556 CHAPTER 15: Developing for Android Wearable Devices
Another major limitation of smartwatches these days is the CPU (Central Processing Unit) support.
Processor support is usually limited to a single core, although some smartwatches, like the Neptune
Pine, feature powerful dual-core processors. Storage is usually implemented by using MicroSD
cards, with the Neptune Pine coming with 8GB and offering affordable upgrades to 64GB storage, if
needed.
I have already touched on some of the issues regarding optimizing for CPU and memory in other
areas of this book; those apply just as importantly to smartwatches, if not more so. Be careful about
using things such as data-heavy animation and special effects, if they are not absolutely needed, or
if you do utilize these in your application, make sure to implement them 100% optimally!
It is important to note that both CPU and memory require power to run and to store your application
data and code logic, and another limitation that you will find on smartwatches is battery life. A good
example of this is the Sony smartwatch 2, which currently disables smartwatch Face Skinning in
their API, because they are afraid that developers will create cool animated interactive watch faces
(skins) that they think will drain the battery life of the smartwatch product.
Another important limitation relating to the smartwatch’s CPU processing speed and power relates
to smartwatch Peripherals. Is the smartwatch CPU processor on the smartwatch itself, or is the
CPU processing your application’s program logic remotely, over a Bluetooth 3.0 or Bluetooth 4.1
broadcast standard?
This is probably the biggest consideration of smartwatch peripheral application design and
optimization, as the UI (the smartwatch’s touchscreen) event handling will be initiated on the
smartwatch peripheral, and then sent over Bluetooth 3.0 or 4.1 to a remote True Android device.
This device will then process these events in the onClick( ) or onTouch( ) event-handling structures,
and then send the resulting user experience, that is, whatever program logic is inside of these
event handlers, back over Bluetooth 3.0 or 4.1 to the smartwatch device, to be displayed on the
smartwatch face (display screen) again.
There are three areas in smartwatch application development that you need to be very careful of in
your wearables app optimization. First, how will your graphics perfectly fit the screen pixel-for-pixel?
Secondly, how smoothly will your user interface response and user experience function if you are
developing for a smartwatch peripheral? This is not a concern at all for True smartwatches, as you
now know the reasoning behind this since there is no external (wireless) communication going on.
Finally, how much of the smartwatch’s battery life does your application use? All of these things
point to well optimized Android applications; that is why I have been covering this optimization
process, in one form or another, in many of the chapters in this book.
Optimization will continue to become more and more important, as some Android devices get bigger
(for instance 4K iTV sets) and as others get smaller (smartwatches and smartglasses) or if they utilize
Bluetooth 4.1 technology over a wider expanse (such as with the Android Auto SDK, for instance).
Creating Your EarthTime.APK Android App
Create a new Android application project called EarthTime.APK in the absolute.beginners.
earthtime package using the New ➤ Android Application Project work process you learned about
in Chapter 3.