Not on an Apple Watch. At least, not on an Apple Watch the one time we tried porting our code to it. But it’s theoretically possible to implement the algorithm on any wearable with an IMU which meets basic power efficiency requirements and which let’s you run raw C close to the metal. Apple didn’t let us run the app with the necessary privileges.
In the very beginning we wrote our software for Android smartwatches but that approach caused several problems.
Our customers almost never had an Android smartwatch already. They bought whatever hardware we told them to. We earned $0 per sale even though Android smartwatches cost several times more money for our customers to buy. Customers kept asking us to make our own devices.
Many of our customers were iPhone users. Android smartwatches do not integrate optimally with iPhones.
Google kept changing the API, the user interface and the update/installation process. They even changed the name.
Smartwatches were frustratingly power inefficient in ways we could not alter.
Manufacturers frequently discontinued the smartwatch models we used, including discontinuing software updates, which eventually bricked them.
The smartwatches weren’t standardized enough that we could write software once and it would run well on all varieties.
The problem is that no wearable platform good enough was already owned by enough of the population. As counterintuitive as our approach might seem to a software developer, it made more sense for us to manufacture our own hardware.
Is this something that can now be replicated on a sports watch or wearable via an app?
Not on an Apple Watch. At least, not on an Apple Watch the one time we tried porting our code to it. But it’s theoretically possible to implement the algorithm on any wearable with an IMU which meets basic power efficiency requirements and which let’s you run raw C close to the metal. Apple didn’t let us run the app with the necessary privileges.
In the very beginning we wrote our software for Android smartwatches but that approach caused several problems.
Our customers almost never had an Android smartwatch already. They bought whatever hardware we told them to. We earned $0 per sale even though Android smartwatches cost several times more money for our customers to buy. Customers kept asking us to make our own devices.
Many of our customers were iPhone users. Android smartwatches do not integrate optimally with iPhones.
Google kept changing the API, the user interface and the update/installation process. They even changed the name.
Smartwatches were frustratingly power inefficient in ways we could not alter.
Manufacturers frequently discontinued the smartwatch models we used, including discontinuing software updates, which eventually bricked them.
The smartwatches weren’t standardized enough that we could write software once and it would run well on all varieties.
The problem is that no wearable platform good enough was already owned by enough of the population. As counterintuitive as our approach might seem to a software developer, it made more sense for us to manufacture our own hardware.