Database Users

[App Request] Gesture controlled favorite contact today plugin

I would like to see a today plugin that features quick contacts (Kind of like the HTC home plugin).
The features I would like to see are:
* Today plugin
* Either use photo or set text for each contact.
* Opens contact in default contacts app, doesn't just dial (ie so you can choose to send an SMS)
* Vertical or horizontal list scrolled by gesture. Vertical or horizontal option would be nice, but vertical scroll probably more important - a lot of cube apps (eg ultimatelaunch) are controlled by horizontal gesture, if we could have this contacts app controlled with vertical gesture it would not interfere.
Please note that I mean a gesture controlled list WITHIN the today screen window, not as a seperate full screen app - plenty of things already do this.
* No add contact interface would be required, adding contacts to be included in dialer into a regular outlook category would be perfectly acceptable. Showing photo if contact has one or name if not would also be perfectly acceptable rather than an interface to select that.
V2R Photo Dialer 2 is almost exactly what I want but is controlled by horizontal gesture only. I tried to contact V2R to request this change but I received no response.
[Edit: Thinking about it, it doesn't need to be a favorites dialler, it could just have tickboxes for each category - if you want to use it as a favorite contacts launcher, just set it to the "favorites" category only, or you could leave all categories on to show the whole contacts list]

I'm using Face Contact which has all you've asking for, except horizontal but if you use Ultimate Launch then you can exclude the plugin from the gestures of Ultimate Launch.
http://www.cnetx.com/products/contact/

Nice app - I prefer it to the V2R one. I have emailed the author asking for the option of vertical gesture to scroll the list. I don't care if the list spins horizontally as it is, as long as I can spin it with a vertical gesture so it don't interfere with ultimatelaunch.

evilc said:
I would like to see a today plugin that features quick contacts (Kind of like the HTC home plugin).
The features I would like to see are:
* Today plugin
* Either use photo or set text for each contact.
* Opens contact in default contacts app, doesn't just dial (ie so you can choose to send an SMS)
* Vertical or horizontal list scrolled by gesture. Vertical or horizontal option would be nice, but vertical scroll probably more important - a lot of cube apps (eg ultimatelaunch) are controlled by horizontal gesture, if we could have this contacts app controlled with vertical gesture it would not interfere.
Please note that I mean a gesture controlled list WITHIN the today screen window, not as a seperate full screen app - plenty of things already do this.
* No add contact interface would be required, adding contacts to be included in dialer into a regular outlook category would be perfectly acceptable. Showing photo if contact has one or name if not would also be perfectly acceptable rather than an interface to select that.
V2R Photo Dialer 2 is almost exactly what I want but is controlled by horizontal gesture only. I tried to contact V2R to request this change but I received no response.
[Edit: Thinking about it, it doesn't need to be a favorites dialler, it could just have tickboxes for each category - if you want to use it as a favorite contacts launcher, just set it to the "favorites" category only, or you could leave all categories on to show the whole contacts list]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can do horizontal scrolling photodial with my app, throttlelauncher.... It's free, so if you want to, try it . You can install it from http://www.throttlelauncher.com. After making the full instalation (use the exe setup or install both cabs) here you have a little setup cab for a theme showing only a contact row (if you're interested, you can have much more showing app's and other stuff in multiple pages). So to sum up:
- Go to http://www.throttlelauncher.com/
- Ensure you install everything on the same media (SD or device)
- Install both cab or use the desktop instalation in full mode.
- Install the cab attached to this thread.
- Enable throttletoday today plugin (it might take a little bit to load)
- Add as much contacts as you wish to the row .
Feel free to post any comments, requests or constructive critics . You can customize an xml to make the photos biger, order them in multiple rows, remove the ad delete icons, etc. Hope it matches what you're looking for....

