Hi all.
Dont flame me for this strange request.
My bed side clock is about to die so instead of getting a new one, I am thinking of using my universal as a replacement. My problem is that having the display on even with the backlight set to minimum is too bright for night time use.
With the backlight turned off the display is useless when pitch black so does anyone know of an application I can use that'll allow me to have the backlight on all night whilst charging on a very low setting so that it can be seen in the dark but not light up the whole room.
I assume the built in alarm function will wake me in the morning so dont need to replace that...
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Good luck trusting any Windows Mobile-powered device to wake you up reliably. I thought my Exec was better than my XDA2 but no. It still fails from time to time.
However, if your machine is to be left turned on all night (on charge) then there's a possibility it might be reliable. I'd run it alongside your alarm clock for a while though before trusting it.
I like the idea of the app you request. vijay555 managed to get the screen backlight to respond to settings above the normal control panel range with his VJLumos app - perhaps it can also be set lower using a similar method.
You'll still need a large enough clock display to be readable with blurry eyes at night though.
Incidentally, you can set your Exec to turn the backlight off after (say) 30 seconds of inactivity, but then use the backlight hardware key (next to the volume slider) to turn the screen backlight on again when you need to know the time in the dark.
Just a suggestion
ptravelalarm is an app that displays big clock digits, in landscape mode too. Perhaps worth checking out in conjunction with the backlight hack? oh, and it features loud alarms with volume override too.
Pocketclock is another app but is only 2003 compatible though i kow there is a beta wm5 version available. Not sure when it will be released fully, or if it will support landscape mode (which the beta didn't).
Have a look at 'stoptime'....
And yes it's reliable ! I used it for months for taking my medication (and it's dosing was quite time-dependant !)
jpiek said:
Have a look at 'stoptime'....
And yes it's reliable ! I used it for months for taking my medication (and it's dosing was quite time-dependant !)
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are u using this app on a wm5 pda? I checked out the site and it seems to mention 2003 and earlier, plus no updates since 2004?
No, on a WM2003 ...
jpiek said:
No, on a WM2003 ...
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According to the thread title it's for use on a Universal, therefore wm5 (unless he's seriously tweaked his roms ). Shame, because it looked interesting...
Here's what I have as my Alarm.....
It is SPB Time v.1.1 which you can find here :
http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com/products/time/?en
In the picture below, it is set as BLACK CLOCK and also displays the calendar aside from the time in Digital format.
There a lot of diffeent skins available for free and also you can choose between analog, digital or world clock....
phupton said:
My problem is that having the display on even with the backlight set to minimum is too bright for night time use.
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Click to collapse
seconded. The minimum backlight brightness setting is way too bright. Is there any way to influence this in the registry?
the big clock display looks great with that spb product. Just need a hack to sort out the bright display at night time now.
Its not something I can do but if anyone knows of someone that might be able to help then point me in their direction...
I use the ptravel alarm on a daily basis, as commented above though, the dim setting is still bright enough to light the room. If that can be dimmed further then will be fantastic.
As for relibility, the only time it has failed when on mains was due to finger trouble...
I'd suggest something like that Big-Clock from SPB, if you run the Exec while it's plugged in the backlight will stay lit - all you need is a black background with dark coloured numerals so that the light output isn't that much (on lowest backlight obviously).
You'd ALSO need to turn off the flashing LEDS - I've discovered these are really very bright in a darkened room and very irritating.
Chronos is also very good, only analogue clocks though, although it says it is skinable and I would like it in digital...
Anyone know how to skin Chronos???
http://www.activekitten.com/en/games/detail.php?ID=351
Regards Simon
Related
While playing with my HERMES I noticed the following:
First:
The screen is not as bright as on the WIZARD!
Second:
When turning on the camera you shortly can see that the backlight gets increased while opening the CAMERA application. Now, that tells me that there could be a way to increase the background backlight permanently over its default maximum.
Has anyone an idea? I tried already to raise the registry values for backlight without success.
VJ's
There is a program by VJ called super bright I believe it what you are looking for, if so post a little love for VJ's hard work here is the link
http://www.vijay555.com/vj/releases/vjlumosiii/vjlumosiii.exe
Well, it makes the screen nice and bright - that's for sure!
The drawback's on this neat little application: You can't shut it down other than restarting the PDA, you can't adjust brightness and you can't use the CAMERA as long as the application runs.
