Pebble 4.0 Apps and Firmware Released
blog.getpebble.com
blog.getpebble.com
I loved my pebble, but when it died I decided to try something else, one of the fancier watches. I bought the samsung gear because it has the longest battery life of the non-pebble market (2 days), it's waterproof, and it looks unobtrusive. It's fine, if you disable wifi, turn the screen brightness down, and disable most of the builtins. But then I basically have a pebble with a shitty battery.
My next watch will be a pebble, because they understand the point of a smart watch.
I get 1 week with daily runs using the gps. I get 2 weeks when im not running. I actually just broke the screen while replacing the siding on my house. Reason being I wear it all the time. No need to charge it every day or so, so I forget about it.
Yet I still backed the Pebble v2.
Still, a daily charge is too often. I charge mine every other day. Do you have a watchface showing the seconds ticking by?
I think that Pebble understands better than most that, to many people, a watch is a piece of jewelry more than it is a gadget or piece of equipment—hence why very expensive watches often have less functionality and reliability than a $10 quartz Casio. IMHO, the PTR and OG Steel are the only two smartwatches on the market that really appeal to this demographic.
I think that Pebble's challenge is that the traditional watch market seems to be shrinking—most of the people I know that wear an Apple Watch or Android Wear are people that wouldn't otherwise be wearing watches, and are more interested in the gadget aspect. Regardless of hardware, I don't think that Pebble will ever be able to compete in that market; Pebble support will always be an afterthought for app developers, compared to the ease of the native Apple and Android SDKs. In my experience, Pebble is already falling behind here—the quantity and quality of apps isn't that great (though perhaps I'm missing out on some good apps because my Steel is too old?). They do seem to realize this, and seem to be actively trying to build a larger developer community.
Also problematic for attracting developers: the Pebble app store has no built-in payment facilities, and developers must resort to clunky third-party solutions (such as KiezelPay) to sell paid apps and watch faces. This might not be Pebble's fault, though—I'm guessing that they're restricted by the requirements placed on them by Apple (and perhaps Google) to be in their stores.
I don't need to order pizza from my wrist, despite Google/Apple and their marketing partners want me to.
Now, that said, perhaps you just meant Garmins in general. There are a few choices with notifications and apps, IIRC, priced close to the Pebble.
not designed to be used for more than a few seconds at once.I had a Pebble Steel (the original Steel) and it was great for a while. But when they introduced version 3.0 (I think?), which brought on the new interface I pretty much stopped wearing it. I'm not a heavy calendar user, except when it comes to work. The 3.0 update was based on the idea that users love using the calendar to schedule their days.
That one primary change took away from the simplistic interface that the earlier versions had and made the Pebble more of a chore to keep up with. I didn't want to be bombarded with notifications about tasks/meetings at work, and I certainly didn't want them showing up in the main day view. But then that single today view was mostly unused and empty.
It's pretty unfortunate, IMO. I enjoyed using it up till then. I guess I could give it another chance but at this point the Original Steel has likely reached its end of life, at least with respect to new updates.
The addition of the timeline made _so much_ sense for me. I've barely taken the watch off since (except to upgrade to a Time Steel). It's extremely handy being able to just tap a button on my wrist in order to figure out if I need to be somewhere else. In fact, the biggest frustration has been that I need to press a button; I'd love it if a watch-face permanently showed me my next appointment.
As it turns out, this new update does just that, so, awesome.
Different strokes for different folks I guess :). I'm sorry that UX change hasn't been as good for you as it has been for me.
It's hard to be disappointed with Pebble on the software side -- they've continued to make smart solid improvements with each release and backport as much as possible to the older devices. There have been a few missteps but nothing too ridiculous.
I enjoyed the simplistic interface where I could see current time/day/temp/weather and get notifications as they came up. It was nearly perfect for my usecase except that for iOS they never implemented app filtering (for deciding which of my phone apps' notifications would come through the watch).
