This weekend I built the watch app for Obtain. I still need to work on the complication, but I finished up the icon, interface and all the connectivity between it and the phone.

With the watch app I am keeping it simple. It displays your current weight, goal progress and the ability to add a new weight from the watch. I feel a lot of apps try to cram in too much info into their watch apps, which causes the app to take longer to load and in turn stops people from wanting to use it. Luckily my app itself was already simple, so simplifying the watch app was easy.

All in all there are only 5 variables that I need on the watch:

• Current weight
• Current goal (Next marker or main goal if Pro isn’t unlocked)
• Start weight for the goal (either your start weight or last goal)
• Weight type (pounds, stones, kilograms)
• And if Pro was purchased (which is required to add a weight from the watch)

For now, I decided to store all these items in UserDefaults rather then bringing over CoreData or any other type of data management. In my opinion with 5 items anything else would be overkill.

All that being said. It was a blast to work on the watch app this weekend. The watch is still my favorite Apple device. Sadly, I haven’t had many chances to work on the watch so making one for Obtain was a high priority. As I stated before I still need to work on the complications and hope to finish them next weekend 🤞. I’ve never done them before so looking forward to learning something new. 🤓

Below is a short video of the watch and iPhone app doing their thing.

This weekend I built the watch app for Obtain. I still need to work on the complication, but I finished up the icon, interface and all the connectivity between it and the phone.

With the watch app I am keeping it simple. It displays your current weight, goal progress and the ability to add a new weight from the watch. I feel a lot of apps try to cram in too much info into their watch apps, which causes the app to take longer to load and in turn stops people from wanting to use it. Luckily my app itself was already simple, so simplifying the watch app was easy.

All in all there are only 5 variables that I need on the watch:

• Current weight
• Current goal (Next marker or main goal if Pro isn’t unlocked)
• Start weight for the goal (either your start weight or last goal)
• Weight type (pounds, stones, kilograms)
• And if Pro was purchased (which is required to add a weight from the watch)

For now, I decided to store all these items in UserDefaults rather then bringing over CoreData or any other type of data management. In my opinion with 5 items anything else would be overkill.

All that being said. It was a blast to work on the watch app this weekend. The watch is still my favorite Apple device. Sadly, I haven’t had many chances to work on the watch so making one for Obtain was a high priority. As I stated before I still need to work on the complications and hope to finish them next weekend 🤞. I’ve never done them before so looking forward to learning something new. 🤓

Below is a short video of the watch and iPhone app doing their thing.

My original goal for my April resolution was to finish and publish a personal App in the AppStore. My initial thought was a simple Disney app for tracking a few things while on your trip, but at the end of January a weight tracking app came to mind and I quickly switched gears and built a good 60% of the app in less then a couple weeks.

The only thing I really miss from my pre-iOS 11 life was Weightbot by Tapbots (the creators of Tweetbot), I loved that app and continued to use it even though it was never updated for the iPhone 5 screen. It was quick and great at showing me my current weight and the amount I lost since my last weigh-in, amazingly enough a lot of other apps don’t show you what you recently lost.

But just having an app with that wasn’t going to be enough, every app I’ve used in the past has you input 2 major things, your start weight and your goal weight. For me sadly these 2 numbers are usually pretty far off, so I usually lower my goal weight to something a little more obtainable and once I hit it, I change it to my next obtainable weight. So with the app I am building you’ll have you Main Goal and Mini Goals weight options. I am sure there are a few apps that do this, but I haven’t seen any and honestly, didn’t bother looking too hard, cause I had an idea and just wanted to build it.

I originally planned to have this app done by Mid-February 🤦🏻‍♂️, But instead I got it usable enough and started using it. During that time I have lost over 50lbs, I am not crediting the app for it all, I’ve made some better life choices, but the app has played a part and I have enjoyed using it to see my progress. But with focusing on health and a couple job changes. I fully just stopped working on the app until about a month ago. I’ve made some great progress during my nights and weekends and currently planning to finish it up in the next week or so. I am doing all design 😱 and code myself. The design is definitely out of my comfort zone, but its been fun.

I am super excited about finally finishing this app up. Mainly just to have my own app in the AppStore again. I haven’t had one available in over 7 years now. I’ll try to post more on here soon about it once I finish up the last couple features and add some more polish.

So the big announcement is about 12 hours away. And one of my main concerns is not the price, but the durability of the watch itself.

I have been wearing a smart device (mostly fitness) of some sort since 2011 with the first Jawbone UP.

Ignore the first UP, it had major issues. I have had the other 2 iterations, a Nike FuelBand, Fitbit Flex & Force, and the Pebble Steel.

One thing that all of these devices have in common is they all broke on me and had to be replaced multiple times (other than the recalled force, only had it for a couple weeks). I am not an extremely active person. I’m a computer programmer that spends most of his time in front of a computer, yet I have had all these issues with these wearable devices.

I believe that if anyone can get something right the first time it would be Apple, but I still worry about the durability of a daily device that is covered in glass and worn on my wrist.  I guess only time will tell, but I am personally hoping that there will be an AppleCare option for it.

Device kill count:

• UP – too many to remember
• Nike FuelBand – 3
• Fitbit Flex – 2 bands
• Pebble Steel – 4