I just wonder if the brightness could be increased via Registry Hack - that would be great!
how very odd! i've noticed that comparing my Vario I (Wizard) with my Vario II (Hermes) the Hermes has a considerably better and brighter screen! the colours are a lot more 'fuller'!
i havent tried the 'VJ' app, but will do when i get home,
why would you want it so bright anyway?!
Well, the brightness helps while watching a movie on the go!
Also if you do some work on the road or navigation in the car it comes in handy. I just wish the application mentioned above would not have so many side effects ...
Junner2003 said:
Well, it makes the screen nice and bright - that's for sure!
The drawback's on this neat little application: You can't shut it down other than restarting the PDA, you can't adjust brightness!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just 'click or ok' Super Bright the same way to turn it on or off (no pda restarts needed).
Run the program again to shut it off. I mapped it to one of the hardware buttons.
Thank you vijay555!
it is possible ?
I'm using the KAISER, when in a building i set the brightness to low becuase it has a very bright screen and it's just a waste of battery
But when i go outside i can't see a thing, need to set it to high again
And then i just forget to set it to low again
is it possible to make it be automatic ?
(bright outside - high brightness, dark outside - low brightness)
Thanks !
p.s.
does the KAISER have a light sensor like the Universal's keyboard light sensor ?
if so, is it possible to use that ?
ah man i hear you. when my sister got her blackberry pearl, and i saw it automatically change brightness, i was jealous. aha. unfortunately, the sensor is hardware thing.
i'm not sure about the kaiser but i know the hermes has a keyboard light sensor, but it's on the keyboard, and only says whether to turn on the keyboard backlight or not. not too useful, i'd think.
Hermes and Kaiser have front cameras...
but camera is a no-no for battery
Even once a minute, or on power-on?
Well, maybe yes.
I nice Solution would be a Button you press it, and the Brightness gets configurated automaticly: perfect for battery because you do this only on need!
And there could be a standart brightness reseted after having standby on
I dont know how to use the Camera in VB.Net someone knows?
I was thinking more in the direction of the front camera and the timer ....but bettery above all .... if it is possible it would be awsome !
the buton pressing idea is (forgive me) pointless ... if i wanted to press a button i might as well press the on screen button i already have ! (spb mobile shell)
thanks for the idea though !
it's great to see so many people taking interest, hope it will stick !
SPB software is my solution. You can map your jog dialer for brightness. I use that for volume, so I use touch screen to slide my brightness.
http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com/products/pocketplus/?en
look at the screenshot or demo. Map the brightness as botton4 is a option because brightness is a program link for you to set what ever button as you wish.
blah, i have an at&t 8525, so i forgot about the front facing camera. my current solution is to set the backlight to reasonable indoor setting, and i have VJLumos mapped to my Button5 press&hold. so whenever i go outside, I run VJLumos, and when I get back inside, I run VJLumos again (which turns it off) and it automatically goes back to the previous backlight setting.
Hey guys,
do you think it's possible to wirte a program which automatically can change the backlight according to the actual daylight condition.
Maybe it is possible to start the program when you wake up your device. then the program turns on the built in (front) camera for about a second or maybe more. The camera "checks" out the light intensity. If its very bright the backlight condition is set to the max.
his is only a idea. I'm thinking of it because for example today it's a very sunny and i can almost read nothing on the display of my touch cruise!!
What do you think about it?
greetings
any idea?
Or does any software like this exist?
Maybe the guy who wrote this program below could be of assistance:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=379270
Well, it doesn't have to be so hard...
All we need is a small service that reads from a file the approximate sunrise-sunset time and alters the brightness accordingly. If anyone has the time, he can additionally take advantage of the current time zone and calculate those limits automatically all year long!
Destinator 7 does the exact same think by turning night colors on and off. It is actually better than a build in brightness sensor because it never fails!
Nevermind...did not read the question thououghly
Yeah good ideas,
but a time sceduled scenery has also disadvanteges. When its clowdy outside it causes unnecessary battery consumption.
MVBklight 1.4.2 is not working on my polaris!!
w04g005 said:
Yeah good ideas,
but a time sceduled scenery has also disadvanteges. When its clowdy outside it causes unnecessary battery consumption.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I come from a rather sunny country (greece) so I really missed this!
Anyway, those PDAs have actually very low brightness screens. In a bright day you cant actually see anything. On the other hand, I have yet to see a rainy/cloudy day that requires a reduction to the maximum brightness level. Overall I think that a time scheduled solution should be the best solution for no sensor-equipped devices.
papajohn said:
I come from a rather sunny country (greece) so I really missed this!
