Kiteboarding apps for Garmin watches

[aleks]

Garmin connect page not loading

Can you post what it shows? I know other people can see it, so not sure what happens on your side.

is this app on the garmin connect iq app, tried searching for woo could only find jmg-app by surfy 66.

The app is not published to the community yet - it will be coming later directly from Woo Sports. You will not be able to find it until then. This is just a preview

[Aberdovy kiter]

[aleks]

Looks like it opens a Garmin app on your phone. Try opening the link on your computer, or copy a link and open in a browser.

[airsail]

Some insurance companies selling income protection will reduce your premiums and provide other bonuses if you remain active. AIA is one via their Vitality app. A kitesurf session recorded via a Garmin or similar is classed as an activity and counts towards your points balance. 5 activities a week gets you a $5 voucher, I get itunes gift cards. Plus your points build over the year to different status levels. Prior to covid the 2 x 1/2 price airfares were brilliant.
So there are definitely reasons to log sessions.

[shred_da_gorge]

Interesting thread! I've been using KiteTracker for a few seasons and talked with the developer who has improved it significantly. He tried to build in jump height, but that's difficult to measure with either GPS or altimeter due to pressure and temperature variation impacts on the sensors. (I once paddled a SUP at South Padre Island with a vivoactive3 reporting that I climbed 200' in an hour).

I agree with a previous poster that it's hard to pay attention to the watch while kiting, but there are a few things I find it helpful for, including time of day, time on the water, and heart rate (using strap; optical HRM on wrist is useless in water). I really want to record actual tracks (preferably with GPS+GLONASS for added resolution), and have it show up in Connect/Strava as the proper activity. (Actually would be nice to select windsurf vs kitesurf in the same app, especially as I start to windfoil and kitefoil). Max speed is fun to know, or actual speed and recording of laps and lap speeds if racing.

Looking forward to hearing more about the Woo support - have felt it would be good for them to support a more open format like FIT and integrate better with Strava, and I've written to Strava founders asking them to think about better data views for kite/windsurfing. When writing a watch app for Garmin, also helps to know the FIT file format - Garmin publishes the specs you can read up on. For jumping, you'll probably need to create new data fields for FIT, unless you want to key it into the altitude tracking. (If you haven't figured out the encoding yet for activity types to record this as kiteboarding, you'll find the information here on setting it in the FIT file, and there's a header file containing the codes to use).

[andrewjohn]

Looks like it opens a Garmin app on your phone. Try opening the link on your computer, or copy a link and open in a browser.

Anyway of making it compatible with the Fenix 3?
I suspect quite a lot of kiters might have had a 3 for a while, but don’t feel the need to upgrade.

[aleks]

Anyway of making it compatible with the Fenix 3?
I suspect quite a lot of kiters might have had a 3 for a while, but don’t feel the need to upgrade.

Garmin doesn't support Fenix 3 for Bluetooth SDK (which is required for communication with WOO). It is strange, as the watch obviously has BT hardware (it talks to the phone), but I guess Garmin didn't want to update firmware on old watches to support the new functionality (they introduced BT SDK only a year ago). The oldest Fenix that will support WOO is Fenix 5 plus (not to be confused with Fenix 5 without "plus", that one won't work).

[aleks]

When writing a watch app for Garmin, also helps to know the FIT file format - Garmin publishes the specs you can read up on. For jumping, you'll probably need to create new data fields for FIT, unless you want to key it into the altitude tracking. (If you haven't figured out the encoding yet for activity types to record this as kiteboarding, you'll find the information here on setting it in the FIT file, and there's a header file containing the codes to use).

There is no need to write FIT files manually - Garmin SDK does it for you. You just choose activity type (out of activities available on a given watch). It records most standard metrics (track, speed, heart rate, temperature, etc), plus you can calculate and add your own metrics (like jumps), as I did in the WOO app and posted sample session earlier ( https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activ ... /0?lang=en ). So, yes, WOO session with tracks will be posted on Garmin and can be downloaded or added to Strava at will.

Unfortunately there is no "Kitesurfing" activity type on Garmin - the closest type is simply "SPORT_GENERIC", but name of the WOO activity in Garmin will be still called "Woo Kitesurfing".

[shred_da_gorge]

Try hardcoding the number 44. Here's the information I emailed to the author of KiteTracker from which he was able to successfully set the activity type so Garmin Connect and Strava interpret it as kitesurfing:

"It looks like SPORT_KITESURFING should work as a parameter to the ActivityRecording.createSession method, or typecast the number 44 to preset the activity type to kitesurfing in Garmin Connect, or try "FIT_SPORT_KITESURFING"... In the SDK there is Profiles.xslx that has the enums, and FIT_SPORT_KITESURFING maps to 44."

(The conversation dates back to May 2018 but it's still backwards-compatible because it still works in his 2.x versions).

P.S. This is a helpful resource I found during that research: https://starttorun.info/connect-iq-apps ... ource-code

[aleks]

Try hardcoding the number 44. Here's the information I emailed to the author of KiteTracker from which he was able to successfully set the activity type so Garmin Connect and Strava interpret it as kitesurfing:

"It looks like SPORT_KITESURFING should work as a parameter to the ActivityRecording.createSession method, or typecast the number 44 to preset the activity type to kitesurfing in Garmin Connect, or try "FIT_SPORT_KITESURFING"... In the SDK there is Profiles.xslx that has the enums, and FIT_SPORT_KITESURFING maps to 44."

(The conversation dates back to May 2018 but it's still backwards-compatible because it still works in his 2.x versions).

P.S. This is a helpful resource I found during that research: https://starttorun.info/connect-iq-apps ... ource-code

Thanks ! I did find SPORT_KITESURFING activity type in Garmin SDK (yes, it is 44) and updated WOO app to use it. It doesn't change much compared to Generic activity though - there are no kitesurfing specific metrics that Garmin creates. At least the activity category is correct now.