Apps WorkOutDoors: New workout features

[thelorax76]

A couple of responses to recent discussions:

1. I don't hope for more physical buttons. I used a Garmin Forerunner 230 for four years and hated that I couldn't wear it during yoga or lifting weights or doing anything that involved bending the wrist because buttons would be pressed accidentally and wreck my data. With the crown flipped to face my elbow, this problem is completely eliminated on the Apple Watch.

2. I didn't have any trouble finding this app at all. It was the first one I bought. When I was doing research ahead of time about whether to buy an AW5, EVERYONE extolled WorkOutDoors as one of the reasons to get it over a Garmin. I read it here, in several forums on reddit, on "how I use my watch for exercise" blog posts on the web... After using it for four days, I made my father buy it too. (He's been using the built-in activity app for five years and always wished for a map that showed north.) It's very annoying if Apple won't feature it.

3. Yesterday, on Day 5 of use, I encountered a problem in which workouts would pretend to start but would then be stuck at 88 bpm and 0:00 time. I couldn't find other people reporting this exact problem. Finally I restarted the watch (the suggestion in the Help file for all weird problems), and that fixed it. Have you any idea what I did to create the problem in the first place? It was rather distressing eight minutes into an exhausting indoor rowing session to see the watch reporting no workout was happening. My watch is new, and I don't have much on it yet.

 

[drkaka]

Thanks for buying the app. I am glad that you like it. Sorry that it was hard to find. I am just a one-man operation with no budget for marketing so I pretty much rely on word of mouth.

It was the first time i wrote rewiew for an app or give stars in app store. Hope this helps.
Keep on cfc! You making great work and give us great help.

 

[cfc]

A couple of responses to recent discussions:

1. I don't hope for more physical buttons. I used a Garmin Forerunner 230 for four years and hated that I couldn't wear it during yoga or lifting weights or doing anything that involved bending the wrist because buttons would be pressed accidentally and wreck my data. With the crown flipped to face my elbow, this problem is completely eliminated on the Apple Watch.

2. I didn't have any trouble finding this app at all. It was the first one I bought. When I was doing research ahead of time about whether to buy an AW5, EVERYONE extolled WorkOutDoors as one of the reasons to get it over a Garmin. I read it here, in several forums on reddit, on "how I use my watch for exercise" blog posts on the web... After using it for four days, I made my father buy it too. (He's been using the built-in activity app for five years and always wished for a map that showed north.) It's very annoying if Apple won't feature it.

3. Yesterday, on Day 5 of use, I encountered a problem in which workouts would pretend to start but would then be stuck at 88 bpm and 0:00 time. I couldn't find other people reporting this exact problem. Finally I restarted the watch (the suggestion in the Help file for all weird problems), and that fixed it. Have you any idea what I did to create the problem in the first place? It was rather distressing eight minutes into an exhausting indoor rowing session to see the watch reporting no workout was happening. My watch is new, and I don't have much on it yet.

The Garmin buttons are probably a lot easier to accidentally press than the Apple button is, because they stick out more. Apple's button seems to be much better designed in that respect. However you are right that physical buttons on the left may be an issue for some activities. If they add them then I will make the shortcuts activity-specific instead of being the same for all activities (which is probably a good idea anyway).

It's good to hear that you found the app easily. The only places that it gets regularly mentioned that I know of are here and on reddit. It also gets occasionally featured on blogs and it is amazing how much difference such a mention makes. A reddit post or a blog post will usually double or triple sales for that day. I can only dream of the difference that being featured by Apple would make!

Sorry about the workout not starting. No-one else has ever reported that problem but I have actually seen something similar a couple of times whilst debugging. I also fixed it by restarting, but I have never seen or heard of it in normal circumstances. Sometimes the watch can get confused and need a reboot.
[automerge]1593458000[/automerge]

It was the first time i wrote rewiew for an app or give stars in app store. Hope this helps.
Keep on cfc! You making great work and give us great help.

Many thanks for writing a review on the App Store. I really appreciate you taking the time to do that!

 

[drkaka]

Thanks for buying the app. I am glad that you like it. Sorry that it was hard to find. I am just a one-man operation with no budget for marketing so I pretty much rely on word of mouth.

It was the first time i wrote rewiew for an app or give stars in app store. Hope this helps.
Keep on cfc! You making great work and give us great help.

 

[cfc]

It was the first time i wrote rewiew for an app or give stars in app store. Hope this helps.
Keep on cfc! You making great work and give us great help.

Many thanks for writing a review on the App Store. I really appreciate you taking the time to do that!

