LTE enabled apps

[bradbomb]

I know that work:

1. MyQ for Chamberlain Garage Doors
2. Nest app
3. Starbucks
4. Messenger

Apps that get No Phone Icon:

1. Instagram
2. Twitter
3. Yahoo Fantasy

These are just what I have tried. I'm normally not an app user on the watch. I use it strictly for notifications and fitness tracking

 

[co1f]

Regarding the SMS messages - Apple must have made that stipulation to the carriers (that the iPhone still forwards them), because if they didn't - if they were sent to both, then Apple would have had to build in additional logic to test if this had happened with the LTE watch (otherwise, you would get duplicate messages - one from the carrier's server and one from Apple's iMessage server / continuity).

Considering there's no delivery guarantee with SMS, this would have been problematic for Apple to implement. (and would have slowed down SMS message forwarding).

Isn’t the reason SMS requires the phone is because the watch doesn’t have the SMS radio. Watch only has the LTE radio.
[doublepost=1506385997][/doublepost]

I was sitting at a bar last night without my phone and my watch on LTE and I got a gmail notification. Not sure how or where it got to me but it did.

You probably had your phone on a network somewhere, and your watch forwarded the notification over LTE. If your phone was in airplane mode or completely off, I don’t think you’d get that notification. The watch isn’t a standalone iPhone replacement.
[doublepost=1506387000][/doublepost]

This has been answered many times in other threads. To use the watch standalone on LTE, the iPhone only needs to be on to receive SMS text messages. You should be able to make/receive calls, send/receive iMessages and SEND (but not receive) SMS text messages.

Also, apps that use data (e.g. the watch's Mail app) should work standalone over LTE when the iPhone is powered off.

Sending a real SMS was one of my first LTE-only tests (with iPhone in airplane mode), AT&T... watch could not send SMS.
Just sat there till it failed, or I took phone off airplane mode.

 

[Apfpilot]

You probably had your phone on a network somewhere, and your watch forwarded the notification over LTE. If your phone was in airplane mode or completely off, I don’t think you’d get that notification. The watch isn’t a standalone iPhone replacement.

I can confirm that the phone was at a home with LTE on.

 

[richard371]

Email both Gmail, Exchange etc need to go through the phone first as thats how they are authenticated through the phone. Otherwise you would need a stand alone mail app like on the iPad and this would be a separate device with gmail, corporate email etc. maybe we will get that ability in a future upgrade.

 

[fischersd]

Isn’t the reason SMS requires the phone is because the watch doesn’t have the SMS radio. Watch only has the LTE radio.

Heh, no. LTE is just the latest iteration of cellular protocols. SMS has existed through most of them. The text messages are carried over the LTE network.

Apple uses continuity to deliver all of your SMS and iMessage messages to all of the devices you have (provided you configure it that way).

 

[mzanker]

Sending a real SMS was one of my first LTE-only tests (with iPhone in airplane mode), AT&T... watch could not send SMS.
Just sat there till it failed, or I took phone off airplane mode.

Yes, for some reason on AT&T you can neither send nor receive SMS when LTE-only.

 

[bradbomb]

Yes, for some reason on AT&T you can neither send nor receive SMS when LTE-only.

This is all carriers, not just AT&T. They all require that your iphone is powered on and connected to their network. Now that just means wherever your phone is. So you can leave your phone at home, work or wherever, just make sure it is on and not in airplane mode. So I can be at the beach with just my watch and my phone is at home and I'll be able to SMS/MMS as long as the phone is on. If it is off, I can only call, send iMessages, and use other data apps that are independent of the phone

 

[co1f]

Heh, no. LTE is just the latest iteration of cellular protocols. SMS has existed through most of them. The text messages are carried over the LTE network.

Apple uses continuity to deliver all of your SMS and iMessage messages to all of the devices you have (provided you configure it that way).

fischersd... how confident are you about this topic and your earlier post on this (about "Apple would have had to build in additional logic")?

I wouldn't think Apple would shy away from writing additional code to handle this. Also, while SMS can be carried over LTE... and I'm no expert in this area... I would think iphones would have to have additional "circuits" to handle basic SMS because LTE isn't always on or always available.

 

[Senfinger]

Was under the Impression that Calls, Text and Native Mail app would work over LTE regardless of Phone being powered on or off.

 

[bsb7140]

Still only have ability to make a call, send iMessage, call an uber... but all other third party apps and sms do not work. Anyone find a fix yet?

 

[Tdadlani]

Still only have ability to make a call, send iMessage, call an uber... but all other third party apps and sms do not work. Anyone find a fix yet?

Which carrier ?

 

[bsb7140]

Which carrier ?

