[APP][3.0+] Gliderun *OPEN BETA*

[tincore]

Sports activity tracker

* ALPHA * state.
I'm looking forward for people to test and send suggestions.

Track your sports activities capturing

• location
• cadence
• altitude
• power
• heart rate
• speed
• bearing
• slope
• etc...

Plot progress, lap time and other
Set targets and receive feedback while tracking your session
Works in landscape and portrait

Audio rithmic control.

• Reproduce your music at modified tempo to match your cadence.
• Enable metronome to help with cadence.

Download or import routes.
Routes export to GPX and KML

Google earth route export *Broken*

Check compass and GPS status

Integration of sensors and wearables

• Heart rate and other BTLE sensors.
• Miband
• Ready to integrate more

Google fit integration


https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tincore.and.gliderun

 

[tincore]

IMPORTANT NOTES

The app will only discover wearables like MiBand if they are not used at the same time by another app like MiFit. You need to close MiFit for the band to be discovered.

In the case of the MiBand when you change the app your band stored data will be wiped. I'm investigating a way to avoid this.

 

[berryman13]

What does it do..?

 

[tincore]

First message updated a bit

 

[giorgis91]

How to connect with mi band? I search for devices but it find nothing
Edit: just figured it out
I have a question. After connected to my miband I tapped on the top left settings icon and I saw in the bottom of the list the option "factory reset". Is it really possible? What are the consequences? In the official app this option doesn't exist
Sent with my Nexus 5 through time and space

 

[tincore]

How to connect with mi band? I search for devices but it find nothing
Edit: just figured it out
I have a question. After connected to my miband I tapped on the top left settings icon and I saw in the bottom of the list the option "factory reset". Is it really possible? What are the consequences? In the official app this option doesn't exist
Sent with my Nexus 5 through time and space

To connect the MiBand you unpaired it first from the other app havent you?

The Admin section of wearables exposes all kind of operations. Some of them are rather low level and even should be executed on a particular order. I may hide/show all that under a setting to avoid mistakes.

Factory reset just does that. It will wipe all the pairing data.

 

[giorgis91]

To connect the MiBand you unpaired it first from the other app havent you?

The Admin section of wearables exposes all kind of operations. Some of them are rather low level and even should be executed on a particular order. I may hide/show all that under a setting to avoid mistakes.

Factory reset just does that. It will wipe all the pairing data.

Thank you for answering quickly I ask that because lot of people on an Italian forum that I know had many problems with this wereable and I thought that a factory reset could solve them.
Another question: after using you're app I noticed that after reconnecting the mi band to its official app all the data was lost. Is it normal?

Sent with my Nexus 5 through time and space

 

[tincore]

Thank you for answering quickly I ask that because lot of people on an Italian forum that I know had many problems with this wereable and I thought that a factory reset could solve them.
Another question: after using you're app I noticed that after reconnecting the mi band to its official app all the data was lost. Is it normal?

Sent with my Nexus 5 through time and space

About the data wipe. This is normal the app is setting new user data based on the personal profile.

Same with the alarms. The band, as far as I know, does not have a way to retrieve the current alarm configuration.

 

[saltinbas]

Thanks for the app. I think it very promising. I just installed the app from google play, unpaired the band with mi fit app and connected with gliderun. After connection, it stays short time as connected and disconnects after 4-5 seconds. Is there a reason you can tell? I use smartlock app and I am on cm11.

Thanks again.

 

[tincore]

Thanks for the app. I think it very promising. I just installed the app from google play, unpaired the band with mi fit app and connected with gliderun. After connection, it stays short time as connected and disconnects after 4-5 seconds. Is there a reason you can tell? I use smartlock app and I am on cm11.

Thanks again.

Sorry for not answering before. Is it working better now. There have been a good number of versions.

 

[adobrakic]

Hey, tincore. Thank you for making the app compatible with the Mi Band! Since there's a lack of feedback here for you, I'd like to leave you some general issues/thoughts/etc. If you'd like to inquire about any of my comments, or would like logs of anything, please let me know and I'll provide that. If you wouldn't mind just quoting some of my comment so I can get an e-mail notification of your reply, that'd be great!

