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Diabetes control and its tech; should I build a Chrome app?

Now that I can download the data the data from three different glucometers, of two different models with my glucometer utilities I’ve been pondering on ways to implement a print out or display mode. While the text output is good if you’re just looking into how your different readings can be, when you have more than one meter it gets difficult to follow it across multiple outputs, and it’s not useful for your endocrinologist to read.

I have a working set of changes that add support for a sqlite3 backend for the tool, so you can download from multiple meters and then display them as belonging to a single series — which works fine if you are one person with multiple meters, rather than multiple users each with their glucometer. On the other hand, this made me wonder if I’m spending time working in the right direction.

Even just adding support for storing the data locally had me looking into adding two more dependencies (SQLite3 support, which yes, comes with Python, but needs to be enabled), and pyxdg (with a fallback) to make sure to put the data in the right folder, to simplify backups. Having a print-out or an UI that can display the data over time would add even more dependencies, meaning that the tool would be only really useful if packaged by distributions, or if binaries were to be distributed. While this would still give you a better tool on non-Windows OSes, compared to having no tool at all if left to LifeScan (the only manufacturer currently supported), it still is limiting.

In a previous blog post I was musing the possibility of creating an Android app that implements these protocols. This would mean already reimplementing them from scratch, as running Python on Android is difficult, so rewriting the code in a different language, such as Java or C#, would be needed — indeed, that’s why I jumped on the opportunity to review PacktPub’s Xamarin Mobile Application Development for Android, which will be posted here soon; before you fret, no I don’t think that using Xamarin for this would work, but it was still an instructive read.

But after discussing with some colleagues, I had an idea that is probably going to give me more headaches than writing an app for Android, and at the same time be much more useful. Chrome has a serial port API – in JavaScript, of course – which can be used by app developers. I don’t really look forward to implement the UltraEasy/UltraMini protocol in JavaScript (the protocol is binary structs-based, while the Ultra2 should actually be easy as it’s almost entirely 7-bit safe), but admittedly that solves a number of problems: storage, UI, print out, portability, ease-of-use.

Downloading that data to a device such as the Chromebook HP11 would also be a terrific way to make sure you can show the data to your doctor — probably more so than on a tablet, definitely more than on a phone. And I know for a fact that ChromeOS supports PL2303 adapters (the chipset used by the LifeScan cable that I’ve been given). The only problem with such an idea is that I’m not sure how HTML5 offline storage is synced with the Google account, if at all — if I am to publish the Chrome app, I wouldn’t want to have to deal with HIPPA.

Anyway, for now I’m just throwing the idea around, if somebody wants to start before me, I’ll be happy to help!

Comments 1
  1. Chrome’s serial port API sounds like a nightmare†.I have been playing with the idea of `libglucose` for retrieving data from glucose meeter and making yet-another-standard for handling the data. Then building apps to display and sync (!) on top of that.My ideal app should read in any glucose meeter, be able to securely sync the data (git+ssh?) between app instances/central repo (I have multiple meters in different locations), and display reports.Given these requirements I’ve imagined something like a sync daemon. A very simple thing with little UI that can open its data reports in a browser. These reports could easily be saved or printed. Simple HTML reports would work in any OS (even mobile), any doctor’s office, and should keep the effort of porting to a new platform low.Accu-Chek’s 360 HTML reports (found in Accu-Chek Mobile devices) inspired much of this. ACMs mount as MAS devices containing a HTML file with all the data and resources.†Speaking as an individual and not an official statement from my employer who builds product on top of Chromium.

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