I started this version with the intent to launch a brand new feature in early January 2020, but I didn’t foresee some caveats in the implementation of the new feature, and didn’t want to delay all the work that I am finding extremely pleasant and useful while dogfooding the app everyday. So here we are. The new feature is still happening; just delayed to work out the details. I am also trying an experiment to build and launch another app that might precede this new feature. It’s still very much related to running, but I better 🤫 before sharing too much!
Here’s what we got in this release,
Edit total distance of a run
Satellite mode for route map
Pause indicators for segments and total duration
UI Improvements
Edit Total Distance
This is the key feature of this release. It enables ability to edit total distance of a run that has been already saved in the Health app via Apple Watch. The primary idea behind editing total distance is based on 2 different scenarios,
Races: Races have officially measured course, but the actual distance we cover with our watch might be slightly off due to GPS issues or turns. As runners, our races are the highlight events of the season (or otherwise). So our log showing our race performance inaccurately, with incorrect pace, can be annoying. Now we can fix it using Tempo.
Indoor Runs: Indoor runs are tracked based on the treadmill data (or pre-measured laps on an indoor track). Due to lack of GPS, most tracking devices often report these runs inaccurately. But now we have the control to fix the distance.
Tempo will also auto-update the average pace based on tracked duration. At some point in the future, we will add a more elaborate editing / trimming to be able to slice off part of runs for scenarios when we forget to stop the watch. I originally had this feature as part of trimming, but one of the runners reached out asking for a simpler option as implemented here. Instead of waiting too long for an entire super-fancy, but trickier to build, trimming functionality, I decided to build and release this quickly.
The feature itself seems straightforward, but behind the scenes it took some rearrangement of how we access and cache Health data to account for edited total distance. It's always interesting (and scary) how the entire system setup gets affected when we change a read-only UI to support read-write functionality. We have had notes and tags for write functionality, but this is the first time that Tempo is going to support editing running data. And I believe, with this feature, Tempo is the only running app out there to support updates to a run that has been already saved in the Health app from the Apple Watch Workout app.
Please note that none of these changes will delete or edit your Health data. That’s technically not permissible by HealthKit API, and I wouldn’t endanger our running data. When you edit the total distance, Tempo makes a local entry within Tempo (and backed up to your iCloud) for that run along with your edit. The changes are around how Tempo reads and caches data to your iCloud account to include changes to the total distance. Your edits for the total distance are saved to your iCloud account along with your notes and tags.
To edit total distance of a run, scroll all the way to the bottom of details screen of any run and tap Edit Total Distance.
Satellite Mode for Route Map
That’s exactly as it sounds — we can now relive any of our runs with real-life satellite imagery of the route. And it can also be shared. 🙌
Pause Indicators
If you pause during your runs, you will see the pause times indicated in more places.
Splits for segments (released in v2.7.0) now include pause times.
Total duration of every run now shows total run time + any paused time (in total).
UI Improvements
As soon as you download 2.8.0, you will notice the general screen flow and transitions are slightly different in a good way. These changes are more aligned with overall iOS style, and specifically with iOS 13. In general, you will notice,
Run details and screens off of dashboard are now pushed in from right vs vertically from bottom. This should allow for swiping right to go back (dismiss). And it also allows for easily using page sheet modal screens (example: editing total distance of a run) in various parts of the app.
Bottom bar (aka tab bar) auto-hides and pops back up when the above screens are pushed in / out.
These changes were kind of long overdue and something that I couldn’t afford to spend time on when Tempo was not my full-time project. Getting better everyday. 😃
As always please reach out with feedback or say hi.
Enjoy & Keep Running!
PS: If you are interested in helping beta test the new app, please email rahul@indie.sh or DM @TempoLog.