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wolfeh@lemmy.world

I'm looking for the most "open" fitness tracking system (bike computer, Strava alternative, etc.) (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by grue@lemmy.world to c/bicycling@lemmy.world

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I want to get more intentional about my fitness and measuring my performance and whatnot. As such, I'm in the market for fitness tracking technology for the first time.

However, I'm very much a Free Software / self-hosted sort of person, and I'm very un-thrilled about how proprietary all this stuff seems. It looks like the sensors themselves are kind of standardized ("ant+", whatever that is), and some of the data formats can be imported and exported, but the bike computers themselves and the companion apps and the online services appear to be trying to become walled gardens.

Short of building a bike computer from components myself, what hardware and software should I be looking into?

Edit: my most immediate concern is figuring out what bike computer to get, to be able to log data from the ANT+ speed, cadence, and heart rate sensors I've already bought (along with a GPS track). I'm considering anything from a Wahoo ELEMNT Bolt V3 ($300), to an off-brand(?) one like a Magene C506 ($100) or iGPSSport BSC100S ($38), to using my smartphone with an ANT+ dongle and the "A Training Tracker" app (Github, Play Store).

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[–] grue@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Is the Wahoo computer absolutely tied to the Wahoo app (as in, that app being the only way to get data off the device), or are there other ways to do it (a third-party app or mounting the bike computer as a filesystem and copying files off)?

Does either the Wahoo device or app ever behave badly (e.g. nag you to upgrade to a paid tier, display other ads at you, try to trick you into sending Wahoo your data even after you said no, etc.)?

(Basically, if I settle for a proprietary device and/or software, I want to pick the stuff least likely to abuse me that way.)

It's also easy to get lost in chasing the "is this ride improving my performance" trap. If training is your interest and you're genuinely wanting to see stats improving all that can help and more power to you. But if you also like riding your bike for fun, mental health, getting into nature, etc. remember that it's ok to skip all the data and just have a ride that puts a smile on your face too.

Right now I mostly ride for utility/transportation purposes, but that isn't enough to keep me in shape. I'm trying to "game-ify" it a little bit so that I exercise more consistently. (Speaking of which, I'd like an open source alternative to Zwift too, LOL)

[–] grumpo_potamus@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

So supposedly you can pull .fit files from the Wahoo with a USB connection to your computer. I tried - I had to do an update on the unit, then in the app I had to go to Settings and enable USB connections then also enable the transfer of FIT files

(that option didn't show until after the firmware update). I didn't see any FIT files in /exports or elsewhere, so ?? - It's not their "standard option" for sure.

As for nags - none that I've experienced. They started with all the access as a time-limited trial, then that gets downgraded to the free tier after a month or so. Not a big deal. Strava will bug you to upgrade the most out of my "stack"