(France) Navigo public transportation virtual ticket service

alx

Hello,

The Paris metropolitan area transport authority (Ile de France Mobilités) is managing a (huge) collection of public transportation tickets. They historically come in a paper form. They are not so far from being fully migrated to NFC-enabled "Navigo" smart-cards. Since a few years, it's also possible to store those tickets on Android phones. A kind of virtualized Navigo storage, through Host Card Emulation.

A dedicated app (Mes tickets Navigo - https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.worldline.wallet), managing those "virtual" tickets needs to be installed on the phone. It is said tickets could even be used when the phone is powered off.

I've been trying to use this on my GrapheneOS phone without success. No specific error is being displayed... it just hangs.
I'd like to know if some of you managed to make it work.

Thank you in advance for sharing your experience.

treequell

alx Hi there. It works fine on my Pixel 7 device running GrapheneOS.

You can buy the tickets through the Bonjour RATP app.

There is no need to ever open the Navigo app during the process, it just needs to be installed.

When you can scan at the barrier, you just need NFC enabled, perhaps also your phone unlocked.

Where exactly are you getting stuck? Have you got as far as buying a ticket?

alx

treequell
Hi !

Nice to hear it's working for you, there might be hope :)

I was never able to purchase any ticket.

In the "Bonjour RATP" app, when I'm going to the "Tickets" feature, it immediately displays this message : "An error has occurred. Please check your Internet connection and try again."

From the "Ile de France Mobilités" app (which offers to purchase tickets too), going to the "Purchase" section displays the setup screen asking whether I wish yo reclaim old tickets or not. I select that option then a "Confiugration in progress" message appears and stays displayed for a long time. Eventually, a message gets displayed : "An error occurred. The app encountered a problem. Please try again". So many useful details. Trying again brings me to the same step.

No VPN nor private DNS with blocklists were in use during those attempts.
I'm using a Pixel 6. Bouygues SIM, Orange eSIM in case it matters.

treequell

Yeah, you should be able to get this setup and working. It's likely a configuration issue on your device with something set up not as the app expects.

Although it mostly works for me, I do sometimes get the same error as you. Sometimes because of poor internet connection but not always. I haven't been able to thoroughly test the apps so I am not sure what the different causes are but I can offer some suggestions which might help you to troubleshoot.

Firstly, try clearing the cache of the app and reopening it.

Other things which can sometimes help with problematic apps:

Install the apps in the owner profile, and not in a secondary user profile,
Having Google Play Services installed in the user profile where you have the apps installed,
Installing the apps from the Google Play Store, rather than another app store like Aurora.

In terms of permissions, I have given both Navigo and RATP the network and notification permissions.

treequell

That's all I can think of for now. Let me know how you get on and if you still don't have any luck, I can have a think if there is anything else that might help.

alx

I had cleared the cache of both IDFM and RATP apps before my tests yesterday. The Navigo app was a fresh install.

IDFM and Navigo were installed from the Play Store. The RATP one is unavailable for Pixel 6 on Play Store (and RATP replying with the usual "we can't support devices not running official Android") therefore was installed from Aurora accessing the Play Store as another device model.

Everything is installed in the owner profile. I have one additional user (not used at all nor running during the tests) and I'm using the private space.

In terms of permissions, I gave the same as you. For Navigo, I also granted reminder/alarm access.

What permissions are you granting to Play Services ? On my side : location, network, notifications and sensors. Is anything else required for NFC/HCE to work properly ?

alx

Note: IDFM / RATP/ Navigo apps are not installed in the owner user's private space.

treequell

Very strange. Your setup sounds the same as mine.

I am struggling to find a reason why it works on my device but does not on yours.

I just installed IDFM to test and I can buy tickets for my phone through that app too.

If I read the reviews of IDFM and RATP apps on Google Play Store it looks like many others complain of similar issues.