Ant+ arrives on the iPhone

Well almost, hopefully available soon.

Here is an early review. And here is the Wahoo Website for more information.

They will be offering a small Ant+ dongle that can be used with pretty much any Ant+ device (power meter, heart rate strap, cadence, foot pad etc.) to log data.

They have a Wahoo Ant+ utility app (already) available in the iTunes App store. This can be used to test or record data.

Best yet, they will have an API available to allow any iPhone App developer to develop applications using the dongle. So if you want to do a customer coaching app that monitors your Metrigear or Quarq or ?? device, then go for it.

The developed app's should run (with Ant+ dongle) on pretty much any of the current Apple products. I.e. iTouch (version 3 OS), iPhone (3Gs) and iPad. Allowing for a wide range of platforms. From the inexpensive iTouch ($200 and up), the ubiquitous iPhone, and the larger screen iPad (for those coaching apps).

The Ant+ dongle will be available as a dongle. And also as a iPhone case. I would expect an iTouch case as well (maybe with GPS added.)

I have done a bit of development on the iPhone/iTouch. The specs are pretty amazing. You get a real bang for you buck in these devices. Lots of memory, lots of CPU. The one limitation with the version 3 os is that it is difficult to have something run in the background. E.g. for data-logging. You need to keep it in the foreground and manage the screen to reduced battery usage. And you get kicked out for things like incoming phone calls (iPhone only.) But the version 4 os (fall release) should address some of those issues.

I don't own an Ant+ devices yet (actually, maybe, I have some older Garmin accessories that might be, and an iAero.) But I am going to order this so I can play with it as a developer.