I'm on Android 4.4.4.
- Initially, I had trouble pairing the Mi Band with the app. I unpaired my band from MiFit, killed MiFit, and attempted pairing to Gliderun. Initially, Gliderun would connect to the band, this is where band's lights light up, and you have to tap the band to 'accept' the pairing; but when you tapped the band nothing happened. However, a minute later the band connected to Gliderun as if I tapped it.
- When I connected to Gliderun, it recognized that I had 6,000 steps, but once I began walking, the app started counting from 0.
- I'm kind of confused about the 'start' function on the Activity tab. Am I supposed to have this enabled? Normally, I just go into MiFit, refresh the page for it to download the data from the band. Can I essentially do this with Gliderun without using this start function?
- On the Activity tab, is there a way to make 'empty' cells completely blank?
- Is there a way to track sleep?

Previously, I had trouble getting my MiBand to reliably stay connected with Gliderun, but now it seems to keep the connection fine. I'll start using this app daily instead and I'll check back here with any updates. Thanks again!

 

[tincore]

Thanks for the remarks!

After the band is paired once the app tries to find and reconnect to it automatically. I imagine that first time there was a problem with the connection so it connected on the retry . It *should* also syncronize itself every 1-2 hours..

About step count and the start button. Gliderun tries to combine activity and general tracking. When you start a particular activity (by clicking on start) it should count the steps of that activity. When you are not in a activity it should count those steps globally for a daily total.

To activate global tracking you can go to preferences > tracking or tap on some of the inactive dashboard indicators. Without global tracking activated you should still see some totals after syncronization with the band.

You have,at least, two steps counters the band and your phone. Each of them has an absolute step count.
"Sensor step counts" indicator shows the steps of the active step counter so depending on the band being connected or not it may toggle to your phone. I hope this makes sense.

I will add a "Blank" indicator asap.

About sleep. The app should be already tracking your sleep periods. You can see those on Global stats screen. I would like to add the deep sleep phases but I need documentation or advise on what exactly I have to look for in order to provide a faithful solution.

I'm trying now to fix a few issues to move to beta. I hope I can make a video and some captures soon.

Hey, tincore. Thank you for making the app compatible with the Mi Band! Since there's a lack of feedback here for you, I'd like to leave you some general issues/thoughts/etc. If you'd like to inquire about any of my comments, or would like logs of anything, please let me know and I'll provide that. If you wouldn't mind just quoting some of my comment so I can get an e-mail notification of your reply, that'd be great!

I'm on Android 4.4.4.
- Initially, I had trouble pairing the Mi Band with the app. I unpaired my band from MiFit, killed MiFit, and attempted pairing to Gliderun. Initially, Gliderun would connect to the band, this is where band's lights light up, and you have to tap the band to 'accept' the pairing; but when you tapped the band nothing happened. However, a minute later the band connected to Gliderun as if I tapped it.
- When I connected to Gliderun, it recognized that I had 6,000 steps, but once I began walking, the app started counting from 0.
- I'm kind of confused about the 'start' function on the Activity tab. Am I supposed to have this enabled? Normally, I just go into MiFit, refresh the page for it to download the data from the band. Can I essentially do this with Gliderun without using this start function?
- On the Activity tab, is there a way to make 'empty' cells completely blank?
- Is there a way to track sleep?

Previously, I had trouble getting my MiBand to reliably stay connected with Gliderun, but now it seems to keep the connection fine. I'll start using this app daily instead and I'll check back here with any updates. Thanks again!

 

[adobrakic]

Thanks for the remarks!
After the band is paired once the app tries to find and reconnect to it automatically. I imagine that first time there was a problem with the connection so it connected on the retry . It *should* also syncronize itself every 1-2 hours..

Yup! After wanting to view my current steps for today, I just opened up Gliderun, waited a bit, and it connected to my MiBand after a couple of minutes. I have to close Gliderun in the meantime because my phone is relatively old (HTC One S -- 2, 3 years?) so I can't have the app running all the time.

