Apps Third-Party Watch Apps Suck...

[brinary001]

I love my apple watch that I just got a little over a week ago, but my one and only complaint has been how awful the third-party apps are. They NEVER load. I just see a rotating symbol indefinitely. The only ones that seem to be immune to this issue are the ones updated to OS2 for native support.

I was realistic upon purchasing this thing that it's a first-gen product with a lot of kinks to work out from everyone involved, but come on. I essentially have a glorified notification checker on my wrist right now. Has anyone else had this problem? Is it user error? I'm willing to swallow my pride if it's something on my end. I just want this issue resolved.

 

[LiemTa]

My app fares well.

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...omplications-time-travel-force-touch.1921985/

The initial view controller uses as little memory and initialization as possible to ensure smooth load times. But really, your apps don't load because the OS part of watchOS2 is shoddy.

 

[brinary001]

So you're saying the apps aren't loading because they're demanding too much memory?

 

[TrueBlou]

I think to say they all suck and they never load is perhaps a little unfair.

I've just checked one of my apps, and even though I've not updated it for OS2 yet, the watch app is up and running and completely functioning in less than 3 seconds. That's from a cold start, after I launched it once and faffed about with some other apps, let the watch go back to the watch face and left it for a while, it was up and running faster than I could start the countdown, so lets say a second.

Try it for yourself if you like, it's free now (not limited, no IAP's, no adverts, nada, just free) here's the MacRumors post: Waum, Multi function calculator and converter


But I will agree that there is a lot of work to be done on a lot of apps, there are so many that just frustrate me to the point where I delete them and be done with it.

I'm sure in time the developers, we developers, will improve upon existing functionality greatly now that OS2 is out. Although I guess some will never be updated for a variety of reasons.

 

[sean000]

It's unfair to lump them all together. Some of my third party apps are quite quick to load... most notably is Fantastical. Most of the third party apps I use regularly are quick enough to load, but sometimes they do take too long (even requiring me to reactivate the display). A few I have tried were regularly slow so I removed them.

Once we start seeing more apps that run natively on the watch, the performance of these apps should improve. I hope some of my favorite apps release native versions soon!

Sean

 

[brinary001]

Of course I didn't mean to throw them all under the bus. But because an overwhelming majority of them are so unresponsive (in my case at least 90%), I feel no guilt in generalizing to the extent that I have. There are some diamonds in the rough sure, but they're far too rare to say this device is revolutionary or life changing as Tim Cook has put it many times before. I'd go as far to say the watch is nifty, but that's about it.

 

[sean000]

Of course I didn't mean to throw them all under the bus. But because an overwhelming majority of them are so unresponsive (in my case at least 90%), I feel no guilt in generalizing to the extent that I have. There are some diamonds in the rough sure, but they're far too rare to say this device is revolutionary or life changing as Tim Cook has put it many times before. I'd go as far to say the watch is nifty, but that's about it.

I'd say most I have tried are acceptable, but our thresholds for patience might differ. Even with app loading delays I would absolutely call the Apple Watch revolutionary. It provides dozens of little conveniences to me throughout the day, and the once incessant (but necessary) chiming of reminders and notifications from my iPhone have been replaced with far less annoying silent taps on the wrist that I can easily snooze, dismiss or act on without getting my phone out. Since I no longer need my iPhone as much throughout the day, I only get it out when I really need it. I believe this has cut down on the amount of time I spend being distracted by randomly browsing content because the iPhone invites me to stay awhile. The watch is all about distilling what is important down to quick glances that I can easily hand off to my iPhone for those rare times when a glance isn't enough. So yeah... after 11 weeks of wearing one I would absolutely say it has dramatically changed the way I interact with my technology.

I will be the first to say it isn't for everyone though. You might like it more after we see more third party apps that run natively. You might not.

Sean

 

[brinary001]

I'd say most I have tried are acceptable, but our thresholds for patience might differ. Even with app loading delays I would absolutely call the Apple Watch revolutionary. It provides dozens of little conveniences to me throughout the day, and the once incessant (but necessary) chiming of reminders and notifications from my iPhone have been replaced with far less annoying silent taps on the wrist that I can easily snooze, dismiss or act on without getting my phone out. Since I no longer need my iPhone as much throughout the day, I only get it out when I really need it. I believe this has cut down on the amount of time I spend being distracted by randomly browsing content because the iPhone invites me to stay awhile. The watch is all about distilling what is important down to quick glances that I can easily hand off to my iPhone for those rare times when a glance isn't enough. So yeah... after 11 weeks of wearing one I would absolutely say it has dramatically changed the way I interact with my technology.

