State of Smartwatches regarding freedom?

4 risposte [Ultimo contenuto]
GNUser
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Iscritto: 07/17/2013

Hey guys and girls!

I was wondering, does anyone uses smart watches? Are they usable in freedom? Does anyone uses a smart watch with his GNU/Linux machine instead of a smartphone?
Any suggestions or information highly appreciated ;)

GNUser

Beformed
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Iscritto: 01/12/2017

As far as I know there is no "smart" watch that you can use in freedom, all of them have non-free user subjugating software. In principle the whole idea of an smart watch is to track what you do either with a non-free phone or connected to the internet to a "service" like Google. So I don't know of a way to avid freedom or privacy issues on this devices.

MistahDarcy
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Iscritto: 03/18/2016

I have an Amazfit Bip that I use with the FOSS Gadgetbridge app from F-Droid. The watch itself doesn't run free software (it has proprietary firmware). The device communicates with your phone through Gadgetbridge and doesn't require using any closed services or internet access.

Gadgetbridge supports a wide array of devices and has the capability to support even more with community contributions.

https://github.com/Freeyourgadget/Gadgetbridge

https://f-droid.org/en/packages/nodomain.freeyourgadget.gadgetbridge/

GNUser
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Iscritto: 07/17/2013

Thanks for the replies!
So, basically there is no 100% libre solution yet?
Still, according to MistahDarcy we can use a FLOSS app in the Android device, which is already good. We now only need some FLOSS firmware for the watch itself (similar to RockBox in music players). Hope we get it soon enough.

Hey MistahDarcy can you use the watch with a GNU/Linux computer too?

Thanks.

MistahDarcy
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Iscritto: 03/18/2016

As far as I know, there is no desktop compatible app equivalent to Gadgetbridge.

There's a project called UART-Smartwatch that hasn't seen any updates for a couple of years, but it's basically a DIY hardware watch. It also has free firmware.

https://github.com/no-go/UART-Smartwatch