Anyway, those PDAs have actually very low brightness screens. In a bright day you cant actually see anything. On the other hand, I have yet to see a rainy/cloudy day that requires a reduction to the maximum brightness level. Overall I think that a time scheduled solution should be the best solution for no sensor-equipped devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I second that! Even though I'm not from Greece but it's never too bright during the day. Right now my solution is to map the camera button to backlight so I can change it quickly.
Changing the brightness according to the time of day would not be as helpful as changing it according to the ambient light level. If you walk inside a dimly lit building during the day, you don't need the backlight to be as bright as if you were outside. Also, even outside, a cloudy day can be considerably dimmer than a sunny day.
jfeldredge said:
Changing the brightness according to the time of day would not be as helpful as changing it according to the ambient light level. If you walk inside a dimly lit building during the day, you don't need the backlight to be as bright as if you were outside. Also, even outside, a cloudy day can be considerably dimmer than a sunny day.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I totally agree, but given the fact that there is no ambient light sensor in our devices I dont think that we can do any better. Two scales, one for day and one for night and we are OK for most cases. Yes, as you point out this strategy fails but it is better than:
1. No brightness change at all
2. Manual changes.
papajohn said:
I totally agree, but given the fact that there is no ambient light sensor in our devices I dont think that we can do any better.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats the crux. Some devices especially the newer ones have a camera on the front. I'm no photo-expert but i think every camera is a "ambient light sensor".
The camera also reacts on different light conditions. You can see this by turning on the fps function. But i agree that it would be a lot of work.
Maybe we have to wait till more people and programmers own htcs with such bad displays like the polaris.
Titan Photo Sensor
I found myself thinking about this auto-backlight topic on my way home tonight after a long trip using my 8600 as a GPS. The screen went from being a clearly-visible screen during the day portion of the trip to a flashlight in my eyes at night. While I knew I could adjust the backlighting manually, I didn't want to mess with it while driving. Also, living in Arizona, I can barely make out the screen when in daylight unless the screen is on maximum brightness, but max brightness is horrible on battery life, so I would rather not set it to that by default.
Anyway, the Titan has a photo sensor on the keyboard which is used to determine dim lighting conditions and automatically illuminate the keyboard. I'm not sure if the exact lighting value being detected by the photo sensor can be read, but if it can be, then it should be relatively easy to write an application that would automatically adjust the backlight setting whenever the keyboard is slid open.
The application could both use location-based sunrise/sunset algorithms to set the default backlight value based on time of day, and also allow the setting to be overridden momentarily (perhaps only until the screen is turned off again) by opening the keyboard and sampling the ambient lighting conditions.
This app was designed to improve upon the backlight management capabilities of the Omnia (*May* also work on HTC models). Currently the "auto backlight" function on the Omnia i910 is too sensitive, and ends up cranking the backlight up even in low-light situations where it isn't needed. This results in wasted battery power.
Mode 1 (Hi-Low Manual) - If the current light level meets or exceeds the set threshold, the backlight will be set to 12 (maximum). If the current light level falls below the threshold, the backlight will be set to 1 (minimum).
Mode 2 (Manual / Auto) - Same as above, but if the light meets or exceeds the threshold, the backlight will be set to auto. If the light level falls below the threshold, the backlight is set to manual (whatever value is currently set for manual backlight will be used).
The Threshold setting has 4 marks -- dark, dim, normal and bright. These are pretty subjective, but "bright" has been working pretty well for me in bright light.
Status shows the currently active mode, the approximate light level in lumens and the current brightness (dark, dim, normal, bright), which is essentially just a translation of lumen level.
The UI and installation process is crap. This is not meant to be anything close to a finished product -- just a proof of concept to see if this interests anyone and solves the problem. Backlight management will continue if the app is minimized. Shutting down the app will cease backlight management.
This was developed on an Omnia i910 using Adryn's 6.5 / 2.0 CF03. It should work on any flavor of Omnia i910. It may work on HTC models as well, though I haven't been able to test.
Installation: Unzip the attachment. Copy the two files to any spot on your Omnia. Launch Smartbacklight.exe.
Please let me know how this works for people. So far it seems to be doing a decent job of saving my battery and eyesight in and out of sunlight.
I proposed something like this over at modaco a while back but didnt (and still dont) Have the knowlage of prgramming for mobiles required to do anything about it of course this was back when the supid screen wouldnt auto rotate if you force dimmed the screen (lower than the lowest setting) the backlight on the omnia is quite frustrating to say the least It really makes you envy the AMOLED display on the omnia2 but then again iphone zelots will even envy that
Ill give it a spin myself but i reccomend you bring this project over to omnia.modaco.com or samsung-omnia.org you will probbly get a better response.
