Skybox 1.0 (Mobile Shell Alternative) - Windows Mobile Development and Hacking General

This program looks to have a lot of potential. With some customization this could be as nice as Mobile Shell....or so it seems....
http://www.teksoftco.com/index.php?section=skybox

Interesting,
Trying it now.
EDIT: tried it 3 mins - uninstalled immediately.. Too slow on my HTC Trinity..
The problem is that i can't delete it completely I hate when these things happen.

My initial thoughts....
TaskBar Replacement: Completely covers your existing start menu bar. You can only access your start menu with a hardware key, there is no way to know what tasks your are running. There is nothing to customise. You can access at all times.
Today Plugin: You can scroll with your finger or click on icon to activate scrolling. It is ok, you can today plugins and add shortcuts but that is it. You can only display icons and no text which sucks. There are no accessible options.
Menu Screen: Similar to Mobile shell but very slow. Scrolling left to right works but it not smooth and sometimes you start programs cause it bogs on my Titan.
Home Screen: Not too bad i guess, the graphics are not great but maybe customizible with regedits or file replacements. You can customize which program each icon to open certain programs.
I give this a 5 with mobile shell as a 8. I think it has potential but there is very little options and the animations are slow. I like that the taskbar menu and bottom bar are is accessible at all times (wish mobile shell did this) but could be a lot better. I think if I tried real hard I could make Wisbar Advance 2.0 work just like this program.

Related

Lets see your today screen

I need some inspiration.
Heres mine
nice looking today screen there. might be an idea to list the today plugins that your using for any users that might be unsure what they are! will post pics of mine once i have it looking how i want :wink:
Tom
This is my home screen.
I'm running:-
1. PhoneAlarm at the top
2. Plugin of my own showing date, battery life, temperature, notes and voice notes saved/outstanding and operator (with phone number popup)
3. Customised AlarmToday
4. NotesToday (the tiny blue dot, when shrunk, and then in drop down mode).
5. My modded version of QOTD.
6. cLaunch with some mods of my own.
7. SideX to run today plugins I don't need all the time, eg PocketWeather.
8. All running with SmallMenu Plus as my start menu.
Update (15 August 2005):
This is using a program I've written to provide a bigger Today Screen, removing the menu bar at the bottom. I use the bar at the top, so that stays put!)
Basic homescreen:
Showing NotesToday drop down:
Showing SideX today item (Floating keyboard):
Basic homepage showing my phone number popup - I use a dual sim so I can pop up my current telephone number (cus I'm too lazy to remember it!):
SmallMenu start menu button:
Showing my tool to relocate start button so I can have full screen applications:
Sorry for all the photos!
V
Phone Alarm + Pocket Plus 3 + Pocket Breeze
Here's mine..
Marsware WeatherPanel
SBSH PocketBreeze
SBSH iLauncher
RhinoStats
that's mine
Mine is just simple:
From top to bottom:
Spb Pocket Plus
PocketWeather
Phone Dashboard
XCPUScalar (The buttons at bottom and CPU load at top)
Pocket breeze / contact breeze
DK Today
SPB Pocket Plus
This is mine! Very simple, cause I don't want a crowded today screen. I have Pocket Plus 3 and Wisbar Advance 2.4 installed with a custom made Windows Mobile 5.0 theme. I can use it pretty much as a one handed device now, cause I have the cascading start menu onder the contacts hardware button and the REAL close button under the agenda hardware button. So I can navigate and close everything on my MDA by using the hardware buttons and the navigationkey. (Btw if you hold the action button the context menu will pop up, for more non-touchscreen action. ) Me iz happy. :twisted:
hamsup1o said:
Here's mine..
Marsware WeatherPanel
SBSH PocketBreeze
SBSH iLauncher
RhinoStats
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What theme do you use? It's very cool
jackleung said:
Phone Alarm + Pocket Plus 3 + Pocket Breeze
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice what theme are you using?
This is my one
Regards
cimber
vijay555 said:
This is my home screen.
I'm running:-
1. PhoneAlarm at the top
2. Plugin of my own showing date, battery life, temperature, notes and voice notes saved/outstanding and operator (with phone number popup)
3. Customised AlarmToday
4. NotesToday (the tiny blue dot, when shrunk, and then in drop down mode).
5. My modded version of QOTD.
6. cLaunch with some mods of my own.
7. SideX to run today plugins I don't need all the time, eg PocketWeather.
8. All running with SmallMenu Plus as my start menu.
Basic homescreen:
Showing NotesToday drop down:
Showing SideX today item (PocketWeather):
Basic homepage showing my phone number popup - I use a dual sim so I can pop up my current telephone number (cus I'm too lazy to remember it!):
SmallMenu start menu button:
Showing my tool to relocate start button so I can have full screen applications:
Sorry for all the photos!
V
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really really want that Phonealarm skin you have there......
dmmh - I haven't quite finished it yet; phoneAlarm still needs work on the textwindow (see the up/down arrows on the left? they blank the icons and show a textwindow containing info about SMSs etc. But Bruce (author of phonealarm) hasn't finished implementing it yet.
It still works well right now tho, shows calls/sms/voice calls (you get a red highlight when a missed call etc) and one click access to bluetooth and headset.
On the right you've got a display of profiles (I only use loud, vibrate, flight mode and silent). Clicking on the very left (invisible) will bring up config.
The whole thing is coloured to match my today theme, a plain magneto blue, to complement my OS X start button!
If you'd still like the skin, send me a PM.
V
OK here:
Here is mine
Shortcuts are all working and the window has tabs as you can see where you can switch to different pages.
xcilion said:
Here is mine
Shortcuts are all working and the window has tabs as you can see where you can switch to different pages.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really like the "simple" today screens. Can you list what your using, from the top menu bar down.
Thanks
xcilion: it's beautiful, is it claunch, WDA, PPX or something else?! :lol:
Coming from the SPV Smartphone and p900 (WDA is like p900's Tracker software, which is a beautiful piece of software, highly recommended), I think the today screen should do that, show you what you're doing Today/let you use the phone at a glance on switching on the phone.
I think program menus/launchers should be programs away from the Today screen, because you've got to have Today plugins running in the background all the time, whereas launchers and apps you don't need often should be launched as needed to save resources (at least on HTC with smallish memory).
Did you remove the "NEW" taskbar yourself, or is that a 3rd party launcher? I've just made a tool to remove the NEW bar from normal today screen for an extra 26 pixels - yours looks great Size matters!
V
here's mine:
All: I've updated my screenshot to show this program I've written
See here!
V