Thanks for that, but the ThrottleLaunch PhotoDialer only allows scrolling of contacts via a horizontal gesture. I need to control it with a *vertical* (up/down) gesture. Also, ThrottleToday will not show inside ultimatelaunch - it will show if I put it on the main Today screen, but trying to add it as a today plugin in ultimatelaunch does nothing.
I did get an encouraging response from the makers of Face Contact yesterday though:
Hello,
thanks for your feedback.
At first thought, the idea of using a vertical gesture and having the list scroll horizontally appears a little bit disturbing, but we think we understand the rationale behind your suggestion.
We will indeed play around with UltimateLaunch to see if you can find out an option that is both intuitive and that allows Face Contact to be usable within their interface.
As it is now a possible solution is to exclude our plugin from being affected by Ultimate Launch gestures, so that when our plugin is active (and only in this circumstance) the left-right gestures will actually scroll the contact list instead than spinning the cube. Then, as soon as you apply the left/right gestures outside of our plugin, the cube will take control.
When developing Face Contact we left the door open to the possibility of having a vertical layout of the contact list, though, of course, this doesn't fit well with the current Today screen organization, which assumes all plugins are placed horizontally. In other words, it wouldn't be that difficult for us to layout the whole list vertically instead than horizontally,
So, we will definitely keep your comment in mind, as it is possible that within a different context (such as Ultimate Launch), we could actually provide both a vertical layout and vertical gesture, which would indeed make quite a lot of sense.
At this stage, having just released Face Contact a couple of days ago, we are currently gathering feedback to see how to move on with further releases and updates.
So, your feedback is very welcome: thanks again.
Best regards,
The CNetX Support Team
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I downloaded Face Contact last night, and so far I am liking it. The reason I went with Face over VR2 is the space issue. VR2 looked to take a lot of space up in the Today screen, and being on a 240x240, space is a big issue. Face seemed to take a minimum of memory and leave room on my screen. I have it in a Shell tab with the native Palm picture dialer. The only option I could think of adding is the ability to dial automatically when the picture is pressed. I know that can lead to a lot of mis-dialings, but maybe a setting like normal usage until the pic is pressed for a second or so, and then the chosen primary number is dialed. If that makes sense great, if not, please let me know and I will try to explain better!!
Here is a screen shot of where I have Face on my Today screen:

im using face contact. it does everything you are asking for. im also using ultimatelaunch, the two make beautiful music together. especially if you choose the "disable gesture" feature when you enable it in ul. ive played with this quite a bit, and it is very intuitive how smooth everything STILL works. especially for these to be a first version for both apps. experiment with it. the result is perfect

Lots of nice feedback here: thanks guys.
syrguy1969 said:
...
The only option I could think of adding is the ability to dial automatically when the picture is pressed. I know that can lead to a lot of mis-dialings, but maybe a setting like normal usage until the pic is pressed for a second or so, and then the chosen primary number is dialed. If that makes sense great, if not, please let me know and I will try to explain better!!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not sure if this is referred to Face Contact, or to other software you are using. If you are actually talking about FC, then please note that you can easily reassign the TAP and TAP & HOLD actions to trigger different commands, including CALLING the selected contact. Just check the "Action Settings" screen and you'll find the options there.
Also note that when Face Contact is the active plugin you should be able to CALL the selected contact by simply pressing the START CALL key of your phone. This is usually easier and less error-prone than having to tap or tap and hold. And, if you call by using the START CALL key, you can use the tap and tap&hold actions for other things, such as displaying the shortcut menu, or accessing the Face Contact Manager.
PS: we have included quite an extensive help file, with lots of tips and tricks and information on things like this. Maybe you may want to give it a quick look.

I guess I missed the tap+hold part, that is exactly what I was getting at!!! I guess this app has just about it all for me then, I will keep testing like crazy, but so far I am very pleased with it!!!

i'm using throttle now, but the pics look like garbage. I'm seriously OCD about the dumbest stuff, so I'm still looking for an answer. I just want face contact to have a transparent background, and I'd buy it.

