Bill Day: Please tell us about yourself and your work.

Gym Hero: We are Jannik and Jannis, the founders of Big Mike Alright, the small but nice company behind Gym Hero. Gym Hero is currently a side project we are working on in addition to our day jobs and college. We both love sports but are especially addicted to kitesurfing!

BD: What is the “elevator pitch” for why someone should use your app?

Gym Hero is a gym workout tracking app that learns from you while staying out of your way as much as possible. The user interface is streamlined and optimized to be used while you work out, even with shaky hands. Workout routines are automatically learned as you go, so you never have to enter a weight or name twice. You are free to name your workouts and exercises however you like – full flexibility instead of endless searching and browsing in predefined, fixed lists. Each of your workouts gets its own webpage (if you want) with all the details, so you can share, compare and discuss with friends.

BD: How did you get started using the Health Graph API?

We both have been using Runkeeper tracking for our cardio activities for quite some time now. Being data and statistics junkies, our weight goes into the Health Graph via a Withings scale, and our blood pressure is monitored and sent to the Health Graph via a Withings blood pressure monitor. We track our runs and the bicycle commute to work with RunKeeper.

Because we also love to work out we wanted to add our gym workouts to our Runkeeper profile as well. When we heard about the Health Graph API we wanted to join. Quantify yourself!

BD: How is using the Health Graph benefiting Gym Hero and your users?

The Health Graph community is a place where sports enthusiasts of all types meet to motivate each other, exchange, discuss and most of all track and measure their performance. It’s a great place to collect all your sports and health related data. So obviously, we wanted to allow our community to join the Health Graph family and vice versa.

And for the programmers reading this: The Health Graph really is easy to use and embed into your applications. Go try it out!

BD: Which portions of the Health Graph API do you use, and why?

Since Gym Hero focuses on doing one thing only, but doing it really well, we use the strength training portion of the Health Graph API. We feed full workouts including workout notes and exercise names into the Health Graph. We don’t track cardio or time based training (yet).

BD: What do you like about the Health Graph? What would you like to see changed?

We love the idea behind the Health Graph. Bringing together such a great variety of health data is simply awesome. On top of that it’s a breeze to integrate into other applications. Just keep up the great work!

BD: If you could request any new feature from the Health Graph, what would it be? How would you use it?

We would like to see a little more flexibility when it comes to defining muscle groups for each exercise. Our basic idea for Gym Hero is to give our users full freedom in naming their exercises/workouts. We would love for this to also be possible for muscle grouping.

BD: Can you share any future plans for your app? What’s coming next that your users will be excited about? Does the Health Graph play a role in that, and if so, how?

We’ve been updating every five to six weeks with new features and improvements, but there are a lot of updates still to come. We will extend the workout summary view for a better performance check, add data sync with iCloud and a workout timer to name only a few upcoming features.

Our users can also request and vote for new features. They can do this by clicking on the speech bubble in the app or by going here. Please help us build the finest workout app ever by making your requests. We love to hear from our users!

BD: Is there anything else we should know about you or your application?

If you want to track your gym activities and are looking for a slick app which is not blown up with useless stuff check out Gym Hero. Never leave without flexing!

Cross-posted from the Health Graph blog.

Bill Day: Please tell us about yourself and your company.

Geoff Pitfield: We’re currently an angel-backed team of two. I’ve been making mobile stuff since the days when that meant doing your own hardware, and have been working on Fleetly since early 2010. I’m a Product Design grad and MBA, but I’d never really coded so I taught myself in order to build Fleetly, which has certainly been interesting. Fleetly’s the first app that lets you check in on your fitness and evaluate your overall Fitness Level, based on all the exercise that you do, from weight training to long distance running. I got started on the app when I couldn’t find anything fun to use that supported the variety of activities I was doing to train for a triathlon.

BD: What’s the “elevator pitch” for why someone should use your app?

GP: It’s a fun, social way to stay motivated about your fitness *and* get meaningful insight into what you’re doing. When it clicks for people, they end up doing things like an extra 20 pushups or running another mile just to pass their friend on the leaderboard. That’s a great thing.

BD: How did you get started using the Health Graph API?

GP: Our users started vigorously and repeatedly demanding RunKeeper integration!

BD: How will using the Health Graph benefit your business?

GP: We think it will both increase our user base and increase retention, because Health Graph integration makes it much easier for people to use – they no longer have to enter their data into multiple applications.

BD: Which portions of the Health Graph API do you use, and why?

