2021-02-20
Like, but... probably not enough to use
2021-92-20: retrying Hourly after not using it for many months.
BRIEF: many improvements, but still not enough to make me switch.
if I were to switch, I might use Hourly on my watch and disable it on my iPhone, in favor of the now old “Chime“ app.
main problems: watch notification does not display the time, and I wish there were spoken time on the watch. chosen times not synced between iPhone and multiple Apple watches
—-+ DETAIL 2021-02-20
The ability to set almost arbitrary times to chime is much appreciated. if I were to continue using Hourly, I would undoubtedly set alarms just before the hour.
However, it is a pain to set so many times, 12 or 24 of them, and then have no good way of saving or restoring them. Setting so many custom times on the watch is even more painful than setting them on the phone. And there does not seem to be a way to keep the custom times on the watch the same as the custom times on the phone. especially since I have two Apple watches, version 3and version 4,having upgraded. I swap them when battery runs out. I would like to have the same times on both watches.
Note: I might like to be able to edit the watch settings on my phone, but I almost certainly do not want to receive notifications on both the active watch and the phone at the same time. That would drive me crazy. In fact, for the most part I only want to receive time notifications on the (active) watch.
I am a big fan of spoken time. But the male voice that Hourly uses on the iPhone gives me the creeps, and will probably be one of the reasons I do not use Hourly this time around. I prefer Apple’s default female voice, or the female voice used by the Chime app.
I wish that I could change the voice message, which seems to be hardwired as “it is 2 PM” or “ it is 1400”. simply the time “2 PM“ without “it is“ would be an improvement,like Apple spoken time. I would like to have “almost 2 PM“ when I set the custom time at 1:58 PM, just before the hour, to give myself time to log into zoom before the meeting starts.
The Hourly notification on the watch does not seem to display the time at all, just the logo. Which somewhat defeats the purpose, adding an extra step, to dismiss the Hourly logo and look at the time on my main watch face.
Setting Notification times using the Hourly app on the watch has a problem for people with old eyesight like me: I increase the text size to maximum, and made all text in bold, to improve readability, but as a result in the Hourly app when you are configuring times many numbers do not fit and appear in the boxes as “...”. I would prefer a textual time picker, rather than this one that relies on the digital crown.
—+ Older review
My first review from many months ago:
I like Hourly - mainly because it is the first hourly chime app I have found that, on my Apple Watch, creates a notification that shows both current time and the alarm time.
[This has changed in the 2021-02-20 version of the Hourly watch app — now it seems not to display the time at all, just the Hourly logo.]
(I almost missed an appointment because Apple’s default alarms show only the alarm time. I had not dismissed the notification, and thought I was looking at the current time.)
I am uncertain about whether Hourly works on the watch when the phone is distant or separated. What I really want is an hourly chime that runs standalone on the watch, but where a phone app provides easy configuration. I.e. phone optional.
Hourly requests cell phone data access by default, which is a security concern. I have disabled, and will see what breaks.
BUG: Hourly is currently displaying its text message twice on my watch.
[2021-02-20: I no longer see this bug .]
Hourly only chimes on hour and half hour. E.g. cannot set a chime at 5 minutes before the hour, which is what I prefer.
[2021.02.20: The new version of Hourly concert almost arbitrary times. Thanks! I would be using Hourly now if the time notification on my watch displayed the time.]