J Shed said:
...
I just want face contact to have a transparent background, and I'd buy it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey Shed, please have a look at my post concerning the plugin background in the Face Contact thread here...
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=378145&page=7

evilc said:
Thanks for that, but the ThrottleLaunch PhotoDialer only allows scrolling of contacts via a horizontal gesture. I need to control it with a *vertical* (up/down) gesture. Also, ThrottleToday will not show inside ultimatelaunch - it will show if I put it on the main Today screen, but trying to add it as a today plugin in ultimatelaunch does nothing.
I did get an encouraging response from the makers of Face Contact yesterday though:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi evilc!
Sorry for the delay on the answer. Vertical scroll on throttlelauncher is planned for a further release (probably 1.0), it's still alpha so many things are missing but I thought It will mach what you where looking for... Any way, I've install UL and find out why the plugin is not showing... seem's that UL doesn't work exactly like the today screen when hosting today plugins (probably to save some memory) so the today plugin exe is not launching. To sum up, to make throttletoday plugin show inside UL the only thing needed is running manually the ThrottleTodayPlugin.exe located on the throttlelauncher instalation path. At least that worked for me. Also as you've said the horizontal scrolling will interfer with the tab change gesture so disabling os setting a time out it is needed by now....
J Shed said:
i'm using throttle now, but the pics look like garbage. I'm seriously OCD about the dumbest stuff, so I'm still looking for an answer. I just want face contact to have a transparent background, and I'd buy it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi shed!
If contact photos don't look good you can try playing with the config.xml file to change the contact photo width an height values (I recommend to keep the 3/4 ratio if you use standar photo dial photos). The config.xml file will be inside the PhotoDialer1Row (or 2Row if you use this one) on your setups folder on your throttlelauncher instalation path. All you need to do is search for the allcontactswithphoto tag and play with it's height and width attribute.

Gabibbo:
I saw your post and had already replied. I'm just waiting for the version to show up.
APBilbo:
I have thinkered with that setting, the problem is in just how throttle scales the images. I don't recall the terms, but the scaled images are distorted.

@evilc .... I too use face contacts in a UL panel. When you use the disable gesture feature, It only disables the gestures from being passed to UL in the active plugin area. You can still spin the cube via gesture in an inactive area of the panel. Or if combined with something else, an area that does not otherwise respond to a gesture. Try it out.... In my case I have found that though it is a great idea, the vertical gesturing is not necessary for a fully functional solution.

J Shed said:
...
APBilbo:
I have thinkered with that setting, the problem is in just how throttle scales the images. I don't recall the terms, but the scaled images are distorted.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ok, thanks for the info... I'll take a look at that... It's NET.CF the one scaling the images.... probably there's a smother method to get it...

nextpimp said:
@evilc .... I too use face contacts in a UL panel. When you use the disable gesture feature, It only disables the gestures from being passed to UL in the active plugin area. You can still spin the cube via gesture in an inactive area of the panel. Or if combined with something else, an area that does not otherwise respond to a gesture. Try it out.... In my case I have found that though it is a great idea, the vertical gesturing is not necessary for a fully functional solution.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, I realised that a while ago, it is OK if you have something else in the UL tab without gestures disabled, so that you can gesture left in that area to spin the cube.
I think overall, the interface I would like would be gesture left/right between the faces, then up/down to scroll info on each face. I think for this interface, a vertical list would be more suitable than horizontal scrolling icons, it would just work better visually.
I really like the music browser in conduits pocket player - I would kill for one of those in a UL face along with a contacts list done in a similar manner on another face, thumbcal (with scroll month by vertical gesture) on another face... That would be nirvana for me.

Is Xperia a good Office-mobile?

