New device, no bluetooth

Argh, I'm sorry about this. It looks like a few weeks ago I updated the firmware we put on the Bangles so it automatically booted to the recovery menu and had a way to perform tests in it, but at that point the person preparing the Bangles started using that menu to trigger testing instead of our usual method, and so the factory reset didn't get done automatically.

We've just checked and it looks like it only happened to a few Bangles, but I'm afraid yours was one of those. Your Bangle should be absolutely fine, it's had the tests done, but unfortunately it didn't have that factory reset step (which you had to do yourself) - so I'm really sorry about that.

On the charger front - did your Bangle have a bit of black tape over the middle two contacts of the charge connector when you got it? They should usually have that, and that stops the corrosion from happening (it's caused by a small voltage on the 2rd pin from the right, which is for low level programming).

It's usually stuck on pretty well but it is possible that it has come off. If it isn't there it'd definitely be worth covering it up again as without that pin covered, the other pins do start to corrode (info here). It's unfortunate but it's a side-effect of having those SWD debug pins available on the back so you can completely change the software on the watch if you want to.

And good news on the Bluetooth - that sounds expected. The watch will pair with the OS, but not in its default state.

The issue is that Bluetooth Low Energy doesn't have a generic Communications Port profile (unlike 'classic' Bluetooth), so Windows in particular doesn't think it's a device it can do anything with, and so doesn't show it in the pairing list.

Bangle.js implements something called 'Nordic UART' which is about as close to a standard for a communications port as you get in Bluetooth LE.

For developing apps, I'd still recommend https://www.espruino.com/ide/ - yes, it's in the browser, but it does 'just work' and is pretty friendly for developing normal-size apps.

However if you do want to use command-line, there is an espruino package available from NPM which handles communcations from the CLI: https://www.npmjs.com/package/espruino

On Linux it should work nicely once you use the line mentioned here to give Node.js bluetooth priviledges, or Windows can be a bit tricky to get Bluetooth working with on the command-line so you can leave a browser window open (on that, or another device) to get the bluetooth communications and you can then use the CLI to communicate through that: https://www.npmjs.com/package/espruino#web-ide-remote-connection