Database Users

Today Screen Launcher IDEA.. please develop..

hi. i first posted this idea on the PointUI forum.. so forgive me for the blasphemous screen.. anyway.. i jsut want to share this idea for those developers, willing to create a scrolling today screen launcher..
click thumbnail for the animated demo..
the idea is, to create a launcher that is customizable (custom icons - TGA or PNG for transparency), scrollable, and FUN.. hehe..
anyway.. it's a simple horizontal swipe and scroll.. but the added feature of the - what i call - default pane..
the default pane should be a set of five shortcut icons (user configurable) that can be easily accessed from anywhere in the horizontal list.. how? double tap the space above the icons..
for example, you have a 16 icon horizontal list, if you are in the end of the list, and you have to go back to your default pane, just double tap the space above the icons, and the list will scroll back to your default pane..
also, there should be an option for memory or default..
the memory option remembers the last position of your launcher and remains where it is even after you launched a program or switched to another window..
the default view scrolls the list back to the default pane after launching a program or every time the today screen becomes active..
this idea could not just be a today screen plugin.. it can also be a launcher that can be called via screen gesture (FtouchSL/FtouchFLO).. the difference with this launcher, is if implemented, would just be an over-window rather than a full screen launcher.. it may also be a task switcher.. depends on the developers choice..
here's a quick demo..
[/i]click on the thumbnail for the animated demo..[/i]
once again, this is just an IDEA.... for someone else with the programming prowess..
i'm just good with photoshop and ideas. but binaries and hexadecimals kill me..

Good idea..i hope some one develops it...u can try Throttle launcher

Where did you find the picture?
Have you done it by yourself?

look into ultimatlaunch also... very similar to what you are wanting

with customize icons and wallpaper... wold be good.. and a feeds infos too on the clock and events apperance

the upper part of the picture/animation is the PointUI Home interface.. no credit for me with that..
the bottom part however is mostly my creation.. (the icons used were modified from bundled stardock icons for windowsXp)
i created the bottom part and the application launcher ribbon as an idea suggestion for the developers of PointUI..
a bit inspired by the leaked wm7 pix and the iphone springboard hacks they created over at cre.ations.net
i don't really like PointUI that much (YET, but i'm getting there), so i also suggest the idea as a native Today Screen plugin.. and an all around launcher.. a minimalist approach, compared to the touchFLO cube and it's encarnations..
i don't like ultimate launcher that much.. i'm not into Tabbed launchers.. too much space consumed..
throttle launcher looks cluttered at the moment.. too much things are rendered on screen at the same time.. it takes up much time loading and, again, screen real estate.. i'm still eyeing for its future improvements though.. especially if it will be able to get customized, as in, to be able to select the features that will be loaded, and will not..
it's not likely that all people want to see a big clock, a bunch of contact pictures, all of the shortcuts, and running programs cramped in their screen at the same time..

Would be awesome...good idea buddy.

ytsejam_ said:
throttle launcher looks cluttered at the moment.. too much things are rendered on screen at the same time.. it takes up much time loading and, again, screen real estate.. i'm still eyeing for its future improvements though.. especially if it will be able to get customized, as in, to be able to select the features that will be loaded, and will not..
it's not likely that all people want to see a big clock, a bunch of contact pictures, all of the shortcuts, and running programs cramped in their screen at the same time..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
they have a single line launcher now, it the same thing you ar requesting. I'm also keeping an eye on them i think the single line can be a nice addon to every rom. (but it has to be easy customiseble)

If you combine Ultimate Launcher with some clever today screen plugins, especially with rltoday, you can do at least the first part with customization only.

if only the creator wants to make pointui for VGA sigh..

That concept has been done here

i tried v2r and though it was not that good....this idea is awesome though i would love to see it developed

I like the concept.... I'll try to achieve something similar with my app (ThrottleLauncher) and report back with what can be done . Some questions:
Any way of getting the art work used on your screen shots?
What are the left and right arrows on the clock for?
Thanks for that cool concept!