 

[drkaka]

One interesting info:
I try to freeze your app, i've download all my country's offline map on the watch. I was scrolling for a while but it was working withoute any lag or freeze. Pretty good work cfc!

 

[twisted-pixel]

That's good to hear. Hopefully it was just a one-off due to the unreliability of a first beta. Thanks for letting me know.

ok...I have discovered that walks do not save to my phone.

The one that failed the first time was a walk...it saved to WOD, but doesn't show up as a workout in my phone's health app.

I rebooted and then went for a quick run. The run shows up in the Health app

I did another walk today. Saved, hit done...but doesn't show up in my health App
A quick run...saved...does show up
another quick walk, does NOT show up

so it looks like walks are not getting saved to the phone

 

[cfc]

ok...I have discovered that walks do not save to my phone.

The one that failed the first time was a walk...it saved to WOD, but doesn't show up as a workout in my phone's health app.

I rebooted and then went for a quick run. The run shows up in the Health app

I did another walk today. Saved, hit done...but doesn't show up in my health App
A quick run...saved...does show up
another quick walk, does NOT show up

so it looks like walks are not getting saved to the phone

Just to check - this is on the first watchOS 7 beta? The app doesn't do anything different for walks than other workout types so it could be an issue with the watchOS beta. I will take a look later and see if it is the same for me.

 

[Akrapovic]

I've been holding off reporting this one as I wanted to be sure it was WoD that was involved with this bug, but I think it is involved somehow.

Since moving from AW3 to AW4 I've been getting occasional music issues when running. Huge drop outs. Things worth noting:

• Phone in airplane mode (Wifi and BT off)
• Watch is non-celluar
• Earphones are PBPs, BT'd to the AW4
• Music is standard music app. Music is stored on the phone
• WoD as the Workout App

I originally thought it was the earphones, but I've done lots of tests without WoD running and it doesn't do it then.

It seems to be related to when WoD is about to do something. For example, it sometimes stutters when I'm about to get the notification for having run 1km, or 2km etc. Stutter, then the buzz on the watch for the notification. Sometimes when I turn my wrist to see the screen - so related to loading the graphics for the screen then. Sometimes it does it at what feels like random points, but it could be that WoD is doing something under the skin that I'm not aware of. Sometimes the stutters are a few seconds, but a few times it has completely cut out the music for over a minute. If I go into the music app, it says it's still playing. Starting and stopping doesn't do anything.

It was doing this on the public version of the app, with no change on the beta.

Are there any features I can turn off in WoD that would reduce the CPU usage to see if it stops this? Or any tips on how to reduce CPU usage on the AW4 anyway?

 

[cfc]

I've been holding off reporting this one as I wanted to be sure it was WoD that was involved with this bug, but I think it is involved somehow.

Since moving from AW3 to AW4 I've been getting occasional music issues when running. Huge drop outs. Things worth noting:

• Phone in airplane mode (Wifi and BT off)
• Watch is non-celluar
• Earphones are PBPs, BT'd to the AW4
• Music is standard music app. Music is stored on the phone
• WoD as the Workout App

I originally thought it was the earphones, but I've done lots of tests without WoD running and it doesn't do it then.

It seems to be related to when WoD is about to do something. For example, it sometimes stutters when I'm about to get the notification for having run 1km, or 2km etc. Stutter, then the buzz on the watch for the notification. Sometimes when I turn my wrist to see the screen - so related to loading the graphics for the screen then. Sometimes it does it at what feels like random points, but it could be that WoD is doing something under the skin that I'm not aware of. Sometimes the stutters are a few seconds, but a few times it has completely cut out the music for over a minute. If I go into the music app, it says it's still playing. Starting and stopping doesn't do anything.

It was doing this on the public version of the app, with no change on the beta.

Are there any features I can turn off in WoD that would reduce the CPU usage to see if it stops this? Or any tips on how to reduce CPU usage on the AW4 anyway?

No-one has ever mentioned that before but it sounds like the watch is doing too much for some reason. Have you tried rebooting the watch and preferably the phone as well?

I heard from someone yesterday where the watch was killing off apps such as WOD. It turned out that his Apple Music app had gone rogue and was using 17 times as much memory as WOD! So it could be something similar here, in which case a reboot should help.

 

[Akrapovic]

No-one has ever mentioned that before but it sounds like the watch is doing too much for some reason. Have you tried rebooting the watch and preferably the phone as well?

I heard from someone yesterday where the watch was killing off apps such as WOD. It turned out that his Apple Music app had gone rogue and was using 17 times as much memory as WOD! So it could be something similar here, in which case a reboot should help.

