What happened to Push Notifications in SDK 3.0.0?

Former Member over 6 years ago

It was on the basis of push notifications being promised for June that I purchased a Garmin watch to replace my Pebble, yet we have heard nothing in over a year.

The stock Garmin notifications are pretty terrible. The fact that Garmin did not allow notifications to be replaced via the SDK from the outset, and THEN missed their own given timeline for restricted to 'select developers' push notifications is perhaps even worse.

These watches have the potential to be excellent smartwatches, yet they're hampered by Garmin's poor attempt at software.

jim_m_58 over 6 years ago

The permission for these is in 3.0.12 (and probably before), and in the 3.1.0-beta3 SDK these's some in the API documentation about using them. (where it says available since 3.0.10)

If I recall from the CIQ Summit, it's not a generally available thing, but something you have to contact Garmin about - kind of like Trial Apps.

Former Member over 6 years ago in reply to jim_m_58

This whole concept of restricted APIs and 'select developers' is a bit of a joke. I really don't understand what Garmin are aiming for here. It would perhaps be fine to have all these limitations if they made the stock firmware/software highly customisable, but it's far from it.

If Pebble were able to have fully open APIs allowing for fully-fledged background applications and notifications, while maintaining a 7-day battery life, why can't Garmin (on much bigger, thicker watches nonetheless)? It's extremely frustrating.

These are capable devices with a ball and chain attached by a company taking the Apple approach of "we know what's best for you, and that's that", when they very clearly don't.