Hacking with Claude on a $27 Smart Watch

sspeckx about 3 hours ago 28 commentsRead Article on mikekasberg.com

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Discussion (28 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

wxw•about 1 hour ago

> Although I’ve been saying “Claude”, I actually did most of the work in OpenCode with some of my favorite open weights models. Kimi K3 & K2.6, and DeepSeek v4 Pro & Flash.

Interesting, is Claude becoming the Kleenex of the agent world?

realo•about 1 hour ago

I launched Claude on my pebble watch face software some time ago. It was also great fun to see it rejuvenate a 10-year old obsolete code base and make it work very well on the latest pebble Time 2 watches now available (finally!) today.

https://apps.repebble.com/bitcoin-and-weather_38d93227474b40...

https://github.com/yodalf/coincan

kixiQu•16 minutes ago

It's interesting to think how nearly-e-waste level hardware could combine with something [home-cooked](https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/) to be really cool, especially for folks who might have been intimidated by this kind of development before.

yjftsjthsd-h•about 1 hour ago

> The watch can’t hold this whole image in memory at once; it has to stream it from the file system.

I really do wish the pinetime had more RAM; it's really really small and a pretty painful bottleneck.

Edit: Oh, once the "pro" version is out I guess there's an easy answer to that: https://pine64.org/2026/03/28/pinetime_march_2026/

dubdbdb•17 minutes ago

The original PineTime has 64 KiB of RAM and execute in place ROM which is plenty for an embedded device

mlhpdx•about 1 hour ago

Take the fun up a level with the Waveshare ESP32-S3 AMOLED 2.09” watch.

Power management is absolutely required, but it’s a fun platform. And for about the same price good display, peripherals and CPU.

I’d like to see one with the C6 variant for the low power core.

mkasberg•36 minutes ago

Nice! This looks fun, maybe I'll need to try this next!

_def•about 3 hours ago

Yay, I wanted to do the same - glad someone did work on it and shared it! Thanks! Although I think what I've learned is that I actually don't like wrist bands, so... yeah.

Groxx•about 1 hour ago

fwiw I pretty much only like the metal "mesh" bands, if you haven't tried those - all other kinds make me sweat (or get uncomfortably juicy when I sweat) and/or collect crud that eventually irritates my skin if I don't wash it frequently. the mesh breathes extremely well in comparison, and essentially doesn't build up gunk at all.

also many watches are incredibly thick and I apparently routinely get my wrist within millimeters of darn near everything. a thin one (pebble time round) solved that, and being light also means it doesn't slide around or require a very tight strap.

x______________•about 3 hours ago

> <..>I actually don't like wrist bands

What's stopping you from using the watch piece by itself or as another type of wearable accessory?

jareklupinski•about 2 hours ago

mine is on a wallet chain like a pocketwatch

reaperducer•about 1 hour ago

Or pin it upside-down on your breast pocket, like a nurse.

(It's upside down so you can just lift it slightly to see the display.)

bravura•about 2 hours ago

The PineTime watch unfortunately does not have any microphone, so there is no possibility of voice control.

dallen33•about 2 hours ago

Not the point of the article but it did show a Bluesky post... I didn't know you could make the Apple Watch interface look different with a third-party app. I gotta try this out.

ck2•29 minutes ago

really hoping someday soon "AI" enables the ability to have an open-source $100 Garmin clone

Coros and Amazfit especially got close but they are closed development even though they push features and bug-fixes daily to compete in the market

there has a to be a single or maybe 2,3 chip solution for known desired features, dual-band GPS, AMOLED screen, full five physical buttons, ANT+BLE+WIFI radios, and enough RAM+storage to not worry about hyper-efficiency anymore

NoboruWataya•about 2 hours ago

> Although I’ve been saying “Claude”, I actually did most of the work in OpenCode with some of my favorite open weights models. Kimi K3 & K2.6, and DeepSeek v4 Pro & Flash.

... This seems needlessly confusing/misleading? Author continues to use "Claude" throughout the article.

HanClinto•about 2 hours ago

Maybe "Claude" is the new "Xerox", but for coding agents instead of copiers?

hgoel•about 2 hours ago

Like older people saying "ChatGPT" for everything AI

mlhpdx•about 1 hour ago

Not just older people, though they may be more likely to make the “Googling with ChatGPT” joke.

NitpickLawyer•about 2 hours ago

Or the refs in some american game using "iPads" while visibly holding some MS tablets that they probably paid handsomely to be used and displayed...

system2•about 1 hour ago

If it is open source, is it still considered hacking?

noman-land•41 minutes ago

Hacking is widely considered to historically mean "using a system in a creative and unusual way to get it to behave in ways that were not anticipared or intended by the creator". A hacker is a tinkerer. Some tinkerers do crime. Most don't.

yomismoaqui•about 1 hour ago

Asking this on a site called Hacker News is gold.

system2•43 minutes ago

Heh, true, but when I think about open source, I think of "developing". Hacking indicates a restricted device being unlocked or doing things that it was not meant to do. If this is the definition of hacking, installing Ubuntu on a brand-new machine is hacking.

zem•5 minutes ago

it's the difference between "hacking" and "hacking on"

mlmonkey•about 1 hour ago

Hacking means much more than just breaking into systems ...

reaperducer•about 1 hour ago

I'm old enough to have lived through at least seven definitions of "hacker."

Including the one in the late 1970's when a hacker was someone who took public domain software and then sold it commercially with their own name on it.

knodi•about 2 hours ago

if you used the word "Hacking" anywhere in your project i'm suprised Fable didn't downgrade you.