My goal is to create a TODO/Pomodoro watch app (as I had on my good, old Pebble) that is always on.
https://codeberg.org/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge/wiki/Amazfi...
The following link takes you to a Wiki page about BipOS. In the wiki is all you might need to know: https://codeberg.org/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge/wiki/Amazfi...
It may just be splitting hairs, but it seems like in general those brands should be avoided, between Huawei's alleged espionage and the human rights problems these days, it feels like we should be making the minimal effort to avoid those brands.
Of course, I'm a total hypocrite writing this on a Motorola/Lenovo phone.
NSA backdoors Cisco and Juniper gear, and the United States imprisons a significantly higher percentage of its citizens than the PRC.
Who needs to imprison people when societal norms and other citizens effectively do the job for you?
Since your credit score decides where you can get housing, how much you pay for things like phone access, can affect which jobs you can get, has been shown to affect personal relationships (https://www.brookings.edu/research/credit-scores-and-committ...)
And some of the most dystopian examples in China's system apply to ours. Like if you get a ticket jaywalking and don't pay, the ticket can go to collections, and your score will go down if it does.
Not saying they're the same, but there are way too many parallels to ignore.
China has combined this with (a) 500MP camera which can clearly identify anyone in a stadium full of people and (b) forcing all citizens to present biometric information when signing up for a phone plan.
US citizens are not that far off from them...
You could sell a lot of people on 500MP cameras to detect people in stadiums "for terrorism", and in fact I'd be surprised if we don't already do something similar
After all, we already saw private citizens scanning faces at events: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-lists/future-en...
And we've actually tried to make prepaid phones require ID (which is the spirit of the biometrics)... no suprise, with the terrorism excuse: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/lawmakers-require-id-to-buy-pre...
And does it even matter if there are uncounted companies and agencies having deployed their own CCTV-networks? Traffic counting, toll-roads, security, public transportation, inner city-surveillance, advertisement displays, and sharing that information combined with the SSID/MAC-address/IMEI of your phone via WIFI/GSM/UMTS/LTE/Bluetooth and sharing that information with who knows who for whatever reason and goal?
Watch out for the blimps!
Now playing: [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kE8565_xrc (Tiga & Zyntherius Sunglasses At Night, 3m42s)
However, I think the real difference with most of these is that they're not (as far as I know) state-controlled in the U.S. even if they end up with the same result in some cases. It may seem small because the outcome may be the same but I think it's a very important distinction - I don't love the Equifax and Experian and whoever gives me a credit score but the government should be an impartial adjudicator if there's a conflict between myself and these people about the score - what makes me nervous is when the government has no culpability and not only sets the rules but also enforces them with no recourse. Not to say I don't think that this happens in the U.S., it does all the time, but it's a whole different level compared to China or non-Democratic societies.
It really is a mini-Nazi 2.0 situation and so the comparison with anything that the US has ever done is really disgraceful.
https://github.com/MNVolkov?tab=repositories
And also here on the forum (Google translate link):
https://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=1&...
But I'm worried about the data it sends back.
That being said, I have had a lot of fun learning embedded systems over the holidays and highly recommend getting a dev kit if you want a rewarding hobby that is likely to contribute to this watch coming out “for real” with a lot of fun software some time next year. Admittedly my reading list is very Rust biased, so feel free to ignore parts of it. But I highly recommend the embedded Rust “Discovery Book” [2] and “The Embedded Rust Book” [3]. Also, anything written by Lup Yuen Lee (李立源) so far has had the highest quality of all writing related to PineTime development. The only downside is that it is on Medium (yuck!), but do start with the one where he breaks his PineTime open for the first time and go from there [4]. There is also of course the PineTime sub forum [5]. Lastly, if you are new to embedded systems (such as myself) it may also be worth getting the development board that corresponds to what is inside the PineTime [6]. Happy reading and hacking!
[1]: https://store.pine64.org/?product=pinetime-dev-kit
[2]: https://docs.rust-embedded.org/discovery
[3]: https://docs.rust-embedded.org/book
[4]: https://medium.com/swlh/sneak-peek-of-pinetime-smart-watch-a...
[5]: https://forum.pine64.org/forumdisplay.php?fid=134
[6]: https://www.nordicsemi.com/Software-and-Tools/Development-Ki...
