Following an app suggestion I got the Moves app

A while back I had been thinking of getting the Fit Bit, but I was completely put off by the price. The Fit Bit is a gadget which you wear on your body and records your every move. The idea is that you record how many steps you take during the day and you use it to record your physical activity during the day. One of the problems that people have that use the Fit Bit, is that quite often they lose the object, or it gets put into the wash or generally trashed in some way or other. When they cost so much, this is rather inconvenient and expensive. So when I was listening to the podcast from the British Tech Network, I heard Don McAllister say that he was going to recommend an application called Moves. Basically what you have is an application that will take the place of the Fit Bit and what’s so good about it, is that it is much less likely that you will lose your iPhone5 and you don’t need an extra piece of tech to make it work.

I installed the application straightaway on to my iPhone

So while I was still listing to the podcast with Ewan Rankin and his crew I got my hands on this free application. I had the thing turned on and because I was at work it was able to have something to actually record. I do quite a lot of walking when I am at work and it recorded me walking for 20 minutes. Then I finished work, I got into my car and went to the supermarket and it recorded me for six minutes walking around the shop getting my bits and pieces.

Now for some reason it didn’t do the recording following another seven minutes of driving, when I did a small amount of walking from the car to the bank and back again to the car. The application now has me placed at my home address and I will see if it starts to do so more recording when I go and take the dog out for a walk. Walking for less than 30 seconds is nor recorded.

Will the Moves application kill my iPhone battery?

For sure, the application Moves will have an effect of draining the battery on my iPhone a little bit faster. Any of the applications which use the GPS sensors to track your positioning will do this. It seems though, that is the developer has worked out that it is possible to minimise the battery drain by having it detect when it is completely still and it is not needed to track your movements. I am still in the early stages of using this so I can’t comment on how this will work out on a long-term basis, but so far I like what the application does and I’m willing to risk running out of juice if I have to.

Using the application Moves in the real world

It is not necessary for you to do anything to tell the application whether you’re walking, cycling or travelling in a fast moving vehicle such as a car. I didn’t touch any of the settings and it seemed to know when I was doing what I was doing. The application tells me that so far I have taken 2,164 steps and it also gives me a time line. The left part of the timeline has an icon which shows you a map symbol, tap on that to see where it was when that part of the recording was created. I just tapped on the icon and I was able to add a name to the first place and to the supermarket. It even came up with the suggestion of the name of the supermarket that I went into.

At the top of the screen is the button for Today, if I tap on that it takes me to a rudimentary calendar. You can choose to view either days or weeks. It is also possible to share your physical activity as recorded by the application Moves, through Twitter, Facebook, Mail or to your Camera Roll. Within the settings of the application you get a Frequently Asked Questions section which tells you all about how the application works and what it will record. For instance it doesn’t record walks which are less than 30 seconds. It says that it will even work if you’re walking on a treadmill, although it is likely that the distance calculation will not be very accurate.

Privacy of your data

There is quite a long section in the settings about your privacy concerning your physical movements. Obviously the application has to collect data about where you are and then use that data so that it can give you feedback. Judging by the amount of information put into their privacy policy, I get the impression that they are good guys and unlikely to do anything bad with your data.

The NoStylus verdict on Moves

I think I can safely say that this is a marvellous application, it is especially good because it is free. I haven’t had the benefit of being able to use a Fit Bit, so I can’t make a direct comparison and perhaps I don’t need to. I like what this application does and I think it is brilliant and it is going to save me from the expense of getting other tech devices to work with my iPhone or latest iPod Touch. If you are interested in capturing the data of your physical movements during the day so that you can use it as part of a get fit regime, then the Moves application will be an enormous benefit to you. Did I mention already that you can get it for free? Time for me to go and walk the dog. I can notch up soome more steps…