I've actually completely reinstalled watchOS recently (I'm still on watchOS6). I've restarted the phone (not reinstalled though). Since the phone is in airplane mode and everything is being run off the watch it should take the phone out of the equation. I'm also going to strip off unused apps from the Watch to see if it helps.

I can't seem to replicate this without WoD running. That doesn't mean WoD is the problem obviously - it could be something else taking up resources, but WoD pushes it over the limit. I'll investigate further, but figured this was worth highlighting.

 

[cfc]

I've actually completely reinstalled watchOS recently (I'm still on watchOS6). I've restarted the phone (not reinstalled though). Since the phone is in airplane mode and everything is being run off the watch it should take the phone out of the equation. I'm also going to strip off unused apps from the Watch to see if it helps.

I can't seem to replicate this without WoD running. That doesn't mean WoD is the problem obviously - it could be something else taking up resources, but WoD pushes it over the limit. I'll investigate further, but figured this was worth highlighting.

WOD probably pushes the watch more than most apps, especially in terms of the map, but I haven't heard of it causing music stuttering. There is an issue with spoken audio in the current version, which is fixed in the next version, but that would not affect music.

 

[twisted-pixel]

Just to check - this is on the first watchOS 7 beta? The app doesn't do anything different for walks than other workout types so it could be an issue with the watchOS beta. I will take a look later and see if it is the same for me.

Yes, watch OS7 Beta and iOS 14 beta

Excuse the crudeness of the image below but. I did a walk on 17 June and a run on Jun 20th, that both recorded and then I upgraded.

Walk (1) was not recorded on my phone. I rebooted and did a quick run (2) that did get recorded so we thought it was just a case of a reboot needed. I then did another walk (3) that did not get recorded. Another quick walk (4) also not recorded, and then a quick run (5) which was recorded

 

[cfc]

Yes, watch OS7 Beta and iOS 14 beta

Excuse the crudeness of the image below but. I did a walk on 17 June and a run on Jun 20th, that both recorded and then I upgraded.

Walk (1) was not recorded on my phone. I rebooted and did a quick run (2) that did get recorded so we thought it was just a case of a reboot needed. I then did another walk (3) that did not get recorded. Another quick walk (4) also not recorded, and then a quick run (5) which was recorded

View attachment 929660

Thanks for that. I will see if I get the same problem.

To be honest I probably won't spend too much time looking at it. I have been burned in the past investigating problems with early betas that Apple fix in the next version. Sorry about that.

 

[vimmerru]

@cfc Hi, swimming pools started to work in my city recently as well as in the most of Europe cities. Maybe you can consider return swimming pool recording to the list of planned features?

 

[cfc]

@cfc Hi, swimming pools started to work in my city recently as well as in the most of Europe cities. Maybe you can consider return swimming pool recording to the list of planned features?

Swimming pools are still closed here in the UK. Most activity types are very similar so if it were any other activity then I would probably add it and rely on other people testing it. However swimming has a lot of unique features, so I want to get it working myself before even releasing it to testers.

One of the problems is that watchOS informs the app of each lap very late. So it can be over a minute before a lap is reported. In my informal testing at home (waving my arms around in the air!) this can cause problems at the end of the workout because it sometimes misses the last lap. However it is difficult to tell if this is related to my strange testing.

Also the fact that laps are reported late means that the app has to do very different things when it hears about the lap. For every other activity laps are known about in real-time, so the app can simply store the details for the last lap when it knows there is a new lap. However if the lap is reported a minute later then the app has to go back through its history and determine the metrics for that period. So there is a completely different process for swimming than for other activities, which is why I want to test it myself first before even releasing it to testers.

The next version is very close to release, so I do not want to add anything new now, but I may release another new version a month or two afterwards (sort of part 1 and part 2). If the swimming pools open early enough here then I may add swimming to the beta for that version and see how it goes in testing before deciding whether or not to include it.

 

[navsaria]

The BT connection to your phone uses very little battery power and actually saves power for outdoor workouts where the phone will then provide the GPS. I think the problem you had was because your paddling action meant that the watch was waking with every stroke and was therefore almost continuously on with full screen brightness.

The best way to avoid this is to change the Wake Screen settings so that it only comes on when you touch it. You may even need to switch on water lock. Sorry about that - it is a design issue with the watch that is hard to avoid.

Wanted to follow up on the "high Watch battery drainage while kayaking" issue — went out again last weekend, same setup (Apple Watch, gloves, phone in case with me for photos), and this time I used theater mode, simply so I didn't need to do the whole "twirl the crown and wait a moment" if I needed to interact with WOD. This kept the screen off unless I tapped on it.

