App Profile: The MeatStick

Stollem

Rating: 2/5

As a thermometer, it seems to work - if you can figure out the interface. When the app opens, you get a confusing mostly empty screen. Is the thermometer on - I have no idea, it doesn’t say what is and what is not working. Is the extender on - again no idea. This app has the opportunity to be great, instead it fails to be intuitive, but succeeds at ambiguity. When you open an app, it should be very clear to simplest of simpletons what is or is not going on. Open this app, I have no idea what is going on, and I more tech savvy than most. Click around & it’s even more confusing as to whether the equipment is on or off. No current status indicators, such as “Thermometer: Off/On” or “Extender: Off/On”. Only a few unhelpful tiny icons & a graphic logo in the background. When you click on them it tries to add new equipment. I don’t want to add equipment easier than I can discover the status of my existing equipment. Bury that in another layer, bring my status to the top layer.

90Pop

Rating: 1/5

I used it one time, cleaned it put it on the charger and put it in the cupboard about three days later, even though it’s advertised as keeping charged, I went to use it and it said it did not have enough power to be used. I put it on the charger again make sure that the batteries had full charge. Next time I wanted to use it, I hit the charger button in the morning. By afternoon, after having been on the charger most of the day, when I went to connect they told me it had less than 20% charge and needed to be in low power mode. If it actually hold a charge it was good for more than one use I probably would have given it five stars. UPDATE -got it to charge, and sometimes it works, definitely better if you got an opening on top of the stove and keep your phone within 3 feet of the stove. If you put it in a toaster oven it’s iffy if you actually put it in the oven even keeping your phone within 3 feet of the oven it disconnects and it will not reconnect. It is so rarely actually working, that I considered to never work

js785

Rating: 2/5

The stick aside, the app is awful. It’s schizophrenic, and invasive and has several problems that I will list for the developers: First, why even allow us to use it without signing in, if you’re going to pop up the sign in window on every single action. Also, I tried both the Google and Apple OpenID options, and neither worked after several attempts. Finally had to just email login. The alerts and pop ups are insane. If one pops up then 15 more will as well all saying the same thing. It’s like a 90s spam virus. One is enough. The temperature display bounces back and forth from the actual temperature and like ambient temperature. It hurts my head. Either display both side-by-side or pick one. I hate having to wait and catch it at the exact moment it takes the measurement. Smaller things: why can’t I rename the stick, the Bluetooth/wifi stuff with the extender is glitchy, the repeated firmware updates are excessive, the UI in general is too much, and the tutorial is just annoying not helpful. Simplify and improve the app or just ship a small device that displays what it transmits instead.