fleet Engine backend.

    If locationTrackingEnabled is set to true, trip and vehicle updates are sent to the Fleet Engine backend at a regular interval based on the value set for locationUpdateInterval. If locationTrackingEnabled is set to false, updates stop and a final vehicle update request is sent to the Fleet Engine backend to set the vehicle state to GMTDVehicleState.offline. See updateVehicleState for special considerations on handling failures when locationTrackingEnabled is set to false.

    The following example enables location tracking:

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerID = "INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID"

class SampleViewController: UIViewController, GMTDVehicleReporterListener {
  private let mapView: GMSMapView

  override func viewDidLoad() {
    // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
    ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter.locationTrackingEnabled = true
  }
}

    Objective-C

    /*
 * SampleViewController.m
 */
#import "SampleViewController.h"
#import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

static NSString *const PROVIDER_ID = @"INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID";

@implementation SampleViewController {
  GMSMapView *_mapView;
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
  ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter.locationTrackingEnabled = YES;
}

@end

    By default, the reporting interval is 10 seconds, but the reporting interval can be changed with locationUpdateInterval. The minimum supported update interval is 5 seconds. The maximum supported update interval is 60 seconds. More frequent updates may result in slower requests and errors.

    Update the vehicle state

    The following example shows how to set the vehicle state to ONLINE. See updateVehicleState for details.

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

private let providerID = "INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID"

class SampleViewController: UIViewController, GMTDVehicleReporterListener {
  private let mapView: GMSMapView

  override func viewDidLoad() {
    // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
    ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter.update(.online)
  }
}

    Objective-C

    #import "SampleViewController.h"
#import "SampleAccessTokenProvider.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

static NSString *const PROVIDER_ID = @"INSERT_YOUR_PROVIDER_ID";

@implementation SampleViewController {
  GMSMapView *_mapView;
}

- (void)viewDidLoad {
  // Assumes you have implemented the sample code up to this step.
  [ridesharingDriverAPI.vehicleReporter
                                   updateVehicleState:GMTDVehicleStateOnline];
}

@end

    An update_mask error can occur when the mask is empty, and it typically occurs for the first update after startup. The following example shows how to handle this error:

    Swift

    import GoogleRidesharingDriver

class VehicleReporterListener: NSObject, GMTDVehicleReporterListener {
  func vehicleReporter(
    _ vehicleReporter: GMTDVehicleReporter,
    didFail vehicleUpdate: GMTDVehicleUpdate,
    withError error: Error
  ) {
    let fullError = error as NSError
    if let innerError = fullError.userInfo[NSUnderlyingErrorKey] as? NSError {
      let innerFullError = innerError as NSError
      if innerFullError.localizedDescription.contains("update_mask cannot be empty") {
        emptyMaskUpdates += 1
        return
      }
    }
    failedUpdates += 1
  }

  override init() {
    emptyMaskUpdates = 0
    failedUpdates = 0
  }
}

    Objective-C

    #import "VehicleReporterListener.h"
#import <GoogleRidesharingDriver/GoogleRidesharingDriver.h>

@implementation VehicleReporterListener {
  NSInteger emptyMaskUpdates = 0;
  NSInteger failedUpdates = 0;
}

- (void)vehicleReporter:(GMTDVehicleReporter *)vehicleReporter
   didFailVehicleUpdate:(GMTDVehicleUpdate *)vehicleUpdate
              withError:(NSError *)error {
  for (NSError *underlyingError in error.underlyingErrors) {
    if ([underlyingError.localizedDescription containsString:@"update_mask cannot be empty"]) {
      emptyMaskUpdates += 1;
      return;
    }
  }
  failedUpdates += 1
}

@end

    Disable location updates and take the vehicle offline

    Your app can disable updates and take the vehicle offline. For example, when a driver’s shift ends, your app can set locationTrackingEnabled to false. Disabling updates also sets the vehicle’s status to OFFLINE on Fleet Engine backend.

    Swift

    vehicleReporter.locationTrackingEnabled = false

    Objective-C

    _vehicleReporter.locationTrackingEnabled = NO;