ATT...

 

[Senfinger]

Email both Gmail, Exchange etc need to go through the phone first as thats how they are authenticated through the phone. Otherwise you would need a stand alone mail app like on the iPad and this would be a separate device with gmail, corporate email etc. maybe we will get that ability in a future upgrade.

Glad you said this... I'm still wondering why people in the forum said they were able to power there phone off and or Airplane mode and were able to retrieve and send mail.

I cannot unless my phone is up and running. Tried both Corp Exchange and Gmail with Native App.
IP6-IOS11 / ATT
[doublepost=1506453337][/doublepost]I guess mine is getting returned... Was just told by Apple that the device should send and receive email with the phone turned off. If it isn't sounds like hardware or ATT Issue.

 

[fischersd]

fischersd... how confident are you about this topic and your earlier post on this (about "Apple would have had to build in additional logic")?

I wouldn't think Apple would shy away from writing additional code to handle this. Also, while SMS can be carried over LTE... and I'm no expert in this area... I would think iphones would have to have additional "circuits" to handle basic SMS because LTE isn't always on or always available.

(worked in tech and telecom for 20+ years, including 8+ at BlackBerry).
In fact, we used to host the paging servers for several of the North American carriers (that's actually how Research In Motion started to get service revenue in the first place - the company initially made film editing equipment, then the paging boards for servers, eventually making the 2-way pagers which evolved into BlackBerry's).

The evolution of GSM has been TDMA, GSM, GPRS, EDGE, HSPA, HSDPA/HSUPA, UMTS, LTE. (think I didn't miss any of the steps).
There were very few CDMA carriers around the world - the vast majority went down the GSM route (and most CDMA carriers have since transitioned to UMTS and LTE.
While you may toggle between different revisions of GSM, you always have an active context on one of your carrier's base stations (be it on a tower, a repeater in a dense metropolitan area or in the subway in Boston) The only time you don't is when your device says that there's no service.

It also used to be that you could have a voice connection, but not data. That was usually denoted by lower or upper case on your handset (upper case meant you had data connectivity).

Paging (SMS/MMS) has NEVER been a guaranteed protocol. It's always been a "fire it and forget it" - not waiting for an acknowledgement from the other side before deleting the message from the server. This is part of the reason why other message services became so popular (BBM, iMessage) - but, also because those were always included in your data package....back when SMS was usually limited to X# of messages per month - and you paid overages if you went over your limit (just like data).

As paging isn't a guaranteed protocol, Apple can't guarantee the timeliness of delivery (if they don't receive it, they can't forward it). This also means that they couldn't guarantee that there wouldn't be duplicates if the carrier was sending these to multiple devices (as either could be lost due to coverage anomalies).

True, the networks have gotten a lot more reliable over the last 20 years - so you can rely much more on paging - but it still isn't a guaranteed delivery.

 

[profets]

(worked in tech and telecom for 20+ years, including 8+ at BlackBerry).
In fact, we used to host the paging servers for several of the North American carriers (that's actually how Research In Motion started to get service revenue in the first place - the company initially made film editing equipment, then the paging boards for servers, eventually making the 2-way pagers which evolved into BlackBerry's).

The evolution of GSM has been TDMA, GSM, GPRS, EDGE, HSPA, HSDPA/HSUPA, UMTS, LTE. (think I didn't miss any of the steps).
There were very few CDMA carriers around the world - the vast majority went down the GSM route (and most CDMA carriers have since transitioned to UMTS and LTE.
While you may toggle between different revisions of GSM, you always have an active context on one of your carrier's base stations (be it on a tower, a repeater in a dense metropolitan area or in the subway in Boston) The only time you don't is when your device says that there's no service.

It also used to be that you could have a voice connection, but not data. That was usually denoted by lower or upper case on your handset (upper case meant you had data connectivity).

Paging (SMS/MMS) has NEVER been a guaranteed protocol. It's always been a "fire it and forget it" - not waiting for an acknowledgement from the other side before deleting the message from the server. This is part of the reason why other message services became so popular (BBM, iMessage) - but, also because those were always included in your data package....back when SMS was usually limited to X# of messages per month - and you paid overages if you went over your limit (just like data).

As paging isn't a guaranteed protocol, Apple can't guarantee the timeliness of delivery (if they don't receive it, they can't forward it). This also means that they couldn't guarantee that there wouldn't be duplicates if the carrier was sending these to multiple devices (as either could be lost due to coverage anomalies).

True, the networks have gotten a lot more reliable over the last 20 years - so you can rely much more on paging - but it still isn't a guaranteed delivery.