GP: We use the Fitness Activity API, because that’s the part that fits in with what we’re doing, as well as being what our users demanded. We might add weight tracking at some point as well.

BD: What do you like about the Health Graph? What would you like to see changed?

GP: It’s fairly easy to use and is comprehensive. It would benefit from better delete tracking, and should also support an identifier for originating source on entries. Otherwise, you run into problems if someone has cross-linked multiple services. For instance, we already integrate with Health Graph partner Withings (@withings). If someone’s linked their Withings account to the Health Graph, there really should be a way to tell that a given weight entry originated as Withings ID XYZ to avoid duplication. (Editor’s note: De-duplication today falls on the app developer.)

BD: If you could request any new feature from the Health Graph, what would it be? How would you use it?

GP: Off the top of my head, I’d rather see continued focus on making the API as robust, useable, and open a platform as possible. I don’t have any blindingly great feature ideas, per se, other than what I mentioned above which I think is really important. A push update service would be nice to reduce the need for polling.

BD: Can you share any future plans for your app? What’s coming next that your users will be excited about? Does the Health Graph play a role in that, and if so, how?

GP: The really cool stuff has to remain secret. We’ll soon be introducing some new types of challenges that we think are going to be great, and very much focused on the same Fitness Activities we’re linking via the Health Graph. Also, we’ve always had our own little API but never done much to promote it, and we’re eager to help anyone who’s interested. The second most requested thing after RunKeeper is an Android app if anyone wants to play!

BD: Is there anything else we should know about you or your application?

GP: We’ve been doing a cool challenge with Lifehacker (click to access), and also have a badly under-promoted startup challenge (click here for startup challenge), both of which might be of interest. And the app’s available at www.fleetly.com/ios, so check it out!

Cross-posted from RunKeeper‘s Health Graph developer blog.

We’ve written a lot of late about mobile payment platforms and the mobile wallet.  One thing we haven’t written as much about is merchants accepting payments via their mobile phone.  Let’s change that.

Intuit recently announced a special offer whereby new merchants can receive a free credit card reader for their smartphone-based GoPayment service.  The reader works with a number of popular devices running Android and iOS (including iPhone as well as WiFi connected iPod Touch devices).  Blackberry devices are also supported.

In addition to receiving the $200 reader for free, new sign-ups also get their $13 per month service fee waved.  Per transaction charges still apply, with processing volume determining the exact fees payable to Intuit.  See the press release and web site for details.

Click here to read the rest of the piece on the PayPal X Developer Network.

Java ME Application and Tool Repositories

Java ME Emulators and SDKs

Specifications:

• Mobile Information Device Profile
  (MIDP 2.0 Spec, 2.0 Reference Impl, and FAQ; 1.0 Spec and OTA Recommended Practice) — application runtime environment for wireless devices; requires CLDC
• Connected, Limited Device Configuration (CLDC 1.1 Spec, 1.1 Reference Impl, FAQ; 1.0 Spec) — base Java support for mobile phone, pager, PDA class devices
• Mobile Media API (MMA 1.0 Spec, 1.0 Reference Impl) — API for access and control of audio and video; targeted at CLDC and MIDP devices, but does not exclude support by CDC implementations
• Wireless Messaging API (WMA 2.0 Spec, 1.1 Spec, 1.1 Reference Impl) — APIs provides standard access to SMS and CBS messaging; WMA 2.0 will extend WMA to support multimedia messaging via MMS
• Java Technology for the Wireless Industry (JTWI 1.0 Spec, FAQ) — clarifies how MIDP, CLDC, WMA, and MMA technologies interoperate in real world end-to-end solution deployments
• Java APIs for Bluetooth (Java APIs for Bluetooth 1.0 Spec) — enables devices to integrate into Bluetooth environments
• J2ME Web Services (J2ME Web Services Specification 1.0 Spec) — optional package providing standard access to Web Services from Java ME

• Not find the Java ME specification you were looking for? Try searching through: All Java ME related Java Specification Requests (JSRs)
• Still not finding it? Try expanding your search to: All Java Specification Requests (JSRs)
• Related specifications: XHTML and HTML | HTTP 1.1 | TLS (based upon SSL) | HTTP over TLS | Compact HTML | Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) | Bluetooth | IEEE 802.11 standards

Books:

I’ve listed all of the Java ME development related books of which I am aware below, plus a few related wireless titles thrown in at the bottom for good measure. If you are considering buying one or more of these books, be sure you read the reader reviews on each page.