About step count and the start button. Gliderun tries to combine activity and general tracking. When you start a particular activity (by clicking on start) it should count the steps of that activity. When you are not in a activity it should count those steps globally for a daily total.

Ohh, I see, that makes a lot of sense! I'm a student for the majority of my day and don't really have any separate 'activities', so I didn't see the inherent benefit of activity mode, but that does make sense.

To activate global tracking you can go to preferences > tracking or tap on some of the inactive dashboard indicators. Without global tracking activated you should still see some totals after syncronization with the band.

Ahh, I apologize about that, I completely neglected this tab. I figured the Activity tab was more important simply because of its location. This actually looks more like how I was hoping the app would function.

About sleep. The app should be already tracking your sleep periods. You can see those on Global stats screen. I would like to add the deep sleep phases but I need documentation or advise on what exactly I have to look for in order to provide a faithful solution.

Thank you! Again, if there are any logs I can provide that would help, please let me know and I will certainly do so.

--edit--
I'm having an issue where the app doesn't seem to be updating the Global Stats tab. On the Activity tab, my total steps have been counted properly, but when I go to Global Stats, it only shows information from the previous time I synced (about 8 hours ago). I killed the app, re-connected, and re-synced, and the same thing happened.

--edit #2--
After messing around with the Global Stats tab, and switching views (24 hours/day/week), the app resynced on its own (not sure if it was a coincidence or from me switching views), and now the Global Stats tab has updated; but now it has slightly more steps than the Activity tab.

Not a big deal at all, but I figured you'd like to know!

 

[maishsk]

I just found your app. It looks very promising.

Where would you prefer to have me send the feedback.

I understood there was also a Reddit thread somewhere - I could not find it.

Thanks

 

[tincore]

I just found your app. It looks very promising.

Where would you prefer to have me send the feedback.

I understood there was also a Reddit thread somewhere - I could not find it.

Thanks

If you want you can send me an email. If it something more general or open to discussion by other people feel free to post it here.

That Reddit thread is not getting any rythm.

 

[Devo7v]

I had a Mi Band and used the MiFit app for the last couple months, but I lost the device. I've ordered a new one and I'm going to start using Gliderun mostly because of the Google Fit integration. While I'm waiting for my package I've been messing around with your app and trying to figure some things out so I'll be ready to go when my new band arrives. Here's some feedback:

