[HN Gopher] Apple Watch with Android
___________________________________________________________________
Apple Watch with Android
Author : Abishek_Muthian
Score : 62 points
Date : 2024-12-16 16:15 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (abishekmuthian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (abishekmuthian.com)
| Abishek_Muthian wrote:
| Project repo is here - https://github.com/abishekmuthian/apple-
| watch-with-android .
| freedomben wrote:
| Really cool project, and thank you for writing it up so well!
|
| My first question is "why" and the post answers that well (my
| paraphrasing): because Apple Watch is more accurate than anything
| else on the market, and health can be a matter of life and death.
|
| OP is definitely an open source guy though so even if you'll
| never buy another Apple product (like myself) it's still a
| fascinating look at the current state of things!
| defenestrated wrote:
| This is beautiful!
|
| I've been using an Apple Watch Ultra with my Pixel using some of
| the same hacks.
|
| 0. I use messaging apps like WhatsApp, and Messenger which are
| multi device. So I log into them on the home iPhone. (WA
| _finally_ added 'login as companion device' on iOS only a year
| ago). 1. Pushover to get notifications from any other apps that
| don't support multi device. (Signal ugh). I used Buzzkill to do
| the pushing from the android devices. Very reliable once set up.
| 2. I use Google Voice for my calls and SMS so that was easy to
| get on iPhone. (No calls though. The watch doesn't support
| sip/voip calls except Apple's own FaceTime ugh) 3. I spent a year
| doing cellular on Watch. I joined various family members' premium
| plans of the big 3 US networks (as well asany MVNOs like Visible)
| to use cellular on the watch. I paid ~$10/mo via this route. All
| good. But I stopped early this year because I found the cellular
| reliability to be just... piss poor garbage. (This is extensive
| use across US as well as international travel in Europe and Asia)
| It really wasn't worth cellular I realized.
|
| 4. I use Apple laptops, so the "watch to unlock" feature is
| useful multiple times a day :)
| Abishek_Muthian wrote:
| Thank you for sharing your techniques, much appreciated. I
| looked out for Buzzkill type apps and couldn't find any the
| FOSS space; instead I wrote a script in Termux.
|
| Might try Buzzkill as it might be easier for those who aren't
| familiar with the terminal but I'm bit weary about the privacy
| implications especially since famous apps get acquired by shady
| actors all the time.
|
| I've added blacklist in my script to prevent notifications from
| sensitive apps being sent over Pushover.
|
| edit: Buzzkill depends upon Tasker for sending messages to
| pushover? That's a buzzkill(sorry) as Tasker heavily relies on
| GMS & not an option for de-googled phones.
| 293984j29384 wrote:
| I've been using cellular on an Apple Watch 8 for years in the
| NYC metro area and it works flawlessly.
| lstamour wrote:
| Signal can be a bit weaker on the watch up here in Canada but
| is otherwise adequate. The problem with Apple Watch cellular
| when not using an iPhone to forward data is (1) battery life
| on LTE is terrible compared to data over Bluetooth, using
| wifi, or turning on airplane mode and (2) call forwarding
| from iPhone to Watch, on some Canadian carriers, is charged
| per minute due to a carrier bug (Telus) which you can call to
| get refunded but is still frustrating. Normally calls go to
| your iPhone and the voice is forwarded to the watch over
| Bluetooth, I believe. Basically the Apple Watch more often
| acts like an AirPod than a cell phone.
|
| I end up carrying my iPhome with my Android phone to avoid
| this. I mount the iPhone to my bike/scooter when available
| using Quad Lock waterproof cases.
| twism wrote:
| wait ... what's wrong with a galaxy watch 5 pro?
| dvh wrote:
| Wait... What's wrong with dying peacefully in sleep?
| stalfosknight wrote:
| WTF is "aspiration porn"? What is it with people being so salty
| about Apple and going out of their way to paint them in as
| malicious a light as possible?
| gessha wrote:
| My guess on what the author means by aspiration porn is Apple
| sell you a product by selling you aspirations: you can be more
| healthy if you have an Apple Watch, you can be more connected
| if you have an iPhone, you can be a great developer if you sell
| on the AppStore, etc, etc.
|
| More generally, I think people's complaints about Apple are due
| to a combination of brand engineering and market dominance.
| Apple make amazing hardware, they market their products as
| premium and they price it accordingly. If they made inferior
| products, say Surface Books, nobody would care about it. If
| they didn't sell at high price, they wouldn't make big money
| which will limit their ability to innovate (or polish if you
| will).
| tonygiorgio wrote:
| This is a cool exploration. The post mentioned the health
| aspects, yet mostly goes over basic app integrations.
|
| I'm curious about how well the health features translate over to
| the android phone. Is it mostly just to track health metrics
| locally on the Apple Watch, or is there any sort of "export/sync
| to android phone" for health?
