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Ask HN: Best wearableS for indoor location, health data, alarms and zapping me?
2 points by throwawayadvsec on July 15, 2023 | hide | past | favorite
Hi, I'm looking to experiment further with positive/negative reinforcement, hacking my bad habits and change my behavior, using software(maybe even hook it to some GPT based coach)

My first attempt at this was using a Pavlok 2, basically a device that can vibrate, beep, or send you small electric shocks(triggerable with app settings, 3rd party apps or an API). When I was using it completely destroyed my habit of doomscrolling on reddit, imgur etc...it was literally saving me 3 hours a day, I was hooking it up to a custom browser extension I made, it was amazing) it can also help for smoking(it have some primitive motion tracking), sleep schedule, negative reinforcement, time tracking…

But IMHO it lacked a bunch of interesting features, and it wasn't that far from a PoC IMO.

I'm looking for a wearable "stack”(or just one device, but I really doubt I can find a device that does everything)

The features I need would be:

-precise indoor location(≈1meter), I need to be able to know from a distant server, whether I'm located on my bed, in my home-gym, in front of the fridge, on my couch, (I could add desk, but I can detect that with a script on my computer)(putting cameras in every room of the house isn’t a path I’d be keen on taking)

-being able to trigger beeping/vibrating/alarms, and being able to trigger small electric shocks would be nice(from an API), I can use a Pavlok for that but I’d like to limit as much as possible the number of different devices I’m using)

-pedometer, heart rate, average speed

Optional but nice to have:

maybe gps, maybe sleep tracking(Pavlov do track it but it’s not advanced at all)

Gyroscope/accelerometer access(I think pavlok has it, but it's only used in their embedded firmware, and pretty hard to reverse engineer)

a smartwatch screen with notifications/apps

A way to lock the device to my wrist

My spontaneous first plan would have to stuck a pavlok to an apple watch while wearing an AirTag necklace, and managing all that with custom software.

I could spend 1000$ on this + a good amount of coding/reverse engineering.(if you’re looking for a product to build this could be great, a lot of health/self-improvement obsessed people might be interested ;))

I’d only use apple products as a last resort if I don’t find better options.

Do you have better ideas?

Thanks !



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