All running programs icons at system tray?

There is a way to put all runnings programs icons at system tray (left comm manager and battery indicator)?
Some programs is there (like TomTom) but others is running but don't show!
I use SPB pocket plus to show and switch running programs (alt-tab function), but if I can show all at system tray think is usefull.
Thanks
There is a small software called "xbar" making it possible to gather all the programs chosen in a bubble accessible by a simple button from the phone.
Look at here
http://xetranet.free.fr/xbar2/?lang=eng&project=xBar 2&page=Presentation
there's a ton of apps that do that type of thing - I use MagicButton myself.
I don't think any of them put the icons in the 'tray', though. I'm not sure how useful that would be either, as the 'tray' is only visible on the Today screen.
I think is usefull because if you don't close apps don't know "in a flash" what is running! You will see today many times, don't?
I use SPB alt-tab funtion assign to a botton, but if don't enter on it I don't know how many apps are running... anm memory slow down (I use too close app button)!
vbar is a great application with low memory usage.

Which shell do you use on your HD? TF3D, Mobile Shell ...?

Hey folks,
I am still playing around with my new baby and am loving it ;-)
I have been using SPB Mobile Shell for months on my Polaris and like it very much, though TF3D looks nice for sure, but I am simply not used to it yet.
Anyway, which are the best and easy to use tools for customizing (change tab order etc.) on your HDs? I already got myself Weather Database Editor for adding my city to the accu weather database and it worked just fine.
A thing that I am missing right now, is a kinda finger friendly "Settings" tab like there is one in Mobile shell, that makes accessing every setting quiet easy with your fingers.
Any suggestions?
boba
Sadly, Spb Mobile Shell does not work properly on the HD. Dropdown menus do not function, so it cannot be set up to your personal liking. Spb say that they will look into it at some time in the future.
The basic functions of the shell will work, and you can switch to it by installing SecondToday.
nikki-m said:
Dropdown menus do not function, so it cannot be set up to your personal liking.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
'tis true the drop-down menus don't drop down ... but if you're prepared to fiddle you can get the drop-down to scroll to your preferred setting. Click in the drop-down menu to highlight the first choice and then use the up-arrow and down-arrow cursor keys on the soft keyboard to scroll through the options that would normally drop down. When your preferred option appears, tap Enter on the keyboard. I've used this to set up Spb Mobile Shell 2 on the Touch HD. Still, it's worth learning TF3D.
Am I crazy in thinking TouchFlo looks much better than SPB MS ?
because I do !!!