• The headphone icon opens up the music controls and the audio notifications; music controls/library only works with music stored on the phone, is there any way to integrate this with Google Music? There's only a couple of apps that I've seen do this (specifically GMusicFS), but it would be nice.
• On the user screen: for any user input requiring a number (weight, height, goals, etc.) you have a scrolling number which is nice from a UI perspective, but when I have to enter any of these values for the first time, scrolling is very tedious. This is particularly brutal when I'm trying to set up a goal for the first time, I have to scroll all the way from 0 to 8,000. There should be a way to manually input a number using an on-screen keyboard as well. It also looks like the goal is limited to 20,000 steps, theoretically this should be unlimited.
• User profile: I have my units set to imperial. When inputting my height for the major intervals you might want to make the height max out at 7-ft just in case. For the minor intervals, you should put the unit next to the number (inches) and I would limit the user to discrete numbers 1 through 12. I'm not sure how you're calculating height, but the way you have it set up it is very hard for a user to input their height in imperial units. For example: I am 6-ft 2-inches, in order to input my height I have to calculate how many hundredths of a foot 2-inches is. So in my case 2/12=.16666. The average person isn't going to do this and is going to give up when you can't just enter 6-ft 2-inches.
• The compass UI needs a little work, it isn't quickly evident where north is. I would prefer a more traditional looking compass (maybe something similar to this). Also, for some reason my altitude is always blank.
• Synchronize: I have the first three options enabled for Google Fit integration. The app always says disconnected, when I press the synchronize button it changes to connected, but I don't think anything is actually being synced. There should be some sort of progress bar when synchronizing with Google Fit so the user knows it's actually working. In my case I don't think it's working at all. I've enabled the option to download tracked activities from GFit, but nothing ever shows up in the stats.
• In the settings, General: I would make an expert section to the settings menu that has to be manually activated and move Optimize track points and Recalculate calories there. Also for any option where you could be deleting or modifying data (everything under the "Other" section) I would have a confirmation dialog box pop up. That way if somebody accidentally presses one of those options they don't completely wipe out all there data.
• In the settings, Audio: I would either explain the difference between Audio engine A and B or give the user an option to play example audio. Similar to how you have the option to "Listen to an example" of text-to-speech output in the main android settings.
• In the settings, Notification: I think there needs to be a little more configuration for notifications. I really like the way the Notification version of the MiFit app allowed you to set the colors for the LEDs on the Mi Band as well as the number of times it vibrated and the number of times the LED blinked. I know this is a beta version, but I think a little more work needs to be done in this particular area if you want users to switch from the MiFit app. Being able to tell what app I'm getting a notification from just by looking at the band is extremely useful and it's going to make switching hard without it. I don't want to say you should copy the Notification settings screen from the MiFit app, but it has been implemented very well.
• Settings: somewhere you need to provide Help information. For most of the options I'm not sure exactly what they're supposed to do, maybe have a ?-button next to the option that the user can press that will pop up a longer description of exactly what the option does.
• Any thoughts on providing a dark theme as well? Just something simple where you change the background to black and the text to white, the green color should look good with both a dark and light background.
• I saw you have sleep tracking on the list of things to improve upon, really looking forward to that. The MiFit app and Sleep as Android app provide a very clean UI for visualizing your sleep. I would try to implement something similar. I'm sure you've seen it, but this thread might have some hints on how to better pull the sleep data from the MiBand.

I know I wrote a lot, but you have done great work with this app in the short amount of time you've been developing it. I can't wait to see how this app progresses because I think you've got a really good app here. The design looks very good and polished it just needs a few tweaks here and there. Once I get my new Mi Band I'll provide some more feedback.

Keep up the great work. If you want to discuss any of this more I would be more than happy to do so.

 

[tincore]

Thanks for all that feedback! I add everything to my list. Will tackle the more important stuff first.

About audio.
I may eventually add a fallback into system players. The player provides a rythm guidance for your exercise by adjusting the playback rate to your desired cadence so it is rather specific. it is custom built.

About scrolling. If you tap you do not need to scroll. You can enter the number directly. This is NumberPicker standard. I may have missed one or two fields though.

I will increase the daily goals to something in the ultramarathon range.

About imperial input. You are absolutely right. Will change it soon..

I will see what I can do with the compass. It is all a matter of priorities.

Altitude comes from GPS.

GFit issue is a glitch too. Click sync again. I'm now focusing more on FitnessSyncer as it is much more powerful.

Sleep tracking is working. You can see it on Daily Stats. It may need some tweaking though. The band does not really export sleep data so I had to write the algorithms myself and I've already noticed a couple of issues.

Also the custom notifications is a great idea. I have to fit that into a general API. The app is meant to integrate other bands. Just need to get some samples.

I had a Mi Band and used the MiFit app for the last couple months, but I lost the device. I've ordered a new one and I'm going to start using Gliderun mostly because of the Google Fit integration. While I'm waiting for my package I've been messing around with your app and trying to figure some things out so I'll be ready to go when my new band arrives. Here's some feedback:

