No auto-lock for buttons???

Hello,

Are you meaning the lock device feature? When you lock device, you cannot use the buttons to do anything on it, it will stay as a watch that tells time and date.

Garmin-Hannah

On my FR965, I can set things up so that after a timeout period (a few seconds, typically) the watch enters a "locked" state, where both screen and button pushes don't do anything (except bring up a message saying I have to unlock the watch first).  This happens both when the watch is actively being used (if this timeout period passes) and also when the watch first starts up.

I can unlock it with a long-press on any button (prior devices let me set it up so that only a long-press on a key combo I set up will unlock it, though that feature was done away with in recent watches, unfortunately; a shame, because when one is doing something where long presses are likely - like skiing, where the jacket cuff can press a button - the watch gets inadvertently unlocked; this is a separate issue, however, and Garmin seems to not want to restore that functionality).

In any case, in the FR970, there seems to be no way to enable "auto-lock after a timeout" like I can in my FR965.

Are you aware of any way of doing that in the FR970?  It appears that I have to manually lock the watch, there is no "auto-lock after a timeout" feature.  This is very annoying, because after I do something on the watch, it going back to a locked state is ALWAYS what I want (to avoid inadvertent screen or button actions).

Hello,

May I please follow up with you on email if I have permission to do so? 

Garmin-Hannah

Please do! Happy to try to help to improve the product!

- Tim

For anyone who's also having this issue; Garmin-Hannah has told me in email that they seem to have changed everything to be screen-focused - there is an auto-lock, but it's only for the screen (not the buttons), and you unlock it with a screen gesture... so everything is based on expectations by the GUI designers and developers that everyone is a really big user of touch-screen control and gestures, with buttons being less used.

This runs counter to what a lot of people I know do - I use the buttons EXCLUSIVELY (I completely disable the touch-screen), and that's what I prefer.  I have no idea why Garmin developers would focus entirely on touch-screen users and ignore people like me (and many others I've spoken with) who disable the touch-screen and use only the buttons.  The only reason I would ever use the touch-screen would be for maps usage, and I would only use that in a very specific situation (like bike touring, for instance), and even then, I'd probably depend far more on maps on my phone than on my watch.

So Garmin's screen-oriented user focus seems misguided to me.

What do y'all think?

I've asked Garmin-Hannah to send my suggestions/comments to the developers, but she hasn't replied in a week, so I don't know what's going on there.

They have much bigger issues to fix first so don't expect this to be resolved quickly. This is a feature request whereas there are bugs galore they need to fix. 

Agree! Let's hope that Garmin focus and allocate the resources on the important bugs and issues now. 

I would like to see the auto-lock implemented. For example in triathlon race i lock the watch to not press lap button by mistake in transitions. In a mean while I lock it manually.

Hannah responded to me (apparently she hadn't received my email response).  She said that there's nothing she can do about this feature change, and that I should submit a request to the "suggestions" page. Unless something is classified as a bug, this is always what support asks us to do.  But I highly doubt that they pay ANY attention to the suggestions page, given what users here have said they've requested and never seen actually implemented. Too bad that Garmin doesn't pay much attention to their own users' usage patterns, only what they think is the RIGHT way. :-/

Hmm, maybe I should apply for a job at Garmin so I can talk to the developers directly :-D  They have a lot of job reqs out that I'm qualified for (software development)...

I have placed a number of 'suggestions' though the years (different equipment), those have never been implemented nor have had any feedback or comments from Garmin. Also simple things like this (previous models available).
The 'suggestion page' seems to be a way to end the discussion. Of course Garmin could keep up a repository of wanted functionality if they want to, from different sources.

Yes, please apply for a job at Garmin. Maybe "business/support process developer" or so
One task is to develop this forum in a way that enables some order:
- Known issues and status (users can see whats already checked out). 
- Garmin connects the forum posted to forms above. Or creates new.
- Classification in the forms 
- Connect the development and incident management processes to the forum.
- Workarounds.
and some more i guess...