I'm a seasoned developer for Windows software, but trying to follow the flow in creating a Connect IQ app that does communication (with the mobile device). The free PDF book is woefully inadequate for this topic and isn't a help getting started in this area. The SDK docs in this area read fragmented to me as well. I'm wondering if there are other Connect IQ learning sites/samples that provide both the iOS and Connect IQ side of the apps?
In the SDK directory there is the "samples" directory which will show you how to do many things from the CIQ/device side. As far as having a phone app to go with it, garmin has their "disk golf " code someplace, but I don't recall where it is.
If you just want to get/push info to a website, you may not even need a companion phone app.
Thanks @jim_m_58 but I've looked at the samples and there is no documentation to go along with them either. I'm looking at the Comm sample, installed it on my device and it really pretty much does nothing...or I'm using it wrong. And I can't tell because it is poorly documented as to what to expect. That's kind of why I'm stuck. There is not much good 'how to' documentation to help me through the steps required.
There is a README file in the root of the SDK that talks about each sample that may help, as well as the programmer's guide as far as what mc is all about.
The Comm sample is a bit scaled back from was it used to be. It used to get weather data but the site it used started to require an user get an API key, so it was changed to be a bit generic.
I'm in the process of re-evaluating some of the samples and getting the documentation improved. I'll plan a task to include more code comments to provide inline documentation, because I would appreciate that myself if I were trying to learn from the samples. I'm more of a learn by example person. :)
Brandon (this is interesting as one of the words in the Captcha for this post is actually "Brandon"!)
I too learn a language from looking at code, and go to the programmer's guide/api doc when I have questions. More comments in the sample would be good for new folks (maybe a block at the top that generally explains how the code works? "A timer is started to do XYZ..", "this sample uses dc calls and not layouts", etc..)
There was definitely a bit of a learning curve to get up to speed. Better documented code would definitely help here. Given the limited debugging ability, once you have basic functionality working, just make sure you make small changes and test. Once you've spent a little time with CIQ, it'll make way more sense. I've also found just browsing through the latest comments on this blog are a great way to pick up new understanding and tricks to using CIQ.
For me, one frustrating piece was the limitations put on the types of apps (id fields vs watch face vs widget). The only way to achieve what I really wanted was to write full apps.
I too didn't find the CIQ book particularly helpful.
I too didn't find the CIQ book particularly helpful.
Nor did I. Very well written and very nice as far as explaining Garmin's corporate philosophy as to devices being targeted at very, very specific markets, and also as to letting us all know we need to not think in a desktop/tablet/phone mindset - wearables are very different.
But in terms of actually providing useful examples and getting someone up to speed developing a real CIQ app? Nah.
