Food Logging Interface changes

[MattFitbit]

Fitbit update 10/2/18: Thanks for your questions about recent changes to our food logging page. Our team changed the page to the previous version while we address your concerns.

[JoeyDavis]

Glad this got reverted today. The new interface was clearly not ready for prime time given it actually reduced the features available. For example, something as simple as displaying the "Daily Totals" for grams of Fat, Fiber, Carbs, Sodium, and protein were entirely missing.

As it is, these are no longer available in the mobile app...

[MarkNYC.2]

today everything looked normal with the food log. did i notice an epic fckup yesterday, or was that a horrible nightmare? what was that and who had the bright idea of mass deploying such non-intuitive interface? 

[Damatu75]

Yeah...I hate to say it, but I wonder if the ultimate goal is to put that kind of detailed information behind a paywall (i.e., you'd have to be a premium member to access it). I'm honestly kind of surprised they haven't done that with sleep phase tracking...

[SubZe12o]

I would not mind paying for it but they better have all the data I have now plus a **ahem** tone more of options for me to play with in order to charge me for it.  Options like changing the names of my meals, having more then x amount of meals per day, have the option of carbs = x carbs = x without fiber, mobile the same as web interface, copy food from one day to another, fill out 7 days at the same time, and on and on!

[GershonSurge]

Truthfully, I seldom use the food log since I created my own in Excel that is more user friendly. It tracks everything I need, calculates the cost per day of the food and even makes a shopping list. If I wanted to, I know Excel well enough to link it with King Soopers and place an order I could pickup in an hour. It's not worth the effort though as I enjoy the social aspect of walking around the store and meeting people I know.

However, taking functionality away from the food log is a symptom of more things to come in the other areas. Essentially, they seem to want to convert everything to the phone format. The reason I have a 21 inch screen is to be able to fit more data, not to see a small screen in a big format.

I've converted most essential tracking of my physical activities to Excel because I know I can't depend on Fitbit to even be in existence in a couple years. In doing so, I've gotten to the point I can use two inexpensive pedometers to get everything I need. One for the day and one for my walks.

Frankly, I don't like being pushed into more expensive devices that do things I don't need. I don't need to get phone call notifications after the other party has already hung up. I don't use text messaging. I don't need an mp3 player in my watch. My cell phone does fine, thank you. I don't need cookie-cutter coaching. I don't need to spend time during the day analyzing every step of a run/walk. All I need is a simple countdown timer.  I don't need a device where I can't replace the battery. I don't need a device where the numbers are so small I can't read them without my reading glasses. A heart rate monitor is pretty useless to me. I never knew of a kid that looked at a heart rate monitor while they were playing. I don't need bands that are designed to fail and render a $250 device (Surge) useless after a year.

Compared to other devices, Fitbit's strength was the dashboard and the community. The community has dwindled to the point where there are few people who post regularly. Getting people with common interests is difficult. 

[Damatu75]

It would have to be a *lot* of new functionality. As it is, premium costs $40 a year and appears to pretty much provide a bunch of "personal trainer" workouts, which aren't something I'd ever use. It's also hard for me to justify splashing out additional money every year given the frequent issues with the interface and the devices.

[Raynoszs]

EDIT.

Just noticed that they reverted it! YAY! I can finally see my macros again! Thanks Fitbit and hurray to the community for making themselves heard.

Hopefully this was just a mistake on Fitbit’s part or if it was an intentional “update” I hope they realise that people actually like their macro data to be accessible. 

[cind513]

thank you so much, O2BThin for posting that link...yesterday I clicked it and chose to send direct msg to @FITBITSUPPORT  and rec'd prompt direct msg back from them and today my log has been reverted back to the prior format...I can now count grams and fiber and sodium...YAY!...peace & love, darlin'...

[Kurtzie1998]

Just want to also say, thank you for fixing the food logging page.

[GlenSiegel]

I wish I could agree that is wasn't ready for prime time as there were
fewer features. Fitbit changed the format of the weekly emailed summary
some time back and reduced the available information without any
explanation.  But still, tis was not ready for prime time.....

[OhCrude]

Right on. I agree 100% with copy food from one day to another and fill out
7 days at the same time!
I am a simple meal planner. Sunday evening I prepare my Fitness and
Nutrition calendar to fit my activities and events for the week. It is a
hassle to repeat each day or every other day the same or near the same
menu. Hopefully this can be added to the present Food Log Interface.

[djb80]

I must be only one that thought the interface was sort of neat but needed some revision

[waterbear71]

I did complain, they told me to come here and vote on other user's comments and submit my own.  I told them they needed to look at this forum.  Hope your voice is heard!  They told me they don't allow the option to revert for users but maybe they'll revert it for all of us, I think they don't understand just how terrible it is.

[pjfarr]

@OhCrude

For what it's worth, you can create and save meals that you have often and just enter them each day in one shot, without having to hunt down each item and enter it separately. When logging a "saved" meal, each item in the meal and the serving sizes etc. are shown separately, as if you'd entered each one manually.

[MattFitbit · Accepted solution]

Fitbit update 10/2/18: Thanks for your questions about recent changes to our food logging page. Our team changed the page to the previous version while we address your concerns.

[rparrott80]

We don't want an updated page! We want to keep the old one!!!

Moderator edit: word choice

[William78]

"The updated food logging page will be available soon."  

Honestly.  Please no.  Just leave it alone.  It is great the way it is.  Utilize those resources to focus on something else.  Anything else!  Thank you.

[Damatu75]

I'll echo others - please pass on up the line, so to speak, that the new interface we saw was nowhere near ready for prime time. Most of us do understand the desire to provide a consistent experience across platforms; however, consistent doesn't have to mean (indeed, often shouldn't mean) identical. The new food log was essentially a straight-up port of the phone app interface - which provides much less information and a mobile (touch-screen) optimized experience for entering food. The old web interface is much, much easier to interact with on a normal computer screen. It's also completely unnecessary to remove large amounts of essential data for a web interface just so that it looks almost identical to the phone app. Putting on my prediction hat, I suspect that there's also no way that Fitbit will be able to convince people that losing access to that information is "for their own good," so to speak. 

TL;DR: Sure, make the design elements/colors/whatever more in-line with what we see on the phone app, but please, don't sacrifice the data access and functionality that make the Fitbit dashboard so useful to serious users!

[firescapesunris]

Thank you, Matt.  While I appreciate innovation, it's only a positive when it's an improvement.  Thanks for listening to the end users' feedback--

[julianams]

@MattFitbit what do you mean, "The updated food logging page will be available soon." ? 

Will the new page allow us to continue monitoring what we need to monitor in grams or should we migrate to another application? 

I'm happy to ditch fitbit for good if you make it impossible for me to use! Just let us know when.