I now have Hermes/TyTN and are used to and want be able to navigate everything office-related quickly with the keyboard (mostly Outlook Mobile and the ”File explorer” (Word-documents)
So more specifically (but feel free to answer in general terms as well):
- Is the above easy and quick?
(Especilly concerning Outlook Mobile)
- Is it possible to customize a button shorcut to the ”File explorer”?
- I noticed that the keyboard lacks soft buttons and directional arrows - how does that work out?
- Do Word Mobile documents open quickly?
I'm thinking about buying a Kaiser/TyTN II after a litte disapointing test of Touch Pro, but would like to enjoy the fun, exciting and practical things, like Google maps, of a Touch Phone as well.
/Dan

-There are 2 soft keys you can customize
-The D-pad/Optical scroll will still be usable in landscape mode and will be rotated so that it works correctly.
-It one of the fastest phones out there so yes they'll open quickly.

Thanks!
I´m afraid it lead to some more questions :s.
Okey, now I think I can see the scroll wheel which I guess works for instead of vertical arrows, but what about sideways?
By soft keys I meant the keys above the keyboard (se attachment), which one´s did you mean?
The reason I ask if it´s slow with opening Word-documents is that Touch Pro, also one of the fastest, took 15-25 sec. to open a 50kB doc. which is ridiculous because they usually are 150-200kB.

Danne said:
Thanks!
I´m afraid it lead to some more questions :s.
Okey, now I think I can see the scroll wheel which I guess works for instead of vertical arrows, but what about sideways?
By soft keys I meant the keys above the keyboard (se attachment), which one´s did you mean?
The reason I ask if it´s slow with opening Word-documents is that Touch Pro, also one of the fastest, took 15-25 sec. to open a 50kB doc. which is ridiculous because they usually are 150-200kB.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can set those two keys to anything you want on just about any windows mobile device so setting that to file explorer shouldn't be problem at all.
When I was talking about the optical scroller, I was talking about the Xperia. I does not have a scroll wheel. You know those little mouse pads on labtops. Well it has a mini (sorta) one of those for scrolling on the bottom of the screen or you can use it as a D-Pad.
The touch pro has touchflo3d that may slow application loading time because it causes over head. On the standard today screen the Xperia should fly with opening word docs.

Danne said:
I now have Hermes/TyTN and are used to and want be able to navigate everything office-related quickly with the keyboard (mostly Outlook Mobile and the ”File explorer” (Word-documents)
So more specifically (but feel free to answer in general terms as well):
- Is the above easy and quick?
(Especilly concerning Outlook Mobile)
- Is it possible to customize a button shorcut to the ”File explorer”?
- I noticed that the keyboard lacks soft buttons and directional arrows - how does that work out?
- Do Word Mobile documents open quickly?
I'm thinking about buying a Kaiser/TyTN II after a litte disapointing test of Touch Pro, but would like to enjoy the fun, exciting and practical things, like Google maps, of a Touch Phone as well.
/Dan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
May I ask what disappointed you in the Touch Pro?
Except slow opening of word files?

Some clarifications:
- The two soft buttons.
There are two physical buttons below the display that you can use or you can just touch the buttons on the screen itself.
When the keyboard is open there are no physical buttons on the keyboard so you have to touch the screen or use the two buttons below (now on the side of) the screen.
- Directional Keys
Around the optical mouse there are 4 directional keys that work both with the keyboard open and closed. They work fine and they logically rotate with the screen orientation.
- Optical mouse
As Kloc said it's not a scroll wheel but works similar to a touch pad on a laptop.

Danne said:
So more specifically (but feel free to answer in general terms as well):
- Is the above easy and quick?
(Especilly concerning Outlook Mobile)
- Do Word Mobile documents open quickly?
/Dan
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know about navigating to Outlook quickly, but 3 panels carry a shortcut to outlook - the SE Panel, the Spb Panel, and the Windows Panel... and from the latest videos i have seen, it is fast.
There is also another video on youtube where they open various office documents on the device including spreadsheets, word document, etc. and although i did not care to notice, but i am quite certain that it was not slow. i'll try to hunt down that video and post the link here.