Additional books may be available by clicking here to search for Java ME titles in Amazon.com. You can also visit the kvm-interest archives for authors’ descriptions of their books and reviews from other Java ME developers.

• Riggs, Taivalsaari, and VandenBrink: Programming Wireless Devices with the Java(tm) 2 Platform, Micro Edition (The Java Series)
• John W. Muchow: Core J2ME Technology and MIDP (Sun Microsystems Press)
• Cynthia Block and Annette Wagner: MIDP 2.0 Style Guide for the Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition (The Java Series)
• Jonathan Knudsen: Wireless Java: Developing with J2ME, 2nd ed (APress)
• Kim Topley: J2ME in a Nutshell (O’Reilly)
• Michael Yuan: Enterprise J2ME: Developing Mobile Java Applications (Prentice Hall)
• Qusay Mahmoud: Learning Wireless Java (O’Reilly)
• David Fox and Roman Verhovsek: Micro Java(TM) Game Development (Addison-Wesley)
• James Keogh: J2ME: The Complete Reference (McGraw-Hill)
• Daryl Wilding-McBride: Java Development on PDAs: Building Applications for Pocket PC and Palm Devices (Addison-Wesley)
• Yu Feng and Jun Zhu: Wireless Java Programming with J2ME (Sams)
• Michael Morrison: Teach Yourself Wireless Java with J2ME in 21 Days (Sams)
• Eric Giguere: Java 2 Micro Edition: Professional Developers Guide (Wiley)
• Enrique Ortiz and Eric Giguere: Mobile Information Device Profile for Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME): Professional Developer’s Guide (Wiley)
• Bill Ray et al: Professional Java Mobile Programming (Wrox)
• Michael Kroll and Stefan Haustein: Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME) Application Development (Sams)
• Imtiyaz Haque and Brian O’Connor: J2ME Enterprise Development (John Wiley & Sons)
• Dan Harkey et al: Wireless Java Programming for Enterprise Applications: Mobile Devices Go Corporate (John Wiley & Sons)
• James White and David Hemphill: Java 2 Micro Edition (Manning)
• Vartan Piroumian: Wireless J2ME Platform Programming (Prentice Hall)
• Mikko Kontio: Professional Mobile Java with J2ME (IT Press)
• Paul Tremblett: Instant Wireless Java with J2ME (McGraw Hill)
• Dreamtech Software Team: Wireless Programming with J2ME: Cracking the Code (Hungry Minds)
• Hinkmond Wong: Developing Jini(TM) Applications Using J2ME(TM) Technology (Addison-Wesley)
• Mark Beaulieu: Wireless Internet Applications and Architecture (Addison Wesley)
• Martyn Mallick: Mobile and Wireless Design Essentials (John Wiley & Sons)
• Matthew S. Gast: 802.11 Wireless Networks: The Definitive Guide (O’Reilly)
• Bob O’Hara and Al Petrick: The IEEE 802.11 Handbook: A Designer’s Companion

Related Sites:

Java Platform, Micro Edition homepage
KVM-interest mailing list archives (all things Java ME discussed here)
Bill Day’s blog

Discussions: Java.net Mobile & Embedded Community |Nokia Developer Boards | Keitai-L list | Siemens list

FAQs: Sun Mobility FAQs, Glossary | Wireless Telecom Glossary

Portals: Sun Mobility site | Forum Nokia | WirelessDevNet

Devices: Nokia device specs | RIM BlackBerry devices

US Carrier Developer Sites: AT&T | Sprint

802.11 Networks and WUGs: Community WiFi Cafes | Wi-Fi Hotspot List | Wi-Fi Zone Finder | NodeDB.com | 802.11b Community Network List

Bill Day’s technical presentations (Java ME and other topics)
Spotless research VM
Zev Blut’s Basic guide to developing iAppli programs (Java for imode)
O’Reilly Network 802.11 articles
Google Mobile

Events: java.net Event Calendar | JavaOne

News: Engadget | Wireless Week

David Pogue also blogged about the new features here.

Apple has finally pushed out the WiFi iTunes iPhone firmware promised by Jobs several weeks ago and Pogue a couple of hours ago.

Fire up your desktop iTunes and connect your iPhone to download and install the update. And be prepared to wait, as this firmware takes several minutes to download and install. Far longer than I’ve seen with previous iPhone firmware releases.