APBilbo said:
I like the concept.... I'll try to achieve something similar with my app (ThrottleLauncher) and report back with what can be done . Some questions:
Any way of getting the art work used on your screen shots?
What are the left and right arrows on the clock for?
Thanks for that cool concept!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is what I've so far. I know the look is not the same but without the background's it's the closer I can make it for the today plugin. For the "poping up" app, the same theme can be used without the clocks on throttle main app. A little modification on the app will be needed to show the prevous window as background.

APBilbo said:
This is what I've so far. I know the look is not the same but without the background's it's the closer I can make it for the today plugin. For the "poping up" app, the same theme can be used without the clocks on throttle main app. A little modification on the app will be needed to show the prevous window as background.
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Click to collapse
awesome! if you could release your today plugin ribbon, my theme would be complete! really looking forward to this

Michaelr219 said:
awesome! if you could release your today plugin ribbon, my theme would be complete! really looking forward to this
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Click to collapse
The today plugin ribbon is really eassy to achieve with my app ;-). I've made a simple theme for you. Just uncompress the zip file into your instalation dir of ThrottleLauncher (see my signature).
After that, go to ThrottleConfig app (it must be on your programs menu) and set plugin height to 38 (or higher if you customize the icons to be bigger), then sellect Ribbon on the combo box and click "Set Today's" button. Then on the actions menu (left softkey) select Edit AppDB, add as much app's as you wish (needed fields are title, name and exec, only select an icon if you wan't to override the default of the app). Select the app's you want to be on the Used list. After all that add throttletoday plugin to your today screen.
If you wan't to make some playing with the setup you can take a look at this tutorials
http://www.throttlelauncher.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=8
You can for example eassily set the ribbon to be 2 rowed, add a clock, add contact photodial ribbon, etc etc .
edit: removed atachment as it contained an error. Look some post's below for the correct one..

APBilbo said:
The today plugin ribbon is really eassy to achieve with my app ;-). I've made a simple theme for you. Just uncompress the zip file into your instalation dir of ThrottleLauncher (see my signature).
After that, go to ThrottleConfig app (it must be on your programs menu) and set plugin height to 38 (or higher if you customize the icons to be bigger), then sellect Ribbon on the combo box and click "Set Today's" button. Then on the actions menu (left softkey) select Edit AppDB, add as much app's as you wish (needed fields are title, name and exec, only select an icon if you wan't to override the default of the app). Select the app's you want to be on the Used list. After all that add throttletoday plugin to your today screen.
If you wan't to make some playing with the setup you can take a look at this tutorials
http://www.throttlelauncher.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=8
You can for example eassily set the ribbon to be 2 rowed, add a clock, add contact photodial ribbon, etc etc .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
awesome! thank you soo much, im going to incorporate this to the m-series of my iStyle theme, youll get much credit deserved for this. im gonna test this right now! thanks again!

Michaelr219 said:
awesome! thank you soo much, im going to incorporate this to the m-series of my iStyle theme, youll get much credit deserved for this. im gonna test this right now! thanks again!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you need more help or find any probs you know where to find me .

APBilbo said:
If you need more help or find any probs you know where to find me .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i installed the latest version... and unzipped accordingly, i didnt get the "ribbon" as an option in the dropdown menu... and i cant find that clock ribbon like in your screenshot, if you could post that theme like in your first screenshot, itd be much appreciated, im trying to find something similar to the ribbon in pointui... i dont know how to design it, i just would like to easily scroll through a clock, calendar, and if possible, notifications... mainly just clock and calendar... also, is it possible to have it automatically "fall into place" on the flick/scroll... all your work is appreciated... and thank you in advance

Michaelr219 said:
i installed the latest version... and unzipped accordingly, i didnt get the "ribbon" as an option in the dropdown menu... and i cant find that clock ribbon like in your screenshot, if you could post that theme like in your first screenshot, itd be much appreciated, im trying to find something similar to the ribbon in pointui... i dont know how to design it, i just would like to easily scroll through a clock, calendar, and if possible, notifications... mainly just clock and calendar... also, is it possible to have it automatically "fall into place" on the flick/scroll... all your work is appreciated... and thank you in advance
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry... my fault... there was an error on the zip. Setup xml must be inside a folder called Ribbon on the setups folder and not directly inside it. Here you have an update of the simple ribbon setup and the one of the screenshots above (this last will require a little work still but I upload it so you can test it ).

