Music controls don't work for iOS

[zac-garby]

The music app can't control the iOS Music app. I'm assuming this is just not implemented (yet?), but I thought I'd make an issue in case I'm doing something wrong or I need to set something up in order for it to work.

Otherwise, if it's not implemented yet, are there plans for iOS music controls in the future?

[thefenriswolf]

Which companion app are you using?

[Avamander]

BLE standard doesn't contain one for music control (BT Classic does, but we don't have that), such functionality has to be implemented by the companion app.

[zac-garby]

ah that makes sense. i'm using nRF Connect, but only because afaik it's the only one for iOS

[JF002]

Indeed, NRFConnect is a generic app that allows to connect to devices, browse their characteristic, debug the connection,... but it does not provide any higher level functionalities like music control, navigation or notifications.
Unfortunately, I think there's no companion app compatible with PineTime / InfiniTime on iOS for now. Someone want to fill that gap?

[zac-garby]

if i had more time i'd definitely look into making one. also that explains what the notifications section is for, i take it that the watch can show your phone notifications? if so, i'm not sure if iOS actually allows apps to look at systemwide notifications, i would guess not?

[Avamander]

i'm not sure if iOS actually allows apps to look at systemwide notifications, i would guess not?

You can maybe find the Pebble app's App Store description and see if it implemented it. It might actually be doable, but I haven't personally paid attention.

[JF002]

I would be surprised if iOS doesn't allow notifications to be sent to any smartwatch, but I don't know much about the Apple world so...

[zac-garby]

yeah looks like it's possible actually, i was just thinking how obsessed apple is with privacy recently

[tapresle]

Pebble used to do notifications on the original Pebble, I never had a Pebble Time or the others so I can't speak to the other functionality. I've actually recently received my InfiniTime and made a quick and dirty app to set the time via iOS. I'll see what's involved in getting notifications and basic music controls working but can't guarantee any timeline.

EDIT: I've looked into it a bit today, iOS is extremely locked down now compared to the days of Pebble so I believe their old way of getting all notifications to the watch has been blocked, @zac-garby if you have a lead send it my way. I've been able to get Apple Music connected to my app to send music info TO the InfiniTime, but not control back yet. I use Spotify personally so I'll see what extra is included to get that hooked up, looks like I need to get into the Spotify SDK and all that.

[tapresle]

I've done some more digging and it looks like Apple Media Service needs to be implemented on the InfiniTime firmware. Similarly, ANCS for notifications. If there's someone more comfortable with editing the firmware to implement those I'd be happy to test, I don't quite have the tools I need to edit firmware yet and it's been almost a decade since I've looked at C/C++ code 😆

[computergeek125]

Was reminded this issue exists today - I have an iPhone, an unsealed dev watch, a Mac, and probably enough Unix/Linux machines to figure out how to compile Infinitime. I can also help test, but my C/C++ isn't probably up to par for actually writing this

[TheAwesome98-Real]

Old issue but InfiniLink works, but only with Apple Music so far. There was an issue saying system wide media support is coming soon iirc