HOW TO USE THE FORGE

Generic flow — direct cloud OAuth (Oura, Fitbit, Eight Sleep, Suunto, Withings)

1. Open SENTINEL FORGE on phone, web, or desktop.
2. Tap Settings (gear icon, top-right).
3. Go to Connected Sensors.
4. Find your sensor in the Available list and tap Connect.
5. You’ll be redirected to your sensor’s official login page.
6. Sign in with your sensor-cloud credentials.
7. Authorize SENTINEL FORGE to access your data.
8. Return to the app — connection confirmed. Initial sync pulls your historical data (window varies by sensor — typically 30 days to 2 years).

Apple Health (iOS) & Health Connect (Android) — federated flow

Why this matters: If you own a Garmin, Apple Watch, COROS, Polar, Whoop, Ultrahuman, or Samsung wearable, SENTINEL FORGE reads your data through your phone’s health platform rather than a direct cloud connection. You authorize once in Apple Health / Health Connect, and SENTINEL FORGE pulls everything your wearable’s app already syncs to the platform — workouts, heart rate, sleep, HRV, body composition, the lot.

Step 1 — make sure your wearable syncs to your phone’s health platform

This happens in the wearable’s own app (Garmin Connect, Whoop, etc.), not in SENTINEL FORGE.

1. iOS: Open your wearable’s app → Settings (or More / Profile) → Connected Apps / Partner Apps → Apple Health → tap Authorize and turn ON every data category you want SENTINEL FORGE to see (workouts, heart rate, HRV, sleep, steps, weight).
2. Android: Open your wearable’s app → Settings → Health Connect → grant read & write for each category. On Android 14+ Health Connect is built into the OS; on older devices, install the Health Connect app from the Play Store first.
3. Verify: in Apple Health → Profile → Apps and Services, or Health Connect → Connected apps, you should see your wearable listed as a source.

Step 2 — connect SENTINEL FORGE to the health platform

1. Open SENTINEL FORGE on your phone (the native iOS or Android app — this flow does not work in the web app).
2. Tap Settings → Integrations (or Connected Sensors).
3. Tap Apple Health (iOS) or Health Connect (Android).
4. Tap Connect — the OS pops up a permission sheet listing every data type SENTINEL FORGE wants to read.
5. Grant the permissions (Allow All, or pick categories — you can change this later in your phone’s Apple Health / Health Connect settings without touching SENTINEL FORGE).
6. Initial sync starts immediately — first visible results within ~5 minutes, and subsequent syncs are incremental (seconds). iOS (Apple Health): up to 2 years (730 days) of history backfills in the background. Android (Health Connect): Health Connect exposes only the most recent 30 days to apps, so the initial backfill covers roughly the last month — see the Android caveat below for how to pull your full history.

Historical data caveat — Garmin via Apple Health

Garmin Connect → Apple Health is forward-only: Garmin’s official Apple Health integration pushes new activities from the day you enable it forward, but does not backfill your existing Garmin history. The same caveat applies to the Apple-Health-mediated path for most cloud-only wearables. (For Suunto, SENTINEL FORGE pulls historical data directly via the Suunto Cloud API — see the next card — so this caveat only affects Garmin and similar Apple-Health-only routes.)

To pull years of historical Garmin data into Apple Health, use RunGap (App Store, free download; the HealthKit export requires RunGap’s Swag Bag subscription — $4.99 for 3 months, cancel anytime). One billing cycle is more than enough to complete the historical backfill, so this is effectively a one-time cost if you cancel after the export finishes.

1. Install RunGap from the App Store.
2. Open RunGap → Accounts & Settings → add your Garmin Connect login. Let RunGap pull your activity history from Garmin — this can take a few minutes depending on how many years of workouts you have.
3. Tap the upper-left menu (☰) → Share & Export → Health. RunGap will prompt for the Swag Bag subscription if you haven’t purchased it yet. Confirm, then RunGap exports every activity not already in HealthKit. Large histories take 5–15 minutes.
4. Once RunGap finishes, Apple Health is populated with your historical workouts. SENTINEL FORGE picks them up on the next sync automatically — no extra action required on your end.
5. Cancel the RunGap subscription if you don’t intend to keep using RunGap for ongoing exports. The historical data stays in Apple Health permanently — only the ability to run new exports requires an active subscription. iPhone → Settings → your name (top) → Subscriptions → RunGap → Cancel.

Why route through a third-party app? We’re working toward a direct Garmin Health API integration that would bypass Apple Health entirely (full native history, no third-party tools), but Garmin’s developer portal is mid-overhaul and not accepting new API requests at the moment. We’ll wire up the direct path the moment the portal reopens. Until then, RunGap is the cleanest workaround for users who want their full training history visible inside SENTINEL FORGE.

Historical data caveat — Health Connect (Android)

Health Connect exposes only the most recent 30 days to SENTINEL FORGE. This is a Health Connect platform limit, not a SENTINEL FORGE setting — Android caps third-party apps to a rolling 30-day read window unless they hold a special extended-history permission, which SENTINEL FORGE intentionally does not request (it would push our data footprint past Google Play’s minimum-scope policy). So on Android you’ll see roughly the last month of history, then everything new from that point forward.

There is no RunGap-style workaround on Android — and one wouldn’t help anyway. Unlike iOS (where the only gap is Garmin not backfilling into Apple Health), the Android limit is on the read side: importing more history into Health Connect with a tool like Health Sync still wouldn’t make it visible to SENTINEL FORGE, because we’re capped at reading the last 30 days regardless of how much data is stored.

