The age of the smartwatch - A Challenge for Blackberry developers

People have been trying to make dicktracy smartwatches for an eternity, but it is only in the last two years that processor, comms, battery, and screen technology have been up to the challenge of actually realising one.

And they are now catching on:
Pebble: E-Paper Watch for iPhone and Android by Pebble Technology — Kickstarter
MetaWatch STRATA: the Smartwatch for the iPhone 4S & Android by MetaWatch — Kickstarter
TOUCH TIME: Digital Watch with Touch Screen by Donald Brewer — Kickstarter
cookoo; Kickstarter

A common theme, they all tout support for IOS and Android, none of them talk of Blackberry.

This is strange because one of the earliest progenitors was designed for Blackberry:
inPulse smartwatch | Features

Just as there were early smartwatches for Android:
SmartWatch | Android Watch - Sony Smartphones (UK)

Why am i bringing this up?

Because Blackberry is launching a new platform, which has a unified messaging centre at last, and yet there is a deafening silence on the subject of smartwatches.

One of the first truly useful smartwatches to emerge, in 2010, was the metawatch and they even have app support on the now defunct Nokia N9:
Application request - N9 Notification forwarding to Fossil Metawatch - Forum | MeeGo

It is an open platform, which is handy, because Blackberry's lack of interest in smartwatches mean vendors have little incentive to provide official support as they do with Android and IOS.

But, if Meego/Harmattan on the N9 can get support then the same is true for Blackberry! It just needs some interested developers (i am not one).

I think metawatch would even be willing to help, but it is going to require a little interest from BBOS10 developers:

Metawatch | Any thoughts on the potential for Blackberry 10 support (QNX)?

https://twitter.com/billg/status/266532206749569024

we've made several runs at supporting BBOS in the past. We didn't receive much support. Probably won't go down this path again

https://twitter.com/billg/status/266937683102801920

you are free to create a BBOS10 app for MetaWatch; our interface is open. Go for it!

Yes, there is a lot of self interest on my part, i am an N9 user looking for a smartphone future, and while BBOS10 is very familiar and thus tempting, I am not going to adopt a platform that hampers my ability to indulge my inner geek.

I reckon the metawatch guys and girls would be very receptive to a dev wishing to bring their smartwatch to BBOS10, but the ball is in your court..............

Take a look, i think you'll like it:

MetaWatch - Home

Regards

Before I saw recursion only in code... I'm glad it wasn't a dead one.

Sent from my BlackBerry 9900 using Tapatalk

Looks like something I can live fine without.

The big showstopper right now is the lack of Bluetooth 4.0 support. All of these connected watches depend on it, because it's an ultra-low-power protocol that won't kill their batteries in minutes.

I've actually been in touch with the Metawatch guys, and they're not averse to supporting BB10, but it won't happen without BT 4.

BlackBerry 10 devices will have BT 4

Those are different specs than the ones I've seen leaked. The L & N-Series specs I saw leaked quoted BT 3.2, with the Aristo getting 4.0.

Bear in mind that the Dev Alpha HARDWARE may very well support BT 4 (the Playbook's does, too), but I've seen nothing other than the images in your post to show that a driver stack has been written for it yet.

Why do you think that the final hardware would not get 4.0 if the developer devices have it

It has little to do with the hardware spec. The HARDWARE in the Dev Alphas may support BT 4.0, but if BB10 doesn't have a BT stack written to take advantage of it, it's not much good.

So far as I know, the Dev Alphas may physically have BT 4.0, but the system software doesn't currently support it and it won't on the first consumer phones, either.

I would love to be proven wrong on this; if anyone can confirm BT 4 support on the Dev Alpha I'll order that SDK from Metawatch and get cracking!

Originally Posted by Thunderbuck

It has little to do with the hardware spec. The HARDWARE in the Dev Alphas may support BT 4.0, but if BB10 doesn't have a BT stack written to take advantage of it, it's not much good.

So far as I know, the Dev Alphas may physically have BT 4.0, but the system software doesn't currently support it and it won't on the first consumer phones, either.

I would love to be proven wrong on this; if anyone can confirm BT 4 support on the Dev Alpha I'll order that SDK from Metawatch and get cracking!

I get what you mean. Yes it would be nice if the stack was there from the beginning.

i would be surprised if the BBOS10 devices didn't support BT4.0 from the start, it is a well established standard at this point.