• The headphone icon opens up the music controls and the audio notifications; music controls/library only works with music stored on the phone, is there any way to integrate this with Google Music? There's only a couple of apps that I've seen do this (specifically GMusicFS), but it would be nice.
• On the user screen: for any user input requiring a number (weight, height, goals, etc.) you have a scrolling number which is nice from a UI perspective, but when I have to enter any of these values for the first time, scrolling is very tedious. This is particularly brutal when I'm trying to set up a goal for the first time, I have to scroll all the way from 0 to 8,000. There should be a way to manually input a number using an on-screen keyboard as well. It also looks like the goal is limited to 20,000 steps, theoretically this should be unlimited.
• User profile: I have my units set to imperial. When inputting my height for the major intervals you might want to make the height max out at 7-ft just in case. For the minor intervals, you should put the unit next to the number (inches) and I would limit the user to discrete numbers 1 through 12. I'm not sure how you're calculating height, but the way you have it set up it is very hard for a user to input their height in imperial units. For example: I am 6-ft 2-inches, in order to input my height I have to calculate how many hundredths of a foot 2-inches is. So in my case 2/12=.16666. The average person isn't going to do this and is going to give up when you can't just enter 6-ft 2-inches.
• The compass UI needs a little work, it isn't quickly evident where north is. I would prefer a more traditional looking compass (maybe something similar to this). Also, for some reason my altitude is always blank.
• Synchronize: I have the first three options enabled for Google Fit integration. The app always says disconnected, when I press the synchronize button it changes to connected, but I don't think anything is actually being synced. There should be some sort of progress bar when synchronizing with Google Fit so the user knows it's actually working. In my case I don't think it's working at all. I've enabled the option to download tracked activities from GFit, but nothing ever shows up in the stats.
• In the settings, General: I would make an expert section to the settings menu that has to be manually activated and move Optimize track points and Recalculate calories there. Also for any option where you could be deleting or modifying data (everything under the "Other" section) I would have a confirmation dialog box pop up. That way if somebody accidentally presses one of those options they don't completely wipe out all there data.
• In the settings, Audio: I would either explain the difference between Audio engine A and B or give the user an option to play example audio. Similar to how you have the option to "Listen to an example" of text-to-speech output in the main android settings.
• In the settings, Notification: I think there needs to be a little more configuration for notifications. I really like the way the Notification version of the MiFit app allowed you to set the colors for the LEDs on the Mi Band as well as the number of times it vibrated and the number of times the LED blinked. I know this is a beta version, but I think a little more work needs to be done in this particular area if you want users to switch from the MiFit app. Being able to tell what app I'm getting a notification from just by looking at the band is extremely useful and it's going to make switching hard without it. I don't want to say you should copy the Notification settings screen from the MiFit app, but it has been implemented very well.
• Settings: somewhere you need to provide Help information. For most of the options I'm not sure exactly what they're supposed to do, maybe have a ?-button next to the option that the user can press that will pop up a longer description of exactly what the option does.
• Any thoughts on providing a dark theme as well? Just something simple where you change the background to black and the text to white, the green color should look good with both a dark and light background.
• I saw you have sleep tracking on the list of things to improve upon, really looking forward to that. The MiFit app and Sleep as Android app provide a very clean UI for visualizing your sleep. I would try to implement something similar. I'm sure you've seen it, but this thread might have some hints on how to better pull the sleep data from the MiBand.

I know I wrote a lot, but you have done great work with this app in the short amount of time you've been developing it. I can't wait to see how this app progresses because I think you've got a really good app here. The design looks very good and polished it just needs a few tweaks here and there. Once I get my new Mi Band I'll provide some more feedback.

Keep up the great work. If you want to discuss any of this more I would be more than happy to do so.

 

[Devo7v]

Thanks for reading through my comments:

About audio.
I may eventually add a fallback into system players. The player provides a rythm guidance for your exercise by adjusting the playback rate to your desired cadence so it is rather specific. it is custom built.

The current implementation is good, it was more of a wish list item.

About scrolling. If you tap you do not need to scroll. You can enter the number directly. This is NumberPicker standard. I may have missed one or two fields though.

You're right I don't know how I missed that, apparently I've been using Android wrong this whole time.

I will increase the daily goals to something in the ultramarathon range.

I honestly would remove scrolling completely from the goals and just leave it as user input. I don't know if scrolling is very useful when we're talking about differences in thousands of steps.

About imperial input. You are absolutely right. Will change it soon..

Thanks

I will see what I can do with the compass. It is all a matter of priorities.

I don't see this as a priority, it was just a suggestion. Feel free to put this at the bottom of your list.

