Hacker News Reader

Comment by ARussell | Hacker News Reader

This is unfortunate. I have their alarm and find it quite useful. It's nice being woken up at a decent time in my sleep cycle rather than having to hit the snooze button so often because I was woken from a deep sleep. Are there any alternatives?

I'm probably hoping too much if I want them to give me a way to root my Sense as well as an open source version of their server software I can run and point my Sense to.

View on HN

Given that they never released the open API or data access they promised on kickstarter, I wouldn't expect anything from them.

This is a bit of a blow - I love my sense, both for the insights into my sleep pattern, but also for the alarm. It's also nicely designed and unobtrusive on my bedside table.

I'm with you on hoping that they open it up to allow for a private server. If that happened then I'd be tempted to write a new iPhone app for it, it won't be long before the existing app will need updating to work with new iOS versions (Although it seems to work fine with 11). That being said, I'm not incredibly optimistic of a release of either a rooted firmware or protocol spec. It's a shame, it had real potential, it makes me wonder if it failed due to poor marketing or just too shallow a customer pool for this sort of device.

If they had the ability to use a private server, I'd have bought one when it was on Kickstarter. Looked genuinely useful.

I've been using a Pebble Time and the "Sleep as Android" app for this. With the addition of Tasker, my setup also auto-pauses anything I might be listening to when it detects I've entered REM sleep. Great for falling asleep to audiobooks or podcasts.

Have you tried the Sleep Cycle app (https://www.sleepcycle.com/)? They support both iOS and Android.

Not the GP -- I've been using Sleep Cycle for exactly 852 nights. It was of immense help developing sleep hygiene. Now I'm waking up before the alarm, which I believe might make more sense if your take an evolutionary perspective. I'm still using the app, as I've wondered if I could do something interesting with this data.

It's unfortunate that Hello are shutting down. I was thinking into buying Sense for my bedroom, despite that I'm using different app, mostly because the aesthetics.

Aren't you afraid of radiation at all? I've used this app for a few months, but actually stopped because I didn't like having the device so close to my head for such a long period of time.

If you're worried, engage Airplane mode.

I'm enabling airplane mode ~30 minutes before sleep, which is part of my sleep ritual; no notifications and no radiation.

You shouldn't be. It's low power, non-ionizing radiation. It's not going to cause you any harm.

Why does this affect your device? Is it not calculating everything locally?

I don't believe so. Alarms etc are (I suspect) stored locally, but to enact a change on the device I believe it has to send it upstream via the phone app and the device then retrieves the changes.

So when the service is shut down my expectation is that I won't be able to change any of my device settings. Not to mention that the room data and sleep data will be unavailable.

Ah, in that case I feel no pity. Why would anyone buy a device like that is beyond me.

This is the exact reason I don't really like cloud connected IoT devices. For instance, while I'd love to have a Nest thermostat, I refuse to us it due to requiring a connection to function fully. So I've opted instead for a 'dumb' thermostat with WiFi and an open and well-documented local API. About the only current exception to that in my house is my Amazon Echo, and that will be replaced as soon as someone comes out with a viable local-only alternative.

I don't mind cloud connected devices, what I stay away from are cloud-required devices.

Open APIs and the option to run a private server are great, but the device should retain some bit of functionality if there's no network.

Yeah, I agree. I will always give preference for devices that fully function without internet access. For instance, the Venstar thermostat I use has a cloud component where you can track stats and remote control the device if you want, but it's 100% optional and the device loses no functionality, beyond the on-device weather, when there is no internet access. The local APIs allow me to easily integrate it with my HA controllers as well.

Apparently not. You need their app to set the device up (i.e. connect the device to the WiFi, and pair the bluetooth sensor(s) to the device).

The app only communicates with the Sense device via bluetooth when setting up its WiFi connection, everything else goes through a web API to the company's servers.

I haven't tried, but now I wonder if the alarm even works without an internet connection.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com