Thoughts and ideas of a dyslexic designer/developer
Late last night my pebble watch got a firmware upgrade to version 3.0 of the Pebble software. It required a reboot and the new pebble app on my phone. I have been wanting this upgrade for a long while since I first saw the timeline feature.
My 1st gen @Pebble watch just got upgraded to pebbletime!
Need to curb my enthusiasm and go to sleep…— Ian Forrester (@cubicgarden) May 16, 2016
I’m very happy to say its a incredible interface for a smartwatch.
.@ade_oshineye @mahemoff @jonprice @einarvollset @kurtinc re smartwatches vs smartphones: "The Smartwatch Trap" https://t.co/R3Uea547aO
— Jonathan Stark (@jonathanstark) December 7, 2015
Ade tweeted this blog and I had a quick read.
I found this interesting and so true in the respects of what I think about smartwatches…
Once watch makers accept that we don’t want/need a tiny smartphone on our wrists, they’ll start making much more compelling watches. The only smartwatch maker that gets this right now is Pebble.
Just as phones serve a fundamentally different use case than tablets, watches serve a fundamentally different use case than phones. Watches are primarily for knowing things, not doing things.
Many of my friends who have the apple watch have given them up as the battery and consistent charging makes it a burden.
Funny enough theres also another older blog which I always think/talk about when people asking me about my pebble watch.
The more you have to charge a watch, the more you have to take it off.
The more you take a watch off, the less useful it is.
The less useful the watch is, the less likely you are to put it back on.
Sleep tracking is a big deal for me and that means the only time my watch gets any charge is every once in a while, as I’m in the shower. Of course this isn’t every day because most of the time I’m in the shower wearing it.
Iphone users who bought a pebble have been complaining that the pebble smartwatch’s connection with the phone is getting more and more flaky.
While on the other side the connection with Android phones is getting tighter (especially with some support for Android wear). I’m Apple are also going to/has restricted access to more apis since they want exclusive access for the apple watch.
This makes me wonder how long pebble will support the iphone?
Its great they support both operating systems but when one of them wants you off their closed platform? How long do you stay and keep struggling to support it while the walls close in, crushing your development efforts and driving your customers against you?
Food for thought, pebble?
Ubuntu’s scopes
I like ubuntu’s unity paradigms of scopes and lens, even though I prefer to use Gnome Shell as my default on the desktop. The scopes and lens really make a lot of sense. It was fascinating to see Ubuntu apply it across their phone and tablet. Be interesting to see how it works on Ubuntu TV if thats still ongoing?
Pebble timeline
When I first saw the pebble time interface, I instantly thought, when are they going to roll that across there existing line of smartwatches? If not, maybe I might invest in one of the new ones. Division of a interface by future, present and the past on a watch makes a lot more sense than anything else I have seen to date including the Apple Watch.
Android Material Design
Ice cream sandwich or Android 4.0 was a massive step up in style for Android but Android 5.0 Lollipop really was the first Android when the interaction design was thought about at a deeper level.
I don’t necessarily like the style of flat plates of colour for example the Google hangout app is just the wrong kind of green for my pallet but the interaction model is nice. Although I have spotted a few places where the rules are broken by certain apps.
I do enjoy my pebble smartwatch. Just recently it starting supporting Android wear notifications and replies, making it much closer to the other smart watches you can buy on the market but still with 7 day battery life and a readable screen in bright sunlight.
But even with that, I was thinking it would be great if they just included a microphone, so you could reply instead of using prewritten messages or emoticons. Well its almost like they heard me and not only added a microphone but also a 64 colour epaper display in their new kickstarter project, Pebble time…
I’ll be interested to see the timeline interface in daily life too.
The one thing Apples Watch announcement did this week is legitimise the sector of wearables, people are saying.
This might be true but frankly just because Apple joined the many other companies building products which are made to be warn.
I personally think the Apple watch is a little ugly and the route Apple’s taken of bundling more power into the watch than others isn’t ideal. In my mind what will define wearable is power and interface.
Although Apple may make a big deal about its interface, I have deeper concerns about the power usage. Same as I have for all the ideas to put a computer in a wearable product to be honest.
Laugh at Google Glass all you like but its limitations were actually interesting and the crappy applications all seems to be about using Glass for things it was never meant to do, like augmented reality. Wearables have strong limitations and should do one or two things really well. This is why I still like my pebble watch. It does notifications really well.
Creativity in the limitations and less is more, is something I feel Apple may have missed? Regardless, its good hear all the years/decades of other wearable tech are now legit thanks to Apple (snark)
Found via Adewale on Google+ of all places..
Watered-down smartphone apps are spreading like weeds on Google’s new wearable platform. If you want an example of everything wrong with smartwatch apps right now, just look at all the Android Wear calculators.
Since I got the pebble smart watch, I have been asked again and again why not get a Android Wear? For me besides the questionable battery life and overkill on screen size, I also haven’t seen much which makes me want one. Yes Google Now is compelling but not enough to fork out serious money.
However the questionable app question does apply across the board. There are some very questionable apps on the pebble too. They can do with looking at the recommend developer list.
Does the app provide a useful service in specific situations where taking out a phone is impractical?
Does the watch show users something important that they’d miss if they didn’t take out their phones in time?
Does the watch app save significant time without sacrificing significant functionality?
These are pretty good points… And some of the examples make sense.
Delta’sAndroid appis another example of a wearable app done right. If you check into a flight on your phone, the watch automatically provides up to date gate information right on your wrist (question two) and presents your boarding pass to use at the gate (question three).
Similarly,Allthecooks’ Android Wear functionscan save time by showing recipe instructions on your wrist. Having those instructions follow you around the kitchen makes a lot more sense than having to constantly look back to your phone or tablet for reference.
The pebble has little to no input but I have already seen apps which try and input data via a bluetooth back channel from a bluetooth headset via the phone. For goodness sake, leave it alone!
The pebble is great for notifications and to be honest I wouldn’t want to see it used for much more. Getting developers to accept its limits should be easier than Android wear but you know what people are like, push and push.
As Adewale says…
The future isn’t about trying to do everything with one device – it is about finding therightdevices to do thingsyouwant to do, and to do them in thebest possible way. Forcing an app onto a form factor it is ill suited for does injustice to both you, the concept of the app, the platform, and worst of all – your users.
Couldn’t agree more…
Bobby asked me why I didn’t get Androidware.
I bought the pebble watch from Amazon mainly because I’m a fan of eink (although I read via steve its not actually eink but rather the generic epaper) and I’m not a fan of worrying about charging items, especially things we take for granted like watches. I tried to get one from ebay a while ago but it was at that point when they started to get popular and the price jumped up. Maybe I should have backed the kickstarter at the time.
Androidware looks really good and I love the idea of Google Now on most things but to be honest, it needs to be reliable. And reliable for me includes not having to worry about charging it everyday.
I’m sure I’ll do an update of how I’m finding the pebble in months to come. But right now I’m quite happy with the notifications coming through on the phone screen. i did play with a couple of apps and I like the idea of evernote on my arm and I need to check if I can get google tasks and calendar on there too. Also wonder if theres ifttt.com support yet?