I don't know why, but I love the history of this stuff. Still remember seeing a phone in ~2001 with data in the form of GPRS and it blowing my mind. Kind of worked in telecom for a bit and actually lived in Waterloo for a while too. Funny, when I saw your location as Kitchener and seeing the detail in your posts I was thinking you must have worked at RIM at one point.

 

[JimmyR4]

Basically none of my 3rd party apps are working on LTE if my iphone is off/in airplane mode.

 

[fischersd]

Basically none of my 3rd party apps are working on LTE if my iphone is off/in airplane mode.

It's entirely possible that these apps are still using the functionality of the original spec and relying entirely on the iPhone app to do the heavy lifting. The app vendors were encouraged to change this when the S2 Watches came out, having more apps run entirely independently on the watch.

The apps shouldn't care about which radio is providing them the data path - be it LTE, Wifi or Bluetooth. They should just request it from the WatchOS.

 

[Senfinger]

Ok... so it appears ATT and Apple aren't handshaking properly. If you turn off the phone or place in airplane mode your Native Mail App will not work.

 

[fischersd]

Ok... so it appears ATT and Apple aren't handshaking properly. If you turn off the phone or place in airplane mode your Native Mail App will not work.

Well, not certain that the mail app on the watch could be considered a full mail client (somehow doubt it) - you should message Apple.

Also remember that SMS/MMS (text) is going to the iPhone, not the watch (Apple's forwarding it, via iMessage/continuity).

Pretty sure their official stance is that your iPhone should still be on somewhere and in coverage. (it could very well be that for mail the iPhone app is sending a low-graphic version to your watch).

 

[Senfinger]

Spoke with Apple Tech today- and they confirmed that Phone calls, SMS/Imessage and NATIVE Apple Mail App will work with Phone off or in Airplane mode.

Well, not certain that the mail app on the watch could be considered a full mail client (somehow doubt it) - you should message Apple.

Also remember that SMS/MMS (text) is going to the iPhone, not the watch (Apple's forwarding it, via iMessage/continuity).

Pretty sure their official stance is that your iPhone should still be on somewhere and in coverage. (it could very well be that for mail the iPhone app is sending a low-graphic version to your watch).

 

[fischersd]

Spoke with Apple Tech today- and they confirmed that Phone calls, SMS/Imessage and NATIVE Apple Mail App will work with Phone off or in Airplane mode.

SMS and iMessage aren't the same (though both can be used by the app). You should be able to send SMS from the watch, but I'd doubt you being able to receive with the iPhone off. Hmm. Not unless they've put a time-out value in for the iPhone registration (ie, if the iPhone is off for X minutes, forward SMS to the Watch). They're both active/active, not a round robin scenario.
iMessage will work regardless, that's all Apple's infrastructure, so they can easily sort out the routing.

Edit: Also confirmed on my S0 over wifi that the mail app works fine without connectivity to the iPhone, so it should function fine over LTE.

 

[Senfinger]

S0? Did you actually turn off phone/airplane... If you just turned off bluetooth and wifi on phone it WILL still work.

But the minute you turn the phone off. the man in the middle kills it = )

SMS and iMessage aren't the same (though both can be used by the app). You should be able to send SMS from the watch, but I'd doubt you being able to receive with the iPhone off. Hmm. Not unless they've put a time-out value in for the iPhone registration (ie, if the iPhone is off for X minutes, forward SMS to the Watch). They're both active/active, not a round robin scenario.
iMessage will work regardless, that's all Apple's infrastructure, so they can easily sort out the routing.

Edit: Also confirmed on my S0 over wifi that the mail app works fine without connectivity to the iPhone, so it should function fine over LTE.

 

[acctman]

Email works on Watch LTE without phone around

 

[Senfinger]

SMS and iMessage aren't the same (though both can be used by the app). You should be able to send SMS from the watch, but I'd doubt you being able to receive with the iPhone off. Hmm. Not unless they've put a time-out value in for the iPhone registration (ie, if the iPhone is off for X minutes, forward SMS to the Watch). They're both active/active, not a round robin scenario.
iMessage will work regardless, that's all Apple's infrastructure, so they can easily sort out the routing.

Edit: Also confirmed on my S0 over wifi that the mail app works fine without connectivity to the iPhone, so it should function fine over LTE.

Email works on Watch LTE without phone around

So does mine, but have you turned the phone off and tried...

 

[fischersd]

So does mine, but have you turned the phone off and tried...

Umm..."Edit: Also confirmed on my S0 over wifi that the mail app works fine without connectivity to the iPhone, so it should function fine over LTE."

So, what are you asking? I don't need to turn the iPhone actually off when the radios are all off. Trust me, it's not talking to anyone.