Easy Icon Customizing

I found this great program online a few days ago thats very good for (especially for noobys) at allowing you to customize icons right on your ppc. Ive tried it extensivley with .png icons that is use for my iFonz screen. All you need to do is copy and paste the icon you want to customize into My Documents/My Pictures, and bring up the PaintApp. You can zoom in to single block view which in my opinion makes customizing extremely easy. It also has a feature which alows you to resize your icons simply by entering in the size desired. If your creative enough, choose your size, and make one from scratch. This program is also just fun to use. Below is the .cab file for the program. This is great for people who have no experience making icons.
Tip, use something simple like a blank calendar or calculator icon as your base if you want to make a completley new icon. It makes it easier to know the outline of what you want.
Hope you enjoy this. I do.

it looks great
thank you so much for bringing this nice prog here
cheers

TweakMan said:
I found this great program online a few days ago thats very good for (especially for noobys) at allowing you to customize icons right on your ppc. Ive tried it extensivley with .png icons that is use for my iFonz screen. All you need to do is copy and paste the icon you want to customize into My Documents/My Pictures, and bring up the PaintApp. You can zoom in to single block view which in my opinion makes customizing extremely easy. It also has a feature which alows you to resize your icons simply by entering in the size desired. If your creative enough, choose your size, and make one from scratch. This program is also just fun to use. Below is the .cab file for the program. This is great for people who have no experience making icons.
Tip, use something simple like a blank calendar or calculator icon as your base if you want to make a completley new icon. It makes it easier to know the outline of what you want.
Hope you enjoy this. I do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could you go into detail on what you do to customize your icons? I use iFonz also and I would Love to fix my own iPhone icons to work with iFonz...

Details
Here's some details like you asked for in the second reply. Im just going to tell you what I use it for. First, to make changes to an icon, copy it to My Pictures located in My Documents. That's the only folder it reads. When you install the app the first time you run it, it will give you an option 4 a tutorial mode. Do it. Anyway.. Once you bring up whatever icon you chose, you have all sorts of options. You can change the color , the size, everything . Then save it. Go bak and copy/paste it back 2 the original folder or wherever you want and there you go. Also , my favorite, you can create your own icon from scratch. Just select the option to create a new file or image, whatever its called. Then choose the option to chae the size. Set it to whatever size you want, 44x44 , 42x42, and have at it. Just mess around and you'll figure out how to make them rounded like the default icons. Now here's a tip to make this easier. If you want to make you own custom icon, copy and paste a realy simple, almost blank default icon, like the calendar icon or the stock lines icon to My Pictures. open it up in the program. use your zoom feature too zoom in pretty close. Select the paintbrush, use white and erase everything inside the icon except the Main outline. This way you have a border to go by and keep it the same shape and size. That's what I do and it works great. Another great feature is being able to cut and paste images from one to another. Just take any image, ( I used a Yahoo! image from the web) , save it to My Pictures , and open it in the program. Change the size to 1 less or the same as the icons your using. Then select the cut option , outline the image the select the 'cut to clipboard' option. Next choose the open option, (dont save chaes when it asks), open the icon you want to use as an outline, or whatever icon you want to put the image on. Paste the image to the icon and then zoom in and use your tools to touch it up. I've made google,yahoo msn, hundred icons that look great! Its really simple. You've just got to play around. Its just a paint app like on you desktop, on your ppc! Its zoom feature just makes it so easy to work on icons. Im posting this from my vogue, so sorry if spelling and puctuation aren't perfect. Ill post some of my icons tomorrow for u to check out. hope you enjoy. and post any icons you come up with guys!

Thanks! ima give it a try =)

icons on themes, dialer skin.