Hi again (after sleep and work)
Ok, now I understand which soft buttons you guys mean, I was only refering to the ones that TyTN (see pic) has in landscape mode above the keyboard (very practical). I guess I´ll have to use the touch screen for those commands.
Thanks for the clarification about the directional keys I hope they are quick to work with in keyboard ”mode” as you imply.
And msalmank, if you find the link I´ll be happy to see it, if not one of you have direct experience with opening Word-documents. On Touch Pro I actually turned off the Touch Flo 3D and it didn´t become quicker (not much anyway). Slower than my 2 year old HTC TyTN.
Why I was dissapointed in Touch Pro (except slow opening of Word-documents)?
(I realize that the perspective here is narrow, but as said, I use the PDA mostly in this narrow office-way. Constantly and quickly changing calender-appointments and writing in different Word-documents. Besides that TP does have some great stuff in it!)
- The input method with auto suggestion of Words is really crappy (I don´t know it it´s the same in all WM6.1 phones(?))
- Low sound-signals for reminders and SMS
- Low battery time (but I´we seen completely different opinions on this matter so I don´t know what´s up with that)
- Unproportionaly big menus when using the keyboard in landscape mode (might be fixable?)
I just might buy the Xperia and test it and send it back if I´m not pleased. That might be the simplest solution. But buying the first couple of weeks is always risky, isn´t it.

I'm a PC, and this is my office!

I'm a PC, I'm a PC, I'm a PC (while doing a dance)

Touch API?

Is there an API that a developer can use to make use of the touch part of the Pro/Diamond (and other manufacturer touch devices)? I just installed VS 2008 Pro and can't seem to find much info on making use of the touch i.e. detecting finger swipes etc.

sgd2z said:
Is there an API that a developer can use to make use of the touch part of the Pro/Diamond (and other manufacturer touch devices)? I just installed VS 2008 Pro and can't seem to find much info on making use of the touch i.e. detecting finger swipes etc.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AFAIK, no manufacture has released anything about gestures.
You can try and recognise gestures using your own code.
In C++, WM_LBUTTONDOWN (screen is touched), WM_LBUTTONUP (screen touch is released) and WM_MOUSEMOVE (screen touch point e.g. finger moves) are the touch events. Each one of those supplies the x and y coordinates, but things like "finger flicked from bottom to top" have to be coded by you.
If by the "touch part", you mean the capacitive panel at the bottom, then this and this should be of interest.

This was posted earlier over in dev and hacking, not sure if it anything like what you want and unfortunately it is also not free, looks good though!

uniqueboy said:
This was posted earlier over in dev and hacking, not sure if it anything like what you want and unfortunately it is also not free, looks good though!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is almost what I'm looking for but I'm going to try and make my own touch friendly interface before I pay Maybe if it works, I'll release the code for free. What my app needs is something like HTC's album where finger flicks bring up the next/previous photo.

Smartouch and Zoombar

I am trying to find a way to mess with
HKLM/Software/HTC/SmartTouch/ key in registry, which is supposed to control the zoom bar.
I did some research in several threads in this forum, but all I found was some info (mainly on TD1 threads) on how to make the zoom bar (or scroll wheel in TD1) produce scrolling in apps.
However, what I am interesting in, is ZOOMING within any kind of application. Any idea on how to achieve this? The aforementioned key contains values such as ClassName (which is the app's class, something that is not easy to figure out; any tool on finding out an app's class would be appreciated), WheelCount (which probably is sensitivity), and Mode (which I have no idea what it is).
Anyone could help with this?

