3 ms·

I wish I could use a (Mac) desktop application to talk to my Fitbit. It looks like there was one years ago. (First and foremost, I'm at my computer all day lon

I wish I could use a (Mac) desktop application to talk to my Fitbit. It looks like there was one years ago. (First and foremost, I'm at my computer all day long. If it has trouble syncing, I'm right there and not going anywhere. I hate having to find my phone and try to get the data synced just to see how well fitbit thinks I slept last night. Also, would be nice to access my data from my device without involving the cloud.)

RHSeeger 6y ago
My wife bought me a new fitbit for Christmas (mine is getting old, frequently just loses it's charge, etc). It would not allow me to initialize it without syncing to my phone, which had to be running their app. I wound up returning it because I don't _want_ to run their app on my phone. I even looked into if it might be possible to work around the issue. Turns out, the fitbit, which is advertised as having a GPS, actually uses your phone's GPS. It has one of it's own, but it's apparently absolute garbage; it's inaccurate and it drains the battery extremely fast. I'm still using my barely functionalit fitbit charge 2.
- judge2020 6y ago
  Unfortunately that's the price you pay to use most devices - they need accompanying proprietary software. There doesn't seem to be a big enough market for open-standard or open-protocol health/fitness tracking.
  - RHSeeger 6y ago
    But... it doesn't. I can look down at my old, not-phone-connected fitbit any time I want and see how many steps I've walked so far during the day. Or what my heart rate it. Or any number of other things. It doesn't _need_ the phone to be able to do that part of it's job. And I don't want the "challenge your friends to a walk-a-thon" junk that does use the app.
  - nradov 6y ago
    There is a semi-open standard and protocol for fitness tracking: the FIT file format and ANT+ for wireless networking. However most devices which support those standards like Garmin generally require the use of a proprietary mobile app for initial setup. Once you finish that you can uninstall the app.
- bluGill 6y ago
  Pine64 is working on a smart watch. If you are a developer it might be worth hacking on. Just pointing this out for those in the same boat as you. Personally I hate things on my wrist and so I don't know if it is any good as I won't be using it anyway.

RHSeeger 6y ago

My wife bought me a new fitbit for Christmas (mine is getting old, frequently just loses it's charge, etc). It would not allow me to initialize it without syncing to my phone, which had to be running their app. I wound up returning it because I don't _want_ to run their app on my phone. I even looked into if it might be possible to work around the issue. Turns out, the fitbit, which is advertised as having a GPS, actually uses your phone's GPS. It has one of it's own, but it's apparently absolute garbage; it's inaccurate and it drains the battery extremely fast. I'm still using my barely functionalit fitbit charge 2.

judge2020 6y ago
Unfortunately that's the price you pay to use most devices - they need accompanying proprietary software. There doesn't seem to be a big enough market for open-standard or open-protocol health/fitness tracking.
- RHSeeger 6y ago
  But... it doesn't. I can look down at my old, not-phone-connected fitbit any time I want and see how many steps I've walked so far during the day. Or what my heart rate it. Or any number of other things. It doesn't _need_ the phone to be able to do that part of it's job. And I don't want the "challenge your friends to a walk-a-thon" junk that does use the app.
- nradov 6y ago
  There is a semi-open standard and protocol for fitness tracking: the FIT file format and ANT+ for wireless networking. However most devices which support those standards like Garmin generally require the use of a proprietary mobile app for initial setup. Once you finish that you can uninstall the app.
bluGill 6y ago
Pine64 is working on a smart watch. If you are a developer it might be worth hacking on. Just pointing this out for those in the same boat as you. Personally I hate things on my wrist and so I don't know if it is any good as I won't be using it anyway.