Persistence of the Dc content between calls to onUpdate()

Nevermind. The Dc content is not in fact preserved on actual watches. The simulator is not accurate.

On some devices it is, but on other's the dc is cleared before onUpdate.  This is why you always want to update everything on the screen when onUpdate is called,  You can also run into issues with something like a toast that only covers part of the screen if you don't do this.

This has come up in the past and the Garmin folks say to just follow the rule where you draw the entire screen when onUpdate is called, and onPartialUpdate is the only way to update only part of the screen.

Yeah, looks like it, thanks.

I opened a ticket requesting to fix that - forums.garmin.com/.../request---specify-reason-for-watchui-view-onupdate-calls

There have been tickets relating to this over the years.  Here's just the first two I found.

See https://forums.garmin.com/developer/connect-iq/i/bug-reports/bug-some-newer-devices-clear-the-screen-on-every-view-update-simulator-behaves-differently

This one has comments from Travis (one of the CIQ folks) https://forums.garmin.com/developer/connect-iq/i/bug-reports/vivoactive-4-clears-screen-before-onupdate?CommentId=97d0c585-da4d-4146-a1e3-013e2e62b8b6

jim_m_58 said:

This one has comments from Travis (one of the CIQ folks)

Three years have passed ;) Besides as per Travis.ConnectIQ :

We have a few different frameworks that are used to do wire management. One clears the screen first and one does not.

So what I'm asking is for their wire management to pass a flag to onUpdate() specifying if it cleared the screen or not.

Shouldn't be a very hard thing to do unless their run-time is a hairy mess.

In the same post, Travis also says

"You should just do what is the most compatible.. make no assumptions and clear the screen yourself when onUpdate is called."

jim_m_58 said:

In the same post, Travis also says

"You should just do what is the most compatible.. make no assumptions and clear the screen yourself when onUpdate is called."

And that precludes making a suggestion how ... ?

It means your suggestion isn't needed.  There are about 10 years worth of CIQ devices, and even if this was changed in the most current devices, any apps that support older device would still need to do as Travis said.

Travis also said in another post, "This issue has been brought up several times in the past, and our stance has not changed."

jim_m_58 said:

There are about 10 years worth of CIQ devices, and even if this was changed in the most current devices, any apps that support older device would still need to do as Travis said.

By the same logic, ig nobody should be using any CIQ 2, 3, 4 or 5 features, since CIQ 1 devices still exist.

Also, if you want to monetize your app in the CIQ store, you only have to worry about devices released since 2020, most of which are on CIQ 5 (the Fenix 6 Pro "family" is the sole exception iirc.)

To further this point, it seems CIQ has finally left behind old devices with the introduction of "System 7", since it's defined as CIQ 5, and only devices that had CIQ 4.2 are getting CIQ 5.

(In the past, Garmin maintained 2 tracks of CIQ versions, which is why the "System X" nomenclature was introduced in the first place. Basically, "old" CIQ 3 devices continued to receive CIQ updates alongside "new" CIQ 4 devices, and the System level basically referred to 2 CIQ versions - e.g. System 6 was CIQ 3.4 for CIQ 3 devices and CIQ 4.2 for CIQ 4 devices. That seems to be over now.)