I could imagine a few nice things to do with the Zoombar. As I'm missing the arrow keys, it would be great to define a few gestures to use up / down / left / right keys with the zoombar.
e.g.
slide to the right -> right key
slide to the left -> left key
tap on '+' -> up key
tap on '-' -> down key

jcan said:
I am trying to find a way to mess with
HKLM/Software/HTC/SmartTouch/ key in registry, which is supposed to control the zoom bar.
I did some research in several threads in this forum, but all I found was some info (mainly on TD1 threads) on how to make the zoom bar (or scroll wheel in TD1) produce scrolling in apps.
However, what I am interesting in, is ZOOMING within any kind of application. Any idea on how to achieve this? The aforementioned key contains values such as ClassName (which is the app's class, something that is not easy to figure out; any tool on finding out an app's class would be appreciated), WheelCount (which probably is sensitivity), and Mode (which I have no idea what it is).
Anyone could help with this?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi jcan,
Did you manage to find ways to resolve your question? Kindly share with me please!

Try here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=512614&page=5

Thanks for the link mattan, but I had already tried the Advanced Config solution... It is true that you can add Smartouch capability in active apps from there, but the problem is that I tried some (e.g. GSFinder+), and it worked as a scroll device.
What I am trying to find is a way to make the zoom bar work universally as its name says, i.e. zoom. It would be very nice to be able to zoom in anywhere in the device, like having a magnifying glass. Unfortunately, I haven't found anything yet but I know that the solution is hidden somewhere in the Smartouch reg key... Let's hope some fellow xda member will enlighten us!

and it worked as a scroll device.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually it's not, it's work like hardware Up/down key. In some case you can redefine action on it (In program settings), for example CorePlayer, or some games.
I think biotouch must be modified for this

jcan said:
Thanks for the link mattan, but I had already tried the Advanced Config solution... It is true that you can add Smartouch capability in active apps from there, but the problem is that I tried some (e.g. GSFinder+), and it worked as a scroll device.
What I am trying to find is a way to make the zoom bar work universally as its name says, i.e. zoom. It would be very nice to be able to zoom in anywhere in the device, like having a magnifying glass. Unfortunately, I haven't found anything yet but I know that the solution is hidden somewhere in the Smartouch reg key... Let's hope some fellow xda member will enlighten us!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What you would need to do it actually write an application that zooms the screen in hardware (similar to ctrl + mouse wheel zooming in Mac OSX) and control it with the zoom bar in applications that don't work with the zoom bar at present. I haven't actually used GSFinder+ but if doesn't have some sort of zoom level available to it through a menu function or on screen button then there is no way the zoombar will magically give it (or any other non-zooming program) one.

OK, I get it then... So, if an application does not support zooming, then the zoombar can only be used as a scroll device (or up-down key)...
I guess we will have to settle with that type of use then, until a screen zoom application comes up.

jcan said:
OK, I get it then... So, if an application does not support zooming, then the zoombar can only be used as a scroll device (or up-down key)...
I guess we will have to settle with that type of use then, until a screen zoom application comes up.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
this is what u want :

criszz said:
this is what u want :
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What does this cab exactly do, mate?

Read and download here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=406206

According to some review, "pinch to zoom" works *everywhere* ! (is it true ?)

According to some review, "pinch to zoom" works *everywhere* ! (is it true ?)
I don't remember if it was Slashgear or TrustedReviews, but one of them said that if you find yourself in a screen where things look too small to operate (i.e a WM6.5 native screen, or any other window which is not optimized for a capacitve screen), you can use pinch to zoom to enlarge so you could accuratly press where you want.
If this is true it is brilliant.
If it is true, I wonder if you must have the SENSE UI for this feature to be active...

Just read your post, tested it in Windows Explorer (so outside of Sense) and it works, pinch to zoom....

In IE it does not work!

xmoo said:
In IE it does not work!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For obvious reasons, I haven't tested IE yet

In Tomtom 7, does not work!

Can you go to other windows mobile screens which are not compatible with a capacitive screen (like the "tasks" program) and check if pinch to zoom works ?

Noam23 said:
Can you go to other windows mobile screens which are not compatible with a capacitive screen (like the "tasks" program) and check if pinch to zoom works ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In the task list it does not work, but when selecting a task and going to the detail page pinch to zoom does work. So not in the overview but in the detail.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wK_SRdQCG0