Android Wear Overview

“Ok Wai Cheung”

What is Android Wear?

What it can do?

Notification

Wear App

It has...

Touch Screen

Power Button

Sensorsss...

e.g. heart rate meter, GPS, Accelerometer...

Resolution

for designer

Square

Rounded

W 320

H 320

W 320

H 320

DPI?

res/nodpi

res/hdpi (x1.5)

Running on device...

  1. Android
  2. OS version >= 4.3

Android Wear OS version

  1. 4.4 (API Lv 20)
  2. 5.x (API Lv 21)

Hey, what's their difference?

  1. Watch Face API
  2. Material Design UI
  3. Notification priority mode
  4. Resume dismissed Notification

Hey, what's their difference?

UI? UX? 

  1. Don't consider it as a small-sized phone
  2. Do one thing, REALLY FAST
  3. Design for the corner of the eye
  4. Don't always get user focus (e.g. vibration)

Design for big gestures

Better finish all interaction within 5 seconds

Right content at the right time

according sensor information, GPS location, cloud server information, etc...

Development on Android Wear

  1. Optimize notification
  2. Develop wear app 

Notification

Many many styles... such as BigPictureStyle, BigTextStyle, InboxStyle... a tutorial class

But... they are only working on Android OS >=4.1

Notification

Or AW only features like adding pages, action buttons, voice command input or custom layout...

page

stacked page

action

voice reply

You can...

DEMO on Emulator

Android Wear App

Android Wear App

With some Android Wear only UI components...

How to sync / send data to Android phone?

  1. MessageAPI - no data storage, send data once
  2. Syncing Data Item - payload (100 kb) stored in memory, once connected then do data sync
  3. Transfer Assets - for large file (e.g. images transfer)

Common Questions

Can I get GPS from Android Wear?

YES, you can get GPS from Android Wear which connected with an Android phone...

Some Android Wear devices have build-in GPS chips and obtain GPS signal by itself

Can I wake a phone app to foreground by a wear app?

YES, you can and also do it reversely.

What's more, you can open a url or trigger a service...

It handles an intent / pending intent very well! : )

What still works when the watch isn’t paired

  • Tell time and see the date
  • Set an alarm
  • Use the stopwatch
  • Use the timer
  • View your calendar for today
  • See your step count
  • See your heart rate (if your watch has this feature)
  • Change your watch face
  • Put your watch in airplane mode
  • Listen to music through your watch

Useful links

One more things...

for developers

HTTP Connection is FAIL! : (

You can make use of

WearHttp

and a simplified data layer wrapper...

Teleport

Thank You!

Android Wear Overview

By Wai Cheung

Android Wear Overview

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