[REQ] HTC Taskmanager improvement

Hi There,
If you ever used the "Close Button" plug-in from Spb Mobile Plus you prolly know what I mean...
The HTC Taskmanager looks all nice, I like it, but its only accessible on the Today Screen. Is there a way to make it accessible even when you're not on the today screen?
Sometimes when you're doing stuff you want to "alt-tab" to another program and this is an easy way to do it, or when you want to close another/all other programs.
I hope there's a solution because it really is an improvement to the taskmanager.
me too
sorry, no help here. I can only say "me too". I was actually just thinking about this today. I've had this phone for a few months, and it just today occurred to mr today that you can't close other open programs without going back to the today screen, only option is to "x" button back to today screen or hope that what you seek to close is in your start menu under 'recent items'.
any help or development would be super appreciated, thanks all.
There is a shortcut in the Settings folder in the Systems tab. However, I expect you don't want to go through all of that when you want to use it. As an alternative, you could use file explorer and go into the Windows folder, find the Task Manager program in there, copy it and past a shortcut in the Windows/Start Menu folder. Then it would be on your Start Menu. You would need to remove one other item if you were then over the allowed maximum number of items in there.
Is that accessible enough?
I'd rather not put it in my start menu cus there are other "important" shortcuts in there...
I'd rather have it in the upper right corner...
You could use WkTask
the best free taskmanager there is (not working on wm6.5)
whiskeybro said:
You could use WkTask
the best free taskmanager there is (not working on wm6.5)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried it and I like it, Is there a way to make a backup of my settings?
It seems the program doesnt work as i wished it would. I worked with it for a while and I like the concept alot, but there's a major flaw. Sometimes when I make adjustments to, lets say, my alarm settings (winmo clock/alarms setings), and when I press [ok] the window minimizes (I set the one click to minimize), there's no way you can apply the changes because it will keep on running on the background. If I choose to close it then the changes wont apply. This occurs to many other programs I use in simular occasions when you need to press [ok] to apply settings.
I would still have a solution to the HTC taskbar though. I think I would prefer it over the WkTask taskmanager.

Any Chance for the Old Start Menu?

Hi,
I just installed the official 6.5 update but I think the WM 6.5 "Honeycomb" start menu is that damn slow when you got a lot of programs there. You have to scroll a lot and scrolling doesn't look very fluid.
Is there a way or a registry hack to get back the old HTC start menu that was delivered when the Diamond2 originally came out? The best would be if there where 4 icons in a row.
I've added a snapshot to show what I mean. Yes, as you can see on the snapshot I'm back to 6.1
My startmenu is very fluid to be honest, I got my programs and stuff sorted in folders. Like games, media (coreplayer etc), network (commanager etc), personal (phone, sms, email etc), GPS, system (total commander, resco explorer, reg edit etc). I will install SPB Screenshot and show you how it looks.
Here you go.
metacortexx said:
Hi,
I just installed the official 6.5 update but I think the WM 6.5 "Honeycomb" start menu is that damn slow when you got a lot of programs there. You have to scroll a lot and scrolling doesn't look very fluid.
Is there a way or a registry hack to get back the old HTC start menu that was delivered when the Diamond2 originally came out? The best would be if there where 4 icons in a row.
I've added a snapshot to show what I mean. Yes, as you can see on the snapshot I'm back to 6.1
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Its still there under the programs tab... ? or at least it is on mine...
sorry if this is a noob question, but how do i add folders to the start menu like you've done? and change icons?
I have done the same thing that you have done, Created folders in the start menu, to do this you just go to windows/startmenu and create folders in there.
However every time I soft reset my device, extra icons appear on the main start page screen. Is there any way to remove these?
I would love to go back to the HTC Start Menu as it was so much better, I know it is on a Tab on Touch Flow 3D but it defeats the point in having a hardware button to launch programs!
colin_85 said:
I have done the same thing that you have done, Created folders in the start menu, to do this you just go to windows/startmenu and create folders in there.
However every time I soft reset my device, extra icons appear on the main start page screen. Is there any way to remove these?
I would love to go back to the HTC Start Menu as it was so much better, I know it is on a Tab on Touch Flow 3D but it defeats the point in having a hardware button to launch programs!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I totally agree. The current Startmenu lack the support for hiding items en ordering them. Love to find a solution.
I do not have any issues restructuring my start menu.
The only icons I keep on the main page are Phone and Reset, everything else is in a sub-folder and does not add icons to the main page.
Bruce Inman said:
I do not have any issues restructuring my start menu.
The only icons I keep on the main page are Phone and Reset, everything else is in a sub-folder and does not add icons to the main page.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
True, but the TouchFlo "Programs" was much easier.
So am I the only one who's missing the drop-down menu when you tap the Start button - you know, the one that lists seven favourites and your four or five most recent programs?
Why should I navigate the Honeycomb every time I want to go to a program I use about 30 times a day?
Any fixes/hacks to bring this back? Or am I being really stupid and there's a simple option that I haven't found yet?
colin_85 said:
I would love to go back to the HTC Start Menu as it was so much better, I know it is on a Tab on Touch Flow 3D but it defeats the point in having a hardware button to launch programs!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can do this with Topaz Keyboard Controller: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=555821
Map the Start button to run the program "\Windows\manila.exe" with arguments "--switchtopage programs.page", and it should work perfectly - does for me.

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