hybrid app with custom activity

What i am looking for is some sort of hybrid of data fields and app. I want to code some views custom, but also take advantage of the pre-existing fields and allow user customization.

1) The watch allows the user to create a 'custom activity' manually. Is there any way for a developer to package together a 'custom activity' for distribution, but retain the user ability to swap fields. The idea being to pre-set it in a desired way, but allow that a knowledgeable end user could further customize the activity, perhaps taking out or adding some field.

2) What if an app was developed with it's own user interface 'views', but then some of the existing fields (same ones available in the custom activity) were desired to be incorporated into an additional view.
Can this be done?

3) for 2) above, if that is possible, is there a way to allow the user to customize the fields using the built in tools for 'custom activity'.

My idea is that it should come in a way that is suited for most users, and they would not have to do the work of creating a custom activity themselves, all would be pre-set in a suitable way. Users that wish to could use that as a starting point and apply some customization, adding/removing fields using tools built in to the watch.

MoxyRoger over 9 years ago

1) I'm not aware of any way to create a "custom activity" except manually on the device.

2) If you make a CIQ Data Field, you can insert it into the display screens wherever you want (mostly) in the Custom Activity or in any other activity type just like any natively available data field.

3) On button only interface devices the best way to customize the view of a data field is usually to use the App Settings functionality because Data Fields don't have any user input. On touch devices App Settings might be the best option too, but there is the additional option for some touch input to adjust the data field on the device using onTap or the Selectable functionality.

jim_m_58 over 9 years ago

If you do a full watch-app, you can't access the native data fields, but for many of the native ones, they are fairly easy to replicate in your own code, and with app-settings you can configure what's where. In one of my apps, I have 3 "data screens" with 2 "data fields" on each, and all 6 fields can be set for 1 of about 20 different options. In another, I have 12 data screens where I put similar/related info on it's own page, and then allow the user to turn off pages they aren't interested in.

And as Roger said, you can do a CIQ data field that will run in a native activity.

What you decide to do will also depend on what Activity type you want to do. The two apps I mentioned are for activities (sports) that aren't supported on some devices with native profiles, and by doing a watch-app, I can set the proper sport so correct sport shows when data is uploaded to Garmin Connect, and not as "generic" or "other".