Hasta La Gadget!

The fitness app RunKeeper already lets you check stats on your smartwatch, but what is activity tracking without a public shaming social component? Starting today, the iOS version of the app includes a new feed for viewing your friends’ logged workouts along with your own, complete with the ability to comment on and “like” activities à la Facebook. Version 3.5 also adds a leaderboard, which ranks how you stack up against your pals. Hardly earth-shattering features, but the competitive bent might motivate you to push through an extra mile or two. Grab the update via the source link below.

Filed under: Software

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Via: SlashGear

Source: RunKeeper (iTunes)

Pet care industry spending exceeds $50 billion per year in the US alone, so there’s no question that folks are dropping some serious dough on man’s best friend. A device to track your dog’s health, then, makes an awful lot of sense, from a business perspective at the very least. Whistle, designed by a company bearing the same name, keeps tabs on your pooch for 100 bucks. The device connects to your pet’s collar; from there, it quietly measures activity and rest. The information it gathers can then be shared with both you and your dog’s doc, and it’s also added to a database, available to researchers around the world. The device and associated service will provide feedback for improving your dog’s health, tailored to his or her specific breed. You don’t pay any fees beyond the $100 pre-order charge, which you can submit directly to the manufacturer at the source link below.

Filed under: Household, Wearables

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Source: Whistle

This week the folks at Runtastic have made it clear that their ability to track and bring together a community of runners and fitness fanatics is not limited to software. The company has today shown a Bluetooth heart rate monitor, a GPS watch, a “Runtastic Sports Armband” for holding your iPhone or similarly-sized Android phone, and a receiver and chest strap – for heart rate, altitude, distance ran, and more – each of these then fed wirelessly into your smartphone with a Runtastic app. While Runtastic has offered hardware like these accessory bits and pieces before in a more limited way, this week they’ve made their move to the USA.

The company has spoken up about how well they’re doing for downloads, noting their main app to be at a point where it’s downloaded once per second – though when and for how long this happened is not exactly clear. On the other hand, it can be noted that Runtastic’s community of users is above 25 million counting mobile app users and up to 10 million in registered users on their website.

The Runtastic hardware family has also been expanded with a bike mount for iPhone and Android smartphones. The full collection of hardware accessories offered by Runtastic this week have been entered into an exclusive agreement with Amazon.com – so you might not be seeing them available in your local corner shop any time soon. A Runtastic Speed and Cadence Bike Sensor rounds off the family, turning your bike into what the company says will be a “cycling computer” with Bluetooth capabilities.

“By offering hardware, apps and services that are all developed in-house, Runtastic creates an integrated experience that is easy and fun.” – Runtastic CEO Florian Gschwandtner

The company is banking on the idea of creating and offering all software and hardware in their workout ecosystem themselves. With control over all elements from top to bottom, Runtastic enters a place where they’ve got the ability to make changes to software in app form and in updates to the software embedded in each device – if need be.

Such a system has worked well for larger companies in the past – and though businesses such as this don’t often start with the software and work out to the hardware from there, Runtastic seems to be doing just that, in a big way.

Runtastic accessories bring hardware in-house: GPS and Bluetooth on-deck is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Fitbit‘s Flex activity tracker has gone up for presale in the UK, the wrist-worn exercise and sleep monitor expected to arrive on British arms at the tail-end of May. Launched in the US on Monday, the Flex – which we reviewed earlier this week – is one of the more affordable of the latest batch of trackers, undercutting Nike’s FuelBand and Jawbone’s UP.

In fact, the Flex comes in at £79.99 (in the US, it’s $99.99) complete with two sizes of wristband and a wireless dongle for your computer. Alternatively it will sync via Bluetooth 4.0 with your iOS or Android device, though you’ll currently need either a Samsung Galaxy S III or a Galaxy Note II if you’re a Google OS user.

That’s down to different implementations of Bluetooth 4.0 on Android devices, which means most of the current line-up of phones simply won’t work with the Flex. Fitbit tells us that should change in the near future, however, and at least with the USB adapter you can get your exercise data off the band whenever you’re near a computer.

We also had some issues with sleep tracking mode, with side-by-side comparisons between the Flex and the UP suggesting the Fitbit version was seriously underestimating the length of time we were asleep. Still, it’s more comfortable than the Jawbone model. Presales kick off today at Fitbit’s site and Amazon, with retail store availability from May 27.

Fitbit Flex less than three weeks away from UK is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

The popular health and fitness tracking app RunKeeper has updated for both iOS and Android. One of the biggest new additions to the app is support for the new Pebble smartwatch, which now allows users to check their wrist to see if they’re keeping up pace, rather than having to fish out their smartphone to check their stats while on the go.

Both the iOS app and Android app also have some new features coming their way. The Android app now includes easier methods to enter in non-GPS activities manually, such as running on a treadmill or cycling on the stationary bike. The Android version also received a new widget that you can add to your home screen, letting you start and stop activities.

As for the iPhone app of RunKeeper, more users in more countries now have access to the fitness app, thanks to additions of several new languages, including Spanish, French, German, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, and Japanese. The app’s developers note that they’re continuously adding new languages, so we can expect more to come in the future.

Other than that, the updated app comes with the usual big fixes and performance enhancements. As for the Pebble watch, we reviewed the wrist device back in February, and it’s been going out to Kickstarter backers these last few months. While the watch is somewhat cheaply made in a way, third-party support is growing, making it even more tempting to take advantage of the new device.

RunKeeper Pebble support enabled in iOS and Android update is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.