I have tried to search and find what to do to install a theme that has icons, and cannot figure it out. Do I need some program that everyone is using? Also on dialer skins how are those installed?
Do skins kill battery life or use alot of system resources?
Thanks

What theme? If its HTC home, you install the .cab file from the phone or sync the phone to pc and double click .exe.
If its a .tsk file, Put the file in the windows directory of the phone then go to today screen and select from there.
Skins dont use a lot of system resources UNLESS they are actively doing something( S2U2 for example if you install a moving gif as your wallpaper) as they are just being used instead of the originals.. Cheers...

yea, u need to be a wee bit more clear as to what you want, you're probably new and dont know the right terms, so maybe if you posted some pics we could understand a bit better what u are trying to achieve.

this is the style im looking for http://forum.xda-developers.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=51534&d=1190401691 with the big clock and some icons below. I think that I will need a plug in to show the icons. I installed a tsk theme but it only changed the color of the top and bottom bars, but did not show the large clock or icons like that one. I saved it to the memory card, not within a folder and I was able to browse find and install it. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Sorry Im New
thanks,
Nicholas

that big clock is the htc home plugin, which you can download all over this forum, or at www.pocketemu.com which incidentally also has another program called htc home customizer, which would be the easiest way to customize the home icons. It may not have that exact theme you are looking for, so the best way to get that theme is to ask the person who posted that screenshot

XtreMe_G said:
that big clock is the htc home plugin, which you can download all over this forum, or at www.pocketemu.com which incidentally also has another program called htc home customizer, which would be the easiest way to customize the home icons.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ditto. Welcome to the addiction...I'm lucky to keep the same clock and icons for more than a week...

Turning Off Start Menu Transparency

I have WM 6.1 and have recently changed my background to something that has some white in it. Now because of this and the fact that the start menu is transparent I can't read some of the text in the menu.
Before anyone suggests it, yes I'm aware of how to change the text color using the registry. I am not interested in doing this, I tried it and didn't really like it.
I am looking to do one of two things:
1. Remove the transparency.
2. Add a thin black stroke to make it readable.
Any suggestion that works is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Does anyone have any knowledge of what I can do here? This is really pretty obnoxious and I don't know how to fix it.

Stingray88 said:
I have WM 6.1 and have recently changed my background to something that has some white in it. Now because of this and the fact that the start menu is transparent I can't read some of the text in the menu.
Before anyone suggests it, yes I'm aware of how to change the text color using the registry. I am not interested in doing this, I tried it and didn't really like it.
I am looking to do one of two things:
1. Remove the transparency.
2. Add a thin black stroke to make it readable.
Any suggestion that works is greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually, the start menu is not transparent, but rather it uses a piece of the picture in your background to make it look as if it was transparent. Changing system fonts might solve your issue. There are a few programs that will allow you to do that in Dev&Hacking. Also, I believe that mrMakk has a tutorial on how to do this.
Alternatively, you can try to change the menu picture by using something like Theme Creator v2 or Theme Generator v2 (I can't remember the correct name for the program).

Thanks man, I'll give the theme generator a try when I get home.

Theme generator only works on 2002. The themes it generates could not be applied to WinMo 6.1...
Anyone got another suggestion? Surely there is a way to change the start menu picture in WinMo 6.1...

When I select a picture and set it as a Today Background, it brings up a screen so that I could select a Transparency Level.

Comptronic said:
When I select a picture and set it as a Today Background, it brings up a screen so that I could select a Transparency Level.
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Click to collapse
I don't believe that this is what the user is asking for.

egzthunder1 said:
I don't believe that this is what the user is asking for.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
He is asking about the transparency of the Start Menu isn't he? When you click on Start it drops down a menu correct?
On my phone, when I go to save a picture as my wallpaper, I am able to change the transparency of the Start menu. I'm not saying that's the only way, that's the only way I know and it worked for me.
If I'm wrong, I apologize.

Stingray88 said:
I have WM 6.1 and have recently changed my background to something that has some white in it. Now because of this and the fact that the start menu is transparent I can't read some of the text in the menu.
Before anyone suggests it, yes I'm aware of how to change the text color using the registry. I am not interested in doing this, I tried it and didn't really like it.
I am looking to do one of two things:
1. Remove the transparency.
2. Add a thin black stroke to make it readable.
Any suggestion that works is greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I want to get transparent to startmenu (WM6.1). I try some ways as registry othe sotf but didn't
How can u do it, pls help me.?

i was able to have separate pictures for my today screen and start menu, i used themegence, my advice is MAKE SURE YOU HAVE CORRECT RESOLUTION SET or it will scale the images incorrectly i uploaded a picture of the the theme i made for my phone to show what im talking about

Custom Icons [how do I?]

So what is the process for getting custom icons onto the tablet and having them properly associated with their respective apps?
