Originally Posted by
chaadster
Not necessarily. The point could simply be to not have to pull the actual phone out..
Sure, that's possible but not likely at all. Whoever is calling you would need to know to call you on the other number and you'd need to spend extra to enable it. Compared to just using your regular phone you are carrying, that doesn't seem worth it at all.
Originally Posted by
chaadster
As with the Apple Watch which can place and receive calls while connected to the iPhone, obviating the need to handle the phone, I can see the same functionality being handy in a cyclocomputer.
The Apple watch is something people would have access to nearly all the time.
Having that functionality in something you always have with you is much more valuable.
Sure, some people might see the same functionality as "handy" in a cycle computer but probably not enough to do the engineering work to support it.
Originally Posted by
chaadster
Relatedly, an Apple Watch can call over WiFi even without an iPhone if it connects to a wifi network which the iPhone connected to previously and if the cell carrier service supports wifi calling. I can do this from my iPad and laptop as well, as ifi alling s suppored by Verizon. It’s handy if I take off to the cafe wthout my iPhone, but the use-case for a cyclocomputer is less obvious.
The market for the Apple watch is much, much larger than that for cycle computers. You are the second person in this thread that is missing that important thing.
All of these things are, basically, the same kind of devices: technologically, it's possible for all of them to do the same things.
The problem is that adding features costs money, money that makes no sense spending unless you can make substantially more selling it.
So, the issue isn't whether it's possible (it's certainly not that hard) or whether it's useful (any feature will be useful to
somebody).
The issue is whether there is a sufficient market to make enough to offset the cost of adding the feature.
It's worth doing for the Apple watch since the market for that is huge and not that price sensitive.
It doesn't seem worth doing for cycle computers because the market for that is tiny and, probably, more price sensitive. The fact that you are adding a feature that duplicates the functionality of a device most people are going to also carry (and which is more convenient and cheaper to use) makes it even less worthwhile.
And the market for expensive cycle computers be at some risk of people just opting to use the phones they already have instead.