Ps sorry have to go no time to fix spelling or puncuate
A very useful app for Omnia. The concept is definitely smart. Please continue the project. The current UI is not that bad, just need a little more work on settings.
can we have a screenshot ?
How is this different from LUMOS?
Nagrom Nniuq said:
How is this different from LUMOS?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Does LUMOS support the Omnia?
normally yes
Interesting. Didn't get that from the readme.
- supports HTC Raphael, Diamond, Blackstone and Topaz
- should support Rhodium
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll pull it down and take a peek.
"Can't find PInvoke DLL HTCUtil.dll"
As far as the automatic backlight setting goes, it is my understanding that the phone should check how bright (or dark) it is, and adjust the display brightness accordingly (brighter when out in the sun, darker when sitting indoors / dark rooms).
However, it seems to me it just sets the backlight at ~40% and that's it. I went out into the sun with my HD2, and the brightness didn't change and I had trouble seeing what was on the screen.
Is there some kind of way I could test, if the light sensor is working? Or is this setting simply badly designed and I should set the brightness myself?
I'm currently running latest Energy ROM (23569 Cookie May 09) but it was the same with the stock ROM, so I don't think it's related.
PS. A little side question, if I may; if I perform task 29 before flashing... do I still need to do a hard reset after flashing a new ROM?
...in the very least... are there any apps that make use of the light sensor?
Well I know the acctualy percentage in the settings never changes when its on auto (atleast not for me)
But I can clearly tell a difference between being in a dark room and the backlight being on low
to being in the sun and it on max.
Ive also never had trouble reading the screen, the screen is always plenty bright enough.
Prehaps you've got a bad one?
Shaamaan said:
...in the very least... are there any apps that make use of the light sensor?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I know an app that can measure the amount of light in lumers.
lonelykatana said:
I know an app that can measure the amount of light in lumers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Care to share the name of that app?
Also, it's difficult for me to say if the screen is busted or not. On max brightness (as opposed to the automatic setting) it's a lot more comfortable to look at in the sun, albeit indoors it's OK on any setting really.
EDIT: I don't suppose the automatic setting can be tweaked for better performance via some registry changes?
Shaamaan said:
Care to share the name of that app?
Also, it's difficult for me to say if the screen is busted or not. On max brightness (as opposed to the automatic setting) it's a lot more comfortable to look at in the sun, albeit indoors it's OK on any setting really.
EDIT: I don't suppose the automatic setting can be tweaked for better performance via some registry changes?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think it's called Lumos.
Try searching for it.
You certainly can test it. Just cover the light sensor (upper left corner above the screen) with something. I don't recommend thumb, as you might press 'start' button. You will also need any application with white background.
The brightness should clearly drop.
Auto only sets the brightness from 20% to 60% (or so it seems). But the effect is clearly visible.
Dr.Sid said:
You certainly can test it. Just cover the light sensor (upper left corner above the screen) with something. I don't recommend thumb, as you might press 'start' button. You will also need any application with white background.
The brightness should clearly drop.
Auto only sets the brightness from 20% to 60% (or so it seems). But the effect is clearly visible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No change at all.
I'll restore the stock ROM to see if it's a firmware issue, and I'll check that Lumos application.
EDIT: Lumos clearly detects light changes and works well. Seems it's either something to do with Energy ROM after all or possibly I'm just blind and I can't see any changes. I'm still going to check the stock ROM, just to be safe.
BTW, once more, can someone tell me quickly if hard resets are needed after task 29?
EDIT 2: OK, it DOES work after all, I'm just blind; the change however, on the automatic settings, is minimal. I actually had to put the phone under a light-bulb, as covering the sensor didn't really work. I wonder if it should be calibrated like the g-sensor...
night time
i think the day time brightness is fine but the night time setting is far to bright. i would love for this to be customizable as well
rdbthrgnaRDg
Dr.Sid said:
Auto only sets the brightness from 20% to 60% (or so it seems).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can this range be increased?
For indoor use the auto-adjust works fine for day/evening/night, but outside I always need to turn off the auto-adjust, so it can go to 100%. When back indoor again, then switch to auto again and so on ... and so on ... and ...
Just installed .NET CF + Lumos and will see how it works out.
.NET CF for laptop and automatic install to HD2 via ActiveSync:
microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=E3821449-3C6B-42F1-9FD9-0041345B3385&displaylang=en
Latest Lumos v10 RC2:
forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=450318