Result: battery drainage was about 20%, much more in line with what running for a similar amount of time had been. Far better than the ~70% the prior week. Don't think it was water or a glove touching the screen the previous time, it was simply the motion was causing the screen to turn on with each stroke (as you hypothesized, @cfc), and that sucked a lot of power.

I'm not sure why I didn't see a similar drain from MapMyRun when I used it in a similar way, but I wonder if there's much more power usage with drawing the map on the WOD screen? It's really not a big deal at all, and I'm happy to use a mode that limits screen activation for when kayaking. Been loving the app overall, and very happy with it!

 

[cfc]

Wanted to follow up on the "high Watch battery drainage while kayaking" issue — went out again last weekend, same setup (Apple Watch, gloves, phone in case with me for photos), and this time I used theater mode, simply so I didn't need to do the whole "twirl the crown and wait a moment" if I needed to interact with WOD. This kept the screen off unless I tapped on it.

Result: battery drainage was about 20%, much more in line with what running for a similar amount of time had been. Far better than the ~70% the prior week. Don't think it was water or a glove touching the screen the previous time, it was simply the motion was causing the screen to turn on with each stroke (as you hypothesized, @cfc), and that sucked a lot of power.

I'm not sure why I didn't see a similar drain from MapMyRun when I used it in a similar way, but I wonder if there's much more power usage with drawing the map on the WOD screen? It's really not a big deal at all, and I'm happy to use a mode that limits screen activation for when kayaking. Been loving the app overall, and very happy with it!

Glad that using theatre mode fixed it. The map and extra metrics in WorkOutDoors don't seem to use any extra power normally but maybe it does make a difference when the screen is updated on every paddle stroke.

Although I would expect that the extra power drawn by the screen being constantly switched on and off would make more of a difference than briefly using the CPU/GPU, so maybe the screen is not coming on for some other apps for some reason.

 

[Richard Boad]

Have to say this is a great app, do you need any more beta testers?

 

[cfc]

Have to say this is a great app, do you need any more beta testers?

The current beta is very close to release (I hope!) but if you email me at info@workoutdoors.net then I would be happy to include you.

Glad you like the app!

 

[MLVC]

Awesome app! Battery drain was a bit high in watchOS 7 beta 2, hope it’s doing better in beta 3 but have yet to test that. I am already part of your beta program so I’m guessing all the betas will of course result in higher battery usage, which is fine. Just an observation.

I do recommend this app a lot though, one of the best watch apps for me.

 

[johnl1275]

Quick question... So is there a way to let the miles auto-lap, but add an additional manual split? Like if you use the default activity app on the watch it will record the miles but then you can double-click the watch face and add additional splits. After the run, it shows in the workout summary as splits and segments.

I want the per mile information, but I also would like to see additional splits for like half of the run or some other metric. Typically I use this when I am doing negative splits. On those workouts, I like to be able to see the negative split times per mile, but also first half of the run versus the second half of the run.

 

[rbart]

Yes, it’s possible

 

[cfc]

Quick question... So is there a way to let the miles auto-lap, but add an additional manual split? Like if you use the default activity app on the watch it will record the miles but then you can double-click the watch face and add additional splits. After the run, it shows in the workout summary as splits and segments.

I want the per mile information, but I also would like to see additional splits for like half of the run or some other metric. Typically I use this when I am doing negative splits. On those workouts, I like to be able to see the negative split times per mile, but also first half of the run versus the second half of the run.

Yes, each workout can be split in two ways: laps and intervals. Laps are generally fixed distance lengths, but intervals are controlled by the user.

You can either use scheduled intervals (such as "warm up for 5 minutes", "fast for 1 mile" etc) or you can manually start each interval with a shortcut gesture of your choice. To set this up press the watch screen hard and tap Settings then Commands then Shortcuts. Then choose a shortcut from the selection (e.g. double tap, swipe left, press both side buttons etc) and set that to the "New Interval" command.

You can analyse intervals in the iPhone app and in the watch app (both during and after the workout) in exactly the same ways as you can analyse laps.

 

[MJ22]

I commented once before that the pace in my app during a running workout is all over the place. I adjusted the sensitivity of it and it was still totally inaccurate. It was anywhere from 9:00 to 12:00 pace, and one of my miles was in the 8’s.

Is there anything to fix this?? No other running app does this. I want to use this app because I feel the distance is more accurate than the stock Apple app but this pace issue is really bad.

As an aside, does this app use the GPS differently, like make more connections with the satellite? The distance is much more accurate than the Apple app on the same routes.