They do have app filtering on iOS now.
The information they collect is listed quite openly in the first few sections of their privacy policy (link: https://www.pebble.com/legal/privacy ). It's pretty reasonable that the app needs local access to some of this information, less defensible that it accesses other information (geolocation information, unique device ID numbers, time spent in other apps on your phone?!) and not defensible IMO that they need to hoover it up off your phone. At least they're open about it.
Note that they "maintain log files in identifiable form for a period of time for troubleshooting and other purposes" - this is stored in identifiable form indefinitely.
The kicker is under "3. Information sharing and disclosure."
> As we continue to develop our business, we may sell, buy, merge or partner with other companies or businesses, or sell some or all of our assets. In such transactions, user information may be among the transferred assets.
Emphasis mine. Note the way this starts as if it's talking about mergers or acquisitions, then sneaks in "or we might just sell your information to anyone". This bullet point completely negates any restrictions on what they do with your data.
(Throughout an 8-email exchange with one of their lawyers, they managed to completely avoid commenting on any issue I raised, despite ample opportunity to set me straight if I was simply misinterpreting the policy. I'm left with no choice but to assume my interpretation is correct and they have no respect whatsoever for their customers' privacy.)
I wonder if there's a reliable way to ensure the iPhone app cannot "phone home" ever?
(Anybody want to make me an offer on a set of three Kickstarter Special Edition Pebbles? The original, the Time, and the new one I don't have yet?)
I've been meaning to tidy it up and post it somewhere, maybe this will give me some motivation.
(And thanks for GPLing it, I probably won't port it to iOS, but it's nice to know you've chosen to let me if I want to...)
<insert thoughts about the GPL being the best fit for truly free/open source projects, left out because it would have probably started an off-topic flamewar/>
Just for your information: our code implements the pebble protocol over BT classic, that is not allowed to run in background on iOS. The new devices (pebble 2 and pebble time 2) will use the same BLE/GATT protocol on android and iOS though: we will have to implement that too (uff ;-) ) but it will ease the life of a dev willing to port it to iOS.
That's 100% not something I'd ever intentionally sign up to "share" - which means they either opted me in without consent, or used a dark pattern to trick me into consenting to something I wouldn't have if it'd been clear it meant my watch/app was going to send all my activity/movement data to "someone" with no way for me to know what they were gonna use it for or who they were gonna share it with.
I didn't cancel my Kickstarter pledge (my third, I've got the original and the Time) - but I _very_ seriously considered it (and still might just flip it on eBay when it arrives)...
1) They accept your order without even a mention of the T&C, EULA or privacy policy (at least as far as the checkout, I'm not putting my card number in to check for a popup during the payment process).
2) When you receive the product and go to install the app, in tiny print below the signup form they declare that by signing up, you accept the T&C. (This text is visible here: https://youtu.be/GAYL034-j0I?t=1m19s)
3) By accepting the T&C, you agree to the privacy policy linked from within the T&C.
In my book, this is not acceptable behaviour.
The reason I stopped using the original Pebble Steel was due to "screen tearing" issue. It happened on my watch before the warranty expired but I had no knowledge it was a hardware issue a few months after the warranty expired. Pebble refused to replace it and rather offered me a discount on their new products.
I feel it is completely disingenuous as they want to be put in more money into Pebble for something that is inherently a hardware issue. I am quite disappointed at Pebble. The worst part was that I had a sentiment value attached to the watch. It was a gift by my dissertation supervisor on my Ph.D.
Few watches provide vibrating alarms, but Pebble's helps keep me on track during the day without disturbing everyone around me with beeps. I wrote a tiny app to vibrate at different points of a meeting so I know how much time is left without boorishly checking a clock, and the development experience was smooth.
With the Android Light Flow app, I can control which contacts for which apps can send notifications, which helps keep me aware of things I need to be aware of without being a firehose of alerts.