|
| I've been really curious about other open source (or at least
| reversed engineered) devices like the Colmi, and while I'm still
| an Apple consumer, prefer to track and keep things locally and
| private to myself with my own apps and scripts.
| codethief wrote:
| I came here to ask the same question. I hope OP responds!
| dcdevito wrote:
| This is a great write up on how to accomplish this, I hope
| someday Apple just allows the Apple Watch to work standalone.
|
| Having said that, the Apple Watch is the primary reason I
| switched to the iPhone (and Apple ecosystem with it). I have been
| using the watch with cellular since April 2019 and I only take my
| phone with me on the rarest of occasions (usually for events that
| I want to snap pics or video or if I'm taking a day trip or on
| holiday). I've even taken just the watch on small holidays/trips
| by keeping my iPhone fully charged but on Wi-Fi to get all
| notifications.
|
| Once I got used to the workflow I never looked back. I noticed I
| was more focused at work, at social events, dinners either the
| wife and family or friends while being more social and attentive,
| and noticed a huge overall improvement in mood and well being.
| Part of this is due to more focus on health and fitness and the
| Apple Watch certainly helped me stay motivated.
|
| Since 2019 I've lost 25lbs, gained some muscle mass, I now
| compete in friendly running races and I've lowered my blood
| pressure. The Apple Watch truly is the most important gadget I've
| ever purchased and owned.
| mrcwinn wrote:
| If you bought an Apple Watch and keep an iPhone connected to the
| internet, I'm not sure you've completely fulfilled your anti-
| Apple agenda. XD Still neat though.
|
| You might also check in on Garmin watches. They have many of the
| same heart rate monitoring (though no automated emergency SOS)
| and work well with Android.
|
| (Sorry to hear about your friend's passing.)
| becurious wrote:
| Garmin has incident detection and will send a message within
| fifteen seconds unless you cancel.
| mrcwinn wrote:
| Oh good to know! Thank you.
| pedalpete wrote:
| I thought Apple Watch was compatible with Android, just not as
| smooth to use. This is eye opening.
|
| At the same time, though I agree Apple Watch has the best sleep
| tracking (and I work in the sleep space), the difference in sleep
| tracking compared to others probably isn't big enough to justify
| jumping through all these hoops, unless, like the author, you
| enjoy doing this sort of thing.
|
| The Whoop sleep tracking is quite good, but a rather expensive (I
| think) subscription just to get data about a health function you
| have very little direct influence over.
|
| The Xaoimi Bands are inexpensive, and from what I understand,
| also have good sleep tracking.
|
| I also just came across this https://cardiomood.com/, which seems
| to be like a non-subscription, but rather expensive Whoop.
| rerx wrote:
| Do you have an opinion on the sleep tracking in Garmin Fenix
| watches?
| kridsdale3 wrote:
| I was one of the implementers of the Apple Watch (OS 1.0) CalDAV
| support. We always wanted people to be able to "bring your own
| server".
|
| You're welcome.
| divbzero wrote:
| Thank you.
|
| CalDAV and CardDAV are wonderful cross-platform protocols that
| I use every day (including on Apple Watch) and I hope they
| continue to be supported in the future.
| mercutio2 wrote:
| In practice it's unlikely you're using CalDAV or CardDAV on
| Apple Watch, those data classes are synced from your paired
| phone unless you've set your watch up as a stand-alone
| device, which is rare.
|
| One day, hopefully!
| darkwater wrote:
| Is there a way, without jailbreaking, to use that spare iPhone at
| home, powered on and connected to the internet, to run/host some
| server software?
| amelius wrote:
| Ask this guy:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42455642
|
| Apparently, the people at Apple are very open to using your own
| server sofrware with Apple hardware.
| ODW wrote:
| At present the wearables are still bulky enough that I am not
| interested in wearing or using them, despite their utility.
|
| It's probably only a matter of years before the physical aspect
| of the design becomes far less relevant.
|
| I read through another one of your posts and noticed a typo which
| you can see below. Hope this helps.
|
| https://www.spl.ing/report-card?website=abishekmuthian.com&u...
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| The Apple Watch, especially the current generation, is thinner
| than most traditional watches, especially "luxury" watches,
| which are often absurdly thick.
| reissbaker wrote:
| FWIW, the Pixel Watch 3 45mm is basically equivalent to the Apple
| Watch in accuracy according to testing by the same YouTuber
| mentioned in the blog post [1]. And it works out of the box with
| Android. Personally I also like the form factor better, since
| it's round rather than square, and unlike the Apple Watch, it
| still has a working SpO2 sensor...
|
| 1: https://youtu.be/Jr4p66vSmLY
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-12-18 23:00 UTC)