Public Sharing

We’re introducing a small new feature for all accounts called Public URL sharing. This makes things a bit easier to share your statistics while at the same time not having to create a TrustedVue login for everyone you to see them.

What will I see?

You’ll now see a “Share” link at the top of many pages. When Public Sharing is turned on you’ll then be presented with a URL you can copy/paste and send anywhere and to anyone you like. Put it in an Email, Blog post, Social Network, Instant Message or anywhere else you like. You basically get an address you can hotlink anywhere.

What will viewers see?

When people go to this page, they’ll see your statistics in a read-only view as well as a limited navigation for common pages. It is similar to what TrustedVue users see, but with a limited subset of data and they isn’t any messaging. For your immediate diabetes support team and the people you trust, we still recommend giving them each a TrustedVue login.

Right now you can only share single day pages and multi-day statistics/trend pages. We’ll be implementing the graphs in the near future

Privacy

You’re data is of course up to you to choose to share so public sharing is disabled by default. You can easily turn it on my clicking the checkbox in your settings.

For more info on Public Sharing and how to enable it please visit the Public Sharing Help Wiki Page

Multiple Entry Single Input Form

This has been a popular request and is something that will hopefully make it easier to input a large amount of various entries at once. This makes it easy to input all your sugar, med, food and activity entries in one form at the end of the day for example.

We give you quite a few by default and you can always add more by clicking, well, “Add More” Blank entries will be skipped so you don’t have to worry about removing them before submitting.

Set time for entries input via Email or Twitter

Now you can input entries later in the day and still specify a specific time in which the entry happened earlier. Specifying the time is optional and looks like this:

Some examples Via Email:

bg 146 at 11am This is my comment
bg 190 at 1:10pm 
bg 111 @ 12pm
med [med_mobile_code] 6 at 8:15am optional comment
med [med_mobile_code] 10 @ 11pm

Some examples via Twitter.com:

d ss1 bg 146 at 11am This is my comment
d ss1 bg 190 at 1:10pm 
d ss1 bg 111 @ 12pm
d ss1 med [med_mobile_code] 6 at 8:15am optional comment
d ss1 med [med_mobile_code] 10 @ 11pm

Up next we’ll be working on ways to input food and activity entries as well as set events/tags for each entry so stay tuned. For more info check out the Mobile Input Help Page

Other changes

We’ve made a few smaller changes as well:

• Overall design tweaks throughout the application.
• Added compression to the web pages meaning things should feel a bit snappier
• Improved the messaging in SugarStats. Messages are displayed in a nicer format.
• RSS Feeds for the public view. Private RSS feeds for non-public shared accounts coming soon.
• Tons of minor bug fixes

We’ve got tons of even more great new stuff coming out very soon too so stay tuned!

Someone posed a great question to me the other day and it really got me thinking.  Not really so much about the question, but more about the flood of answers that popped up in my head.

The question was:

“What would make me log on sugar stats versus writing info on a paper log, which I don’t do”

While sometimes I tend to think the advantages of online tracking and sharing obvious, it is a reality that to some people, maybe even many, it isn’t.  There are hundreds of millions of diabetic people out there, many not tech savvy all and some who completely hate technology altogether. 

But even if it is obvious to some, it is a great question with a variety of answers. A few of which stick out for me personally:

• Data Aggregation, Trends and Graphs – You can write entries in a log book, but the log book isn’t going to take that data and create useful statistics, trends and graphs out of it.

• A Variety of Input Methods – Other than a pen or pencil that is.  Inputting sugar readings or medication Via Web, Email, Twitter etc, depending on what you use daily, could turn out to be quite convenient for you.

• Sharing. Virtual Viewing, Anywhere – You can only show a logbook to those you bring it to.  Having it online lets you share it, privately or publicly, to whomever you want to anywhere in the world.  The days of needing the schedule a doctors visit which ends up being 10min long as he briefly glances of your likely incomplete log book.  This brings in a new level of flexibility and collaboration with your health-care providers and physicians.

• Social Support – Similar to the point above, having the social support around your progress is a huge factoring in your diabetic health.  With new online resources come out, sites like TuDiabetes.com where people can congregate, share experiences and get motivation to take control and keep it. Plus we’re in the process of adding even more features

• Conscious Awareness – To me, this is one of the main reasons.  Really, you can’t fully know your status or progress unless you’re tracking various bits of info over time. Having to keep these bits of info in mind, daily, brings it to your attention.  Ever heard of “Out of sight, out of mind?”, well that can apply to your diabetes health too.

    Keeping it in mind helps you “keep things” in mind, you tend to make better decisions (About food, things you do etc). Being conscious about it helps you be aware of the things you do daily that affect your diabetes.  Granted this can also happen with writing down your stats in a log book, though having a online solution might fit better into your daily lifestyle.
  

Those are a few of the prominent thoughts I had. Though when it comes down to it, it is really about finding the tools and solutions that work and fit best FOR YOU.  We could really implement every feature under the sun (Trust me, we won’t) but if it doesn’t fit in your particular lifestyle or is something you don’t like using then none of that matters.

In the end what we’re trying to do is creating new and creative tools that people can use daily to improve and monitor their diabetes that fit in this modern age era which we live. All in all I have to say it is great to see so many advancements on so many fronts happening. It is exciting to see things evolve, for the industry and individuals alike.