Before I figured out that it was the pebble, I thought it was bluetooth itself - because when I turned off the bluetooth, the phone acted normally. Which sucked because I use about 6 bluetooth devices with my phone. Two cars, headphones, and indoor/outdoor home entertainment systems.
6+ with always the latest iOS if any of you pebble people are reading this. It's been a nightmare for the past two months, what was otherwise an absolute brilliant experience up until that point. This is a pebble time kickstarter edition.
I've never had a problem with my phone locking up and neither has my wife but some people seem to have constant problems and some none at all. Bluetooth has never struck me as a particularly stable technology in general.
Pebble has been working on going full Bluetooth LE and dropping the regular Bluetooth connection. I'm not sure what the progress is on this (or if they abandoned it) but it would probably improve stability and battery life.
I'm afraid that Android Wear watches will improve on the battery life and outdoor visibility front faster than Pebble will improve on the software front.
A full charge of the Pebble Time lasted me 5-6 days.
There is no way that a Cortex-A series processor will be as efficient as the Cortex-M's microcontrollers that are being used by the Pebbles.
There is also nothing that needs the power of the Cortex-A's either, the M series are perfectly capable of doing everything a watch needs to.
I'd still prefer an Android Wear watch so I can do this natively, but until one comes out with a decent battery life and at a reasonable price point, this works for now.
Related to this, are there any other low-end (in terms of hardware; I'm thinking something cheap and Chinese) smart watches, which allow uploading custom apps to the watch itself?
So far I'm very happy they've updated the Pebble Health watchapp - it's finally usable now (and quite nice), as it display daily stats for last week in nice bar graphs. Also I have an impression that Timeline is a bit more responsive/faster now.
I'm pretty happy with what Pebble is doing (though Health interface on the mobile app could use some further rework to provide more/better information). Can't wait for the Time 2 watches to start shipping!
Doesn't seem like they put much fault tolerance in.
EDIT: Tried the Enigma watchface that came by default, it doesn't crash. I'll use this for now, but that was still quite disappointing. Contacted the developer.
I know it doesn't have all the features of an Android Wear or Apple Watch, but it does most of what I need (notifications and music control) and looks absolutely fantastic - I receive compliments on the watch even before people find out it's a smartwatch, and they're usually blown away when they find out what it can do.
The recent health additions make sense - while they don't blow me away, getting a step tracker for free is no bad thing.
But the software isn't great(unless it's wear). So I'm curious - why does nobody release a decent smartwatch is , that supports apps, and can run well on a cheap($50) watch ?
At that price point, many new users might be interested.
[0] http://www.gsmarena.com/xiaomibacked_huami_amazfit_smartwatc...
There is nothing interesting on this third wave for me personally versus what was already possible.
I see it as a solution the vendors are looking for, to sort out the increasingly stagnant sales of smartphones and tablets.
Specially in the countries where people don't switch their phones every two years, which is the majority of the world actually.
You want to know the time when you're swimming?
I don't do it competitively, just basic maintenance and general wellbeing.
Finally, it being a watch is a bonus since I will not have to remember to put it on before starting.
Regarding outdoor swimming support, the device has to support openwater swimming, because then it contains algorithms to smooth out the GPS signal (it goes off when arm goes inside water). Other option is putting the device below the swimming cap, or a swimming bouy that you drag with you.
Heart rate is a different beast. Your Polar worked below water because it used their own proprietary signal that can be recorded under water. Garmin uses ANT+ which doesn't work there.
They do have a special HR belt called HR Swim (and HR TRI for outside swimming), that pairs to device, then records HR on its own while swimming. After workout it uploads the recording to the watch which combines both data together. Only top triathlon devices support those.
I still use a lot my Pebble because, unlike almost everything else, you can swim and sleep with it (because has enough battery life). But the Samsung Gear Fit 2 does look tempting and is the only non-Pebble that can also do both.
But I was dreaming about a little more, such as rssi measurements from the Pebble itself or scannig Bluetooth tokens proximity.