Apple has also changed the Calculator icon a bit on the home screen. It now has the same appearance, with the orange equals sign etc., as the Calculator icon on the iPod touch. If you find any other differences, please post in the comments.

Last July I wondered in writing about Q2 2006 NOK and MOT numbers:

Is mobile handset design and marketing now a two horse race?

As reported in this Chicago Tribune story on Q4 2006 results, the answer appears to be a big “Yes”. According to the Strategy Analytics numbers quoted by the Tribune:

1. Nokia increased Q4 share to 35.2% worldwide, versus 34.1% Q4 2005
2. Motorola rose to 21.9%, from 18.2% in the final quarter of 2005
3. Samsung lost share, down to 10.7% from 11.1% in the same quarter last year
4. Sony Ericsson is up to 8.7% from 6.6% last year
5. Closing out the top five, LG Electronics sank to 5.7% share from 6.6% in Q4 2005

Although Sony Ericsson increased its share a bit year-over-year, it appears to be more at the expense of Samsung and LG than of Nokia or Motorola. And even with S.E.’s rise, Nokia and Motorola still managed to pull slightly further ahead of the pack.

I wonder how things will stack up at this time next year, after iPhone has had a few months on the market? For Steve to hit his target of 1% share by 2008, Apple wouldn’t need to take very much from the major players.

Getting to the next order of magnitude, however, will be quite a bit more challenging. 10% share would position Apple in the top three mobile makers, assuming they grab share more at the expense of Samsung, Sony Ericsson, and LG than Nokia or Motorola. And as you can see from this quarter’s numbers, 10% iPhone market share won’t be easy to come by. But given the key bit of my quote from mid-2006, that this is a race based upon “design and marketing”, I’d say Apple has a better chance than anyone else at getting there from here. Assuming they listen to feedback and understand the shape of the mobile market, of course.

Alan A. Reiter of Camera Phone Report and Thomas Landspurg of TomSoft both left thoughtful comments on my “WiFi is more important than HSDPA for early iPhone success” blog post from last week.

Tom wrote:

My main point would be that the two places where you’re most likely to have WiFi coverage (the home and the office) are the two places you’re most likely to use a laptop or workstation for data access.

and Alan noted:

The two places you note where WiFi is free — home and office — are the two places you are least likely to use your cellular phone. This is especially true in the U.S. where cellular is much more of a secondary device rather than in many other countries where it’s often a person’s primary phone.

I understand their points, and I am sure for a lot of people they are correct. I do currently use a laptop for most wireless data access at home/work, but I foresee a more even split between computer and mobile device as the iPhone, or similar innovative WiFi-mobiles, come to market. Perhaps this is a difference in use cases, but for me I still see a big opportunity for a WiFi enabled iPhone at home and work.

Part of the reason that I noted those two free WiFi hotspots is that for me, my cell phone is my primary phone. In fact, it’s my only phone, for both work and personal use. So perhaps that magnifies its importance for me in the place where I spend the most time, home and office (ok, my office is a home office since I telecommute, but still). As a “cord cutter”, I break the mold of Alan’s “secondary device” mobile phone use case.

The other reason I noted WiFi support in iPhone is that I believe this device may shift the WiFi usage profile of its owners. I would love to use a device such as the Nokia N800 when I don’t feel like dragging out my laptop (reading news feeds on the couch in the evening, for instance), but I simply am not interested in a non-cellular capable Internet tablet. I have all the nationwide free long distance bucket minutes I could ever need on my cell, and good signal strength to boot, so why bother with VOIP for calling? Here I violate Tom’s “computer for wireless data at home/work” use case.

To me, this says there’s a third use case, one describing customers interested in maximizing their Internet capabilities with a second always available channel that supplements those times when they haul out the “big iron” PC or Mac. If it keeps its promises, iPhone’s 3.5 inch screen and Web browsing interface could solve my small, instant on, mobile Internet access device needs while maintaining my Nano‘s music chops and my phone’s call capabilities. Nerdvana.

It will be interesting to see just how many of us third use case cord cutting gadgeteers there are out there come June.

There have been a lot of so-so and a few really great articles on iPhone in the week since it was launched. What follows are my favorite blog posts, articles, and videos covering iPhone in week one.

David Pogue published an early first pass in his “Some Hands-On Time With the iPhone” after spending about an hour hands-on with an iPhone prototype the day Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced it at MacWorld. He followed that up with answers to a wide variety of reader questions in “The Ultimate iPhone FAQ” and “The Ultimate iPhone FAQ list, Part 2“.

