ESP Connect allows you to easily configure your ESP8266-based IoT devices to the internet. In a few easy steps you can go from a brand new device to a configured and working device. It works with ESP8266 nodes that have WiFi Manager (found at https://github.com/kentaylor/WiFiManager) to allow a straight-forward user experience.

1. You simply turn on the configuration mode of your IoT device.
2. Select your IoT device in the app.
3. Enter the credentials of the network to configure it to.
4. Tap "submit".

ESP Connect will connect your phone to the IoT device's hotspot, obtain a list of networks that the IoT device can connect to, configure it, and verify that the configuration was successful.

Why the app needs the location permission:
Android will not give access to scanned WiFi networks to an app that does not have this permission. Without it, the app will not able to access scanned WiFi networks and therefore can not find your IoT device via it's hotspot.
If your device is running Android 6 (Marshmallow) or above, you will also need to give the ESP Connect permission from within the app. A permission dialog will come up before the app scans for WiFi networks. You'll then have the option to allow or deny the permission. Unfortunately, the app won't work without the permission so it won't proceed past that point.