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> There's lots of road cyclists out there with $750 useless watches now. I can tell you that after this event the odds of me ever purchasing a Garmin device tha

by SCdF 6y ago

> There's lots of road cyclists out there with $750 useless watches now. I can tell you that after this event the odds of me ever purchasing a Garmin device that relies on anything 'cloud' based have even further decreased. They work offline. At least, as much as I use mine it still functions, there may be more advanced features. > Meanwhile my fully offline or local-workstation-hosted GPX based tracking method continues to work normally. You can still get the gpx files right off the watch. Apart from that, this is the classic Hacker News argument of "why do the normies rely on these cloud services it's trivial to <insert giant complicated setup here>". It's awesome that it works for you. My parents, one of whom in his retirement hacks on code that combines local drone captured data with local government LIDAR data and parses it for more accurate maps of his lifestyle block, don't have time for those shenanagins. The expectation that everyone does is folly

walrus01 6y ago
it's not a giant clunky complicated setup - it's a 15 second process once a week of transferring a gpx file from an android phone over to a PC running this: https://www.gpxsee.org/ https://www.gpxsee.org/ If I really wanted to automate it, I would use some sort of tool to do the equivalent of a cron job to scp the files from the contents of /sdcard/bike/*.gpx to my desktop PC.
- vinay427 6y ago
  You can do that offline with Garmin watches right now, along with heart rate data, and can view GPS+HR using a variety of online platforms like Strava. The .FIT files are stored on the watch itself and can be accessed over USB. The online features that aren't currently working involve syncing wirelessly with your phone and their servers, and more uniquely analytics on training (effectiveness, recovery, records, etc.) that your method doesn't seem to offer.
  - cassianoleal 6y ago
    > can be accessed over USB True, but some devices (like the Fenix 6 lineup) don't mount as USB mass storage. For those, Android File Transfer [0] seems to work. [0] https://www.android.com/filetransfer/ https://www.android.com/filetransfer/
- SCdF 6y ago
  As the other person said, all that you're doing can still be done by these watches if people want to. On your system though: what happens if your computer crashes, gets a virus or you otherwise lose the data? You should probably have a backup system right? Now you're adding more steps, and either doing a reasonable complicated 321 setup manually, or back to involving the cloud. I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, but dismissing easy to use cloud systems is just silly. Ironically I push my runs to the cloud (or clouds, as I go watch -> garmin -> strava) because it's an offsite backup that I don't have to manage. I also then export strava data and re-back it up myself, but I'm a tech nerd so that's just icing. You're also side stepping any social features. I know people who are very encouraged to exercise because they see their friends doing it, or because they get kudos / likes and praise when they post their workouts. This may not be important to you but for many people it is.
  - DebtDeflation 6y ago
    >I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, but dismissing easy to use cloud systems is just silly I think what people are really trying to say is that the Connect app should have some sort of "Store my previous n number of Activities locally on my phone for offline viewing" option. These files are typically just a few MB and my Android phone has like 4X as much storage capacity as my Fenix watch. As it stands, I can't even execute a sync between my watch and my phone right now because their cloud is down and that's just ridiculous.
    - SCdF 6y ago
      I definitely agree with this, and I also agree with others who say that Garmin's software is generally the weakest part of their offering
    - walrus01 6y ago
      Why a cloud based service failure should be a barrier to transferring files by Bluetooth or wifi between two devices in the same room is absolutely ridiculous.
    - oldsklgdfth 6y ago
BikerGolfer 6y ago
> They work offline. At least, as much as I use mine it still functions, there may be more advanced features. Not sure if "tracking an activity" only is really considered "working offline". Customization of the devices is a major functionality of GARMIN products and ONLY works with a "Connect connection". Even changing the watch face is not possible, sometimes the watch tries to "verify Connect IQ Apps" which is not possible and you have to restart the watch, to detail just two major nuisances. Not even mentioning people who bought a GARMIN device since the outage started and did not know about it - they are currently proud owners of expensive paperweights and dust collectors. Look out for many pre-owned GARMIN products on eBay in the coming days and weeks!

by SCdF 6y ago

walrus01 6y ago

it's not a giant clunky complicated setup - it's a 15 second process once a week of transferring a gpx file from an android phone over to a PC running this: https://www.gpxsee.org/ https://www.gpxsee.org/ If I really wanted to automate it, I would use some sort of tool to do the equivalent of a cron job to scp the files from the contents of /sdcard/bike/*.gpx to my desktop PC.

vinay427 6y ago
You can do that offline with Garmin watches right now, along with heart rate data, and can view GPS+HR using a variety of online platforms like Strava. The .FIT files are stored on the watch itself and can be accessed over USB. The online features that aren't currently working involve syncing wirelessly with your phone and their servers, and more uniquely analytics on training (effectiveness, recovery, records, etc.) that your method doesn't seem to offer.
- cassianoleal 6y ago
  > can be accessed over USB True, but some devices (like the Fenix 6 lineup) don't mount as USB mass storage. For those, Android File Transfer [0] seems to work. [0] https://www.android.com/filetransfer/ https://www.android.com/filetransfer/
SCdF 6y ago
As the other person said, all that you're doing can still be done by these watches if people want to. On your system though: what happens if your computer crashes, gets a virus or you otherwise lose the data? You should probably have a backup system right? Now you're adding more steps, and either doing a reasonable complicated 321 setup manually, or back to involving the cloud. I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, but dismissing easy to use cloud systems is just silly. Ironically I push my runs to the cloud (or clouds, as I go watch -> garmin -> strava) because it's an offsite backup that I don't have to manage. I also then export strava data and re-back it up myself, but I'm a tech nerd so that's just icing. You're also side stepping any social features. I know people who are very encouraged to exercise because they see their friends doing it, or because they get kudos / likes and praise when they post their workouts. This may not be important to you but for many people it is.
- DebtDeflation 6y ago
  >I'm not saying what you're doing is bad, but dismissing easy to use cloud systems is just silly I think what people are really trying to say is that the Connect app should have some sort of "Store my previous n number of Activities locally on my phone for offline viewing" option. These files are typically just a few MB and my Android phone has like 4X as much storage capacity as my Fenix watch. As it stands, I can't even execute a sync between my watch and my phone right now because their cloud is down and that's just ridiculous.
  - SCdF 6y ago
    I definitely agree with this, and I also agree with others who say that Garmin's software is generally the weakest part of their offering
  - walrus01 6y ago
    Why a cloud based service failure should be a barrier to transferring files by Bluetooth or wifi between two devices in the same room is absolutely ridiculous.
  - oldsklgdfth 6y ago

BikerGolfer 6y ago

> They work offline. At least, as much as I use mine it still functions, there may be more advanced features. Not sure if "tracking an activity" only is really considered "working offline". Customization of the devices is a major functionality of GARMIN products and ONLY works with a "Connect connection". Even changing the watch face is not possible, sometimes the watch tries to "verify Connect IQ Apps" which is not possible and you have to restart the watch, to detail just two major nuisances. Not even mentioning people who bought a GARMIN device since the outage started and did not know about it - they are currently proud owners of expensive paperweights and dust collectors. Look out for many pre-owned GARMIN products on eBay in the coming days and weeks!