Developing an App Facing an Inevitable Sherlocking

David Smith:

This week I’ve been working on a big update to my Apple Watch sleep tracker, Sleep++. While I love the app, it is a bit funny to work on. I am pretty confident that somewhere deep within the Cupertino mothership, Apple is working on their own sleep tracking app for the Apple Watch. […]

In a weird way I’ve just come to peace with this reality and grown to understand that this isn’t something that I should really fear. While the indefinite nature of its arrival certainly gives me a bit of unease, once I accepted that it was inevitable things got much simpler.

Good attitude for a third-party developer.

I think sleep tracking is an inevitable feature for Apple Watch. I’ve been wearing a Series 2 to sleep lately, and I wake up with between 55-65 percent battery remaining. I can usually get to a full charge — or close enough, like say 98 percent — just by charging it while I shower and get dressed. In my use, Series 2 does not need to charge overnight. So it might as well track my sleeping. (My problem with wearing it overnight is that it gives me stand credit for most hours — I must toss and turn a lot while sleeping.)

Update: Numerous readers have written in to say that they’ve been wearing their Apple Watches to sleep for a while, and the problem where they’re getting credit for stand hours while sleeping has only started with WatchOS 3.1.1. So it seems likely it’s just a bug.

★ Wednesday, 18 January 2017