I will be the first to say it isn't for everyone though. You might like it more after we see more third party apps that run natively. You might not.

Sean

I agree it has completely transformed how I interact with my iPhone, especially on a native app basis. I now primarily use my email accounts through Apple's own provided app instead of Google's alternatives just so I can read full emails on my watch.

I also just wanted to say that I restored my watch and most of my apps are behaving quite well now. So I will take some blame on behalf of user error. However, I still stand by my original sentiment that, well, most apps just suck. And every party involved is to blame. Devs aren't dedicated enough to the device (I'll give the indies some leeway here), Apple just now started being more liberal with what they can do with it, and customers aren't demanding enough out of either.

 

[sean000]

I agree it has completely transformed how I interact with my iPhone, especially on a native app basis. I now primarily use my email accounts through Apple's own provided app instead of Google's alternatives just so I can read full emails on my watch.

I also just wanted to say that I restored my watch and most of my apps are behaving quite well now. So I will take some blame on behalf of user error. However, I still stand by my original sentiment that, well, most apps just suck. And every party involved is to blame. Devs aren't dedicated enough to the device (I'll give the indies some leeway here), Apple just now started being more liberal with what they can do with it, and customers aren't demanding enough out of either.

I'm glad your watch is working better now! Sounds like you might have been experiencing unusually long delays. I will say that I have had some issues (longer than usual delays, Siri not waking up or working well, etc.) resolve by restarting the watch. Fortunately I have not needed to do a reset and restore. Speaking of email... the Outlook app is one of those that works quite well on the watch. Since my office uses Office 365, I can read and respond to email via the Outlook app.

Where we are with watch apps reminds me of the iPhone 3G days. A lot of developers just wanted to get their product in the app store first, and then improve them via updates. A lot of those early apps were not very polished, (some were just hastily ported over PalmOS apps). At least the iPhone was the platform that developers prioritized so the apps quickly improved, and Android users often had to wait to see the same apps or features. I am patiently waiting for my favorite watch apps to go native or to add complications. Whenever I check the app store and I see an update for one of those apps, I am frequently disappointed to see that the update focuses on new features for iOS 9 or the iPhone 6s... but nothing new for the watch. Now I know how Android users must have felt back in the 3G days

 

[brinary001]

I'm glad your watch is working better now! Sounds like you might have been experiencing unusually long delays. I will say that I have had some issues (longer than usual delays, Siri not waking up or working well, etc.) resolve by restarting the watch. Fortunately I have not needed to do a reset and restore. Speaking of email... the Outlook app is one of those that works quite well on the watch. Since my office uses Office 365, I can read and respond to email via the Outlook app.

Where we are with watch apps reminds me of the iPhone 3G days. A lot of developers just wanted to get their product in the app store first, and then improve them via updates. A lot of those early apps were not very polished, (some were just hastily ported over PalmOS apps). At least the iPhone was the platform that developers prioritized so the apps quickly improved, and Android users often had to wait to see the same apps or features. I am patiently waiting for my favorite watch apps to go native or to add complications. Whenever I check the app store and I see an update for one of those apps, I am frequently disappointed to see that the update focuses on new features for iOS 9 or the iPhone 6s... but nothing new for the watch. Now I know how Android users must have felt back in the 3G days

I was thinking something similar, but about the first-gen iPhone. It had no apps, yet that thing was wildly popular. It was so transformative in its category that customers were willing to overlook the absence of apps and games, even standard features from flip phones like video recording. I think we're seeing that again with the watch. People are just so excited to have something new and shiny that we don't mind having a somewhat bad experience or no experience at all; which comes back to what you said. Developers are not partial to any one company, they just go with the flow. Whatever device the people flock to is the one that sees the most love from devs. It just happens to consistently be Apple's devices. So yes, I share your confidence and hope in the watch apps getting considerably better, and that in as little as six months to a year we will be singing a completely different tune.