Altitude comes from GPS.

Apparently I was just in a bad location at the time. However it is reporting a different altitude than GPS Test. Gliderun shows me at an altitude of 119ft whereas GPS Test shows me at an altitude of 233 ft so I'm not sure what is going on. Is there some sort of log I can provide?

GFit issue is a glitch too. Click sync again. I'm now focusing more on FitnessSyncer as it is much more powerful.

I don't personally use FitnessSyncer, but I'm sure there are a lot of people who do. Looking forward to GFit integration. One quick question: once GFit is fully integrated, will I be able to sync all the data I collect with Gliderun or is there a limit on how far back I can go? Likewise will I be able to import all of my past GFit data into Gliderun?

Sleep tracking is working. You can see it on Daily Stats. It may need some tweaking though. The band does not really export sleep data so I had to write the algorithms myself and I've already noticed a couple of issues.

As I mentioned, I don't have my new Mi Band yet so I can't test sleep tracking yet. When I get it, I'll give you some more detailed thoughts on it.

Also the custom notifications is a great idea. I have to fit that into a general API. The app is meant to integrate other bands. Just need to get some samples.

The detailed control over notifications is the one thing I'm going to miss the most from the MiFit app. Hopefully it's not too much trouble to add these controls. The only thing I can think of to figure out how to add these controls would be to decompile the Notification version of the MiFit app or see if the api calls on this website are useful.

The more we talk and the more I mess around with the app the more I'm liking it.

 

[tincore]

Thanks again for all the valuable input!

Thanks for reading through my comments:

You are not the first one having trouble with the NumberPickers. I think they are not very well designed. I do not find the field edition intuitive either. Most of the time I forget to click accept so I lose the edition. Maybe I'm doing something wrong.

I honestly would remove scrolling completely from the goals and just leave it as user input. I don't know if scrolling is very useful when we're talking about differences in thousands of steps.

Yes. The plan is at least to space them in 100 or 250 units

Apparently I was just in a bad location at the time. However it is reporting a different altitude than GPS Test. Gliderun shows me at an altitude of 119ft whereas GPS Test shows me at an altitude of 233 ft so I'm not sure what is going on. Is there some sort of log I can provide?

At the moment I'm just showing the Altitude reported by GPS and I think that it has to be corrected by a complex calculation that can be retrieved from a webservice. That may be the issue.

I don't personally use FitnessSyncer, but I'm sure there are a lot of people who do. Looking forward to GFit integration. One quick question: once GFit is fully integrated, will I be able to sync all the data I collect with Gliderun or is there a limit on how far back I can go? Likewise will I be able to import all of my past GFit data into Gliderun?

Last time I tried it I could upload and download all gliderun data. I found GFit rather odd. Up to now it is unclear to me when it really uploads the data to the servers making it is visible from the web or other device. Also you do not retrieve exactly what you save.

As I mentioned, I don't have my new Mi Band yet so I can't test sleep tracking yet. When I get it, I'll give you some more detailed thoughts on it.

Sleep periods seem rather accurate. Still I have to do something to detect short sleep interruptions. Phases analysis is there too although I think that it has to be taken with a pich of salt. (Not only in this app)

The detailed control over notifications is the one thing I'm going to miss the most from the MiFit app. Hopefully it's not too much trouble to add these controls. The only thing I can think of to figure out how to add these controls would be to

It is no real trouble. I will add that rather soon (I hope)..

 

[bews]

Hey Tincore

I think you have done some really great work on the app .. but when I tried to use it yesterday I got a bit confused (maybe you can help me out here).

I couldn't actually see where my step count was being shown. I was assuming it would be on the activity screen but it just didn't seem to update. Is there a way to force a refresh of the count? The only time the app seemed to update was when I reconnected my miband.

The update to fitnesssyncer worked well .. is there anyway to have it automatically sync (either time period or when you open the app possibly)?

I found a spelling mistake as well Where you add your weight and waist, chest, hip sizes there is a "thight" measurement (im guessing its meant to be thigh).

Thanks for your hard work!