To get your full history on Android, connect the wearable directly via its cloud instead of (or alongside) Health Connect — the direct integrations pull years of history straight from the manufacturer and aren’t subject to the 30-day window. Oura, Fitbit, Eight Sleep, Suunto, and Withings are live today; Garmin, COROS, Polar, and Sleep Number are on the direct-API roadmap. Health Connect stays the best catch-all for everything without a direct integration (Samsung Health, Ultrahuman, and the like), within its 30-day window.

Disconnect a sensor

Settings → Connected Sensors → tap the sensor → Disconnect. Existing synced data stays in your account; future syncs stop.

Manual entry — required for any campaign workflow

1. Open the Today view to see your planned mission for the day.
2. Complete the workout.
3. Tap Log Mission — confirm or override the planned values (sets, reps, weight, RPE, distance, intensity zones).
4. The Reconciliation Engine matches your sensor data against the campaign plan, enriches the workout metadata (campaign tier, block, week-in-program, mission-vs-actual delta, intensity-zone alignment), and feeds the enriched record into TALOS.
5. TALOS scores update within minutes — Training Load gets the correct campaign-volume credit, Recovery accounts for the planned strain, Fuel recalibrates against the day’s actual demand.

Without manual entry, sensor-only workouts still log and contribute to raw load — but TALOS loses the campaign context it needs for proper progression tracking, ACWR scoring, and Fuel macros that match the day’s mission. You’ll see the strain, not the picture.

Voice log during the workout

Tap the mic on the Workout screen and speak the set naturally (“3 by 10 squats at 225, RPE 8”). Voice entries count as manual logging and reconcile against the campaign the same way.

Auto-sync — for workouts outside an active campaign

Ad-hoc trail run, casual lift, weekend ruck without a campaign assignment: auto-sync from your Suunto / Whoop / Fitbit captures everything. TALOS uses the workout for raw load calculation but skips the campaign reconciliation step (no campaign mission to reconcile against).

Input methods

• Nutrition Lookup — search the food database, pick servings.
• AI Photo Estimate — snap a meal photo, AI estimates the macros (uses your Nutrition Lookup quota).
• Voice / Text Description — describe the meal in plain language (“two eggs, oatmeal with peanut butter, banana”); AI parses the macros.
• Manual Macro Entry — drop protein / carbs / fat directly when you know the numbers.

The Log action — required to feed TALOS

1. After any input method above, you’ll land on the Create Meal screen with the macro breakdown pre-filled.
2. Confirm or adjust serving sizes / macros.
3. Tap Log.
4. The meal commits to your daily intake. The Fuel pillar of TALOS recalibrates within seconds against your training-load-adjusted macro targets.

Input methods

• Withings smart scale — connect via the standard sensor flow (see Section 01); weight + body fat readings auto-populate the Log Body screen.
• Body Composition AI Scan — upload a body photo for an AI-estimated body fat % (uses the Body Composition AI Scan quota).
• Manual entry — log weight, caliper measurements, or DEXA results directly.

The Log action — required to feed TALOS

1. After any input method, you’ll see the Log Body screen with the values pre-filled.
2. Confirm or adjust.
3. Tap Log.
4. The reading commits to your body-comp trend. TALOS Health metrics update within seconds.

The four pillars

• Training Load — 7-day vs. 28-day acute-chronic ratio (ACWR). Catches overtraining and undertraining.
• Recovery — HRV + sleep + active recovery, scored against your baseline.
• Fuel — macro adherence vs. your training-load-adjusted daily targets.
• Stress — reported stress + HRV correlation, with actionable recovery tactics.

How to read it

• The composite score updates after every workout, meal, sleep cycle, or check-in.
• Tap any pillar for the deep-dive view (trend, contributing inputs, today’s recommendation).
• The composite informs your Today view recommendations — training intensity, fueling, recovery focus.

Browse and enroll

1. Open the Campaigns tab.
2. Filter by tier (Foundation / Vanguard / Sentinel) or category.
3. Tap a campaign for the structure overview.
4. Hit Enroll. Daily missions appear in your Today view immediately.

Campaign reactions

After each mission, mark how it went — too easy / too hard / just right / missed. The campaign engine adjusts subsequent missions in-block to match your actual response, keeping the program adaptive instead of static.

Personal Campaign Import

Have a coach-built plan? Campaigns → Personal Campaign Import → upload (uses your tier’s import quota). The Reconciliation Engine handles imported plans the same way as native campaigns — you still tap Log Mission after each session.

AI-Generated Campaign

Tell the AI your goal (“selection prep, 12 weeks, 16 hours/week available”) and it builds a custom periodized campaign tailored to your training-history baseline. Reconciliation works the same way as any other campaign type.

Start a challenge

1. Open the Compete tab.
2. Tap New Challenge.
3. Pick an opponent (callsign search) or set it as open-invite.
4. Pick the metric and duration.
5. Send the challenge. The leaderboard tracks both operators in real time.

Concurrent challenge cap

Each operator can run up to 1 campaign challenge + 3 non-campaign challenges at once (4 total). Keeps the leaderboard meaningful and prevents burnout from over-stacking.

Find your squad

• Friend connections — search by callsign and send a connect request.
• Group chats — per channel (squad, campaign cohort, challenge group).
• Public PR shoutouts — PRs you log appear on the leaderboard for visibility.