Time covered iPhone’s development with “Apple’s New Calling: The iPhone“. Doubt after reading that one that Jobs is a bit paranoid? Read Fortune’s piece on “How Apple kept its iPhone secrets” to assuage yourself of that misgiving. Bogus prototypes to mislead employees and disguised software to hide the interface from development partners. You name it, and Jobs and company probably did it to keep iPhone hush hush the last couple of years. Good thing or bad thing, you be the judge.

What about the negatives of the device itself?

Lack of third generation wireless (3G) has been picked at by Nokians and others. Read my take in “WiFi is more important than HSDPA for early iPhone success“, which was picked for the Carnival of the Mobilists carnival #58.

Alan Reiter did a great job slicing and dicing the (lack of) imaging capabilities in his “Apple iPhone might be revolutionary, but definitely not for wireless imaging“. 2 MPix cellcam support, average at best. No flash or lens cover, argh. No video, OMG! One of my biggest disappointments with the first iPhone model.

And that leads naturally to my other really big disappointment: Lack of developer support.

As Jobs put it to the New York Times:

We define everything that is on the phone

Oh Steve, does your hubris have no end? Wait, I guess it doesn’t, as NYT reports Jobs continued with:

“These are devices that need to work, and you can’t do that if you load any software on them,” he said. “That doesn’t mean there’s not going to be software to buy that you can load on them coming from us. It doesn’t mean we have to write it all, but it means it has to be more of a controlled environment.”

What about the hundreds of millions of Java ME handsets running mobile apps, Steve? Don’t most of those devices work on a regular basis? Would the mobile Java ecosystem have been possible if it’d been “a more controlled environment”? No way. Open wins in the end.

If you agree, consider signing the iPhone Third-Party Application Support Petition and blog your take far and wide.

Looking for more reasons to dislike iPhone? Check out “10 Ways the Nokia N800 is Better Than Apple’s iPhone“. Or if you’re just looking for more about iPhone and don’t know where to start, visit “All Things iPhone” for a running commentary of what’s known, unknown, and speculated.

Perhaps Stephen Colbert summed up our first week love-hate relationship with iPhone best in giving Apple a “double wag of the finger” while stating:

You can count me out as a customer, until you send me one for free

Watch the video for the true word from week one:

Only one week in, and it’s already been an interesting ride!

Reuters is reporting that Nokia’s media head, Anssi Vanjoki, has described iPhone as “quite interesting” but said in effect that the lack of 3G will cripple it in the marketplace.

Nokia, or at least Mr. Vanjoki, doesn’t get it. And a lot of other people are falling prey to this too.

In a perfect device (updating my wishlist from way back in 2004), there would be HSDPA along with the included GSM+EDGE, WiFi, and Bluetooth. But the truth is, at least in the US a lot more people use WiFi in their office, their home, the coffee shop, and quite a few other places than pay for 3G on their cell. And in the two key places, home and work, WiFi is essentially free. Again this is especially true in the US, Apple’s launch geo for iPhone.

Let’s repeat that: WiFi at home and work is essentially free.

Free is hard to compete with. It’s going to be a long time before my mother pays extra for HSDPA, but she already has 802.11g. If Apple makes the use of WiFi truly seamless, a lot of people will buy. 3G or no.

And besides, who knows what features Apple will have in future versions of iPhone? Jobs has already mentioned 3G for upcoming iPhone models. Perhaps it’ll even be in place before the European and Asian launches.

If you accept that WiFi+EDGE is “good enough” for a lot of people, then why haven’t previous smartphones or mobile computers or whatever you want to call them crossed the chasm into mainstream adoption? In a word, interface. In three words, aesthetics and interface.

Just about everybody hates the interface on his or her phone. Free model or multi-hundred dollar smartphone, doesn’t matter, same dislike. And doesn’t every other phone on Earth look ugly now that we’ve glimpsed an iPhone? The promise of iPhone is that Apple, just maybe, has gotten the beauty of the design and the simplicity of the interface right.

You know, now that I type this I wonder if it’s not so much that Mr. Vanjoki doesn’t get it, as that he doesn’t want to get it. How this chart appears in several months may be the best measure of who’s right, Apple or Nokia:

PS I’m a NOK shareholder and use a Nokia mobile every day, all day. I don’t own any AAPL stock and have never owned an Apple product until my recent Nano. I’m just calling things as I see them.