[1]: https://forum.pine64.org/showthread.php?tid=8129&pid=52537#p...
If you dont like how they implemented it you could easily write your own, the api is fairly straightforward: https://developer.garmin.com/downloads/connect-iq/monkey-c/d...
I need it mainly for blood glucose monitoring and I keep the watchface on all the time that does this.
The downside is that there is no way to stop Garmin to automatically updating the watch software and once an update broke the http callbacks causing my watchface to stop functioning. Angry comments pushed them to stop the automatic updates until the bugs were fixed and let me to downgrade the OS.
The only downside of the Garmin devices is the extra fitness sensors (gps, hrm, pulseox) which not all Pebble users might want. As a runner and cyclist myself these features are all upside, but not everybody will use them and they add to cost / size.
I can recommend the forerunner series. I have the 945 which is marketed at runners but it has the same features as their other high end devices, just in a smaller and lighter plastic case.
There really isn't anything else that I've found to fill the gap. Good battery life, well supported by an open source community, and it really just continues to work very well for my uses.
I've heard good things about the Amazfit models, but they aren't as "open" as Pebble as far as I'm aware. Keep an eye on PineTime [0], it looks promising.
I've been working on a DIY smartwatch firmware that uses the OLED version of the DSTIKE ESP32 watch development kit. This kit is less than $40 and is basically a small ESP32 dev board with a few LEDs and a mono OLED screen.
It has the following features of use for a developer: 2.4ghz wifi, BLE, 2 cores and an interesting ULP core that can actually do a fair amount of logic (such as detect buttons) while still drawing microamps, A modestly accurate RTC that survives deepsleep, An internal white LED, which as packaged can be used as a reading light, A neopixel on the front, a square wave driven buzzer on the front, and a 600mah LIPO battery, and power management with discharge protection and .
It is not by ANY means waterproof, but with some work (3d printing an enclosure and using a sealing spray) it can be modestly water resistant. At its price, you can actually buy more than 1 as backup in the event of serious water damage though.
The predecessor to this was an ESP8266-based system (a much less capable chip) for mass wifi deauth attacks.
It's a very interesting project writing a smartwatch firmwatch from scratch. Currently I'm trying to get to where I can use Rust (which I don't really know yet, so: learning opportunity) to write the core event loops I need. I won't be able to use Rust for the ULP cores (that has to be done in assembler) or OLED drivers, but I'm fairly sure the normal Rust binding generators will work fine.
I highly recommend trying something like this if you have the time and inclination. It's very fun to incrementally add features to the watch.
But also: I'm trying to work out a way to open source my work. My employer produces software for smart watches and wearable tech. Even if I don't know about that part of the business, they're kinda tricky about open source project policies.
It would be nice if it had NFC for payments though.
I find this interesting. I mean, sure, when I'm buying online, having a unified wallet is really, really nice and saves me a lot of effort punching in my credit card with each site I buy from, but in person, I don't see how a phone or watch is more convenient than a credit card; I'm carrying backup cash and ID at a minimum already, so adding a credit card to the mix doesn't really lighten my load. (for that matter, the other day I found myself without a wallet but with cash and my cellphone. I ended up in a bar that took credit cards but not mobile payments or cash. It was awkward.)
What use do you find for a nfc payments solution?
I have a copy of my ID in my phone case, and now I can get away without carrying a wallet (except when I drive) 90% of the time. I've only had issues twice in the last 12 months, and in both cases the vendor blamed their equipment for the failure rather than me.
that's... about what I'd expect, and personally, for a twice a year event, I'm carrying a backup. (for that matter, my credit card fails a lot less than that, and I still tend to carry backup cash or another card) it just seems like it would be super awkward to eat a meal and then not be able to pay.
The backup here is the "cash via phone" thing. I can use my phone to get cash out of ATM, which is not NFC based (it's an in-app thing with my banking app).
>I've only had issues twice in the last 12 months,
which is often enough, for me at least, to want to carry a backup, just 'cause it's super awkward to eat and not pay, regardless of who is responsible for the equipment failure.
(I've been using the atm-via-cellphone thing and it is pretty neat, though mine only lets me use atms branded with my bank, which diminishes the utility for emergency cash. I think mine (at least Bank of America and Chase) does involve some sort of NFC? I can start the process by waiving my phone over the ATM, which resulted in me looking like an idiot, waving my phone trying to get it to work on other bank's ATMs. Reminded me of how when I first got an electric car (not a Tesla) I pulled into a supercharger and it was... several minutes before I figured out that the supercharger was Tesla-only. )
re reading this, I'm beginning to wonder if I have a stronger than usual aversion to seeming like I don't know what I'm doing? it's not something I've really thought about before. Huh.
It's one of these things that you don't understand before you start using it. I was also sceptical about NFC payments, but it's just way more convenient than reaching for wallet and searching for a card. The same with reaching for phone for notifications. On a smartwatch paying and checking notifications is just smoother and instant. It's just a better UX.
Not the parent poster, but I don't carry a wallet. I quite often head to the store without picking up anything on my way out, with my pockets empty, buy some groceries and pay with my watch.
Usually when I'm out for an evening at a bar or restaurant, I'm out with only my phone and watch.
I find it quite freeing not to have to carry much, but YMMV: I'm in Australia, and I don't think I've seen a 'cash only' vendor in over 6 months, and I haven't seen anywhere that takes card but not NFC payments in literally years.
There you go.
I'm willing to back this project even with a Fossil HR on my wrist.
This isn't something of note now is it ? Xiaomi's watches have insane 2 week+ battery lives these days.
https://dev.fitbit.com/blog/2019-12-19-announcing-fitbit-os-...
(Disclosure: I work at Fitbit but not on any of the SDK or device stuff. This is my own personal opinion and should not be considered the official position of my employer.)
I got a replacement pebble of ebay, works great with the "solanum" app (pomodoro) and GoogleTasks for pebble as a todo list that syncs to a google account.
I have the rebble subscription as a support for the maintanance team although I rarely use the voice to text capability.
I wear my pebble everyday. Just because the company doesnt exist doesnt mean the products are useless.
you may have to track down the apk file if you are on android and dont want to use gadgetbridge from F-droid
EDIT: I extracted my pebble apk with apk extractor [1]:
size 26589168 md5 3edeeffdca616336adc27eaf6189e85e sha1 b3b3642ceaf125049eb241fee2e28f573bf2a04f
correspondingly the one on apkmirror is slightly smaller [2]:
size 26589160 md5 eb057a463e688b0f51c2820227fb0520 sha1 41ad7557920e94ab05081e7bab07f0accd759e50
I am actually surprised that the version I have is 8 bytes larger.
[1] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/axp.tool.apkextractor/ [2] https://www.apkmirror.com/apk/pebble-technology-corp/pebble/...
Just need a nice case. No, I haven't tried it myself.
There's a version on Aliexpress but it is preconfigured to be a WiFi Deauther rather than a watch.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000522565001.html?spm=a2g0o...
Edit: this one looks like a good version https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000302271246.html?spm=a2g0o...
The most interesting thing I've noticed is that because it doesn't look like a smartwatch, when I look at my wrist to check a notification, people ask if I'm OK on time. They assume it's a regular watch, and therefore the only thing I could be checking is what time it is. Kind of a funny side-effect of having a well-camouflaged hybrid smartwatch.
Could add that after the last update I was able to finally add a battery indicator to my watchface. So I had only todays date on my current watchface and when I tried adding the battery indicator the app forced me to enable location services to continue.
So I went in, enabled location services, added the battery indicator, went back in and disabled location services. Lo and behold, the battery indicator worked fine.
I don't get this obsession with location services unless they have some ulterior motive. It was equally hard to setup a fixed location in the weather app, easy to miss.
I was so happy with the Pebble Time until about a month ago when the battery quickly started deteriorating. I really miss that smartwatch. To me it's of the utmost importance to not need charging every single day and still be able to read notifications. In regards to the Apple Watch, I don't see any reason to have a high resolution image on my watch. It's a practical device.
It's sad that no one picked up the torch after Pebble.
Largely I'm happy with the Fossil HR because it's so practical. I'm sure a software update will bring me my Signal and Pushover notifications that I'm missing, in time.
They added a bunch more apps — there's maybe 40 or 50 now. The best news is that they're clearly aware that this is an issue and will presumably be adding more in the future. Some of my important apps are still missing, though they've added some important ones (Facetime, Slack, Skype).
Thanks for pointing this out!
1: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fossil-hybrid-smartwatches/id1...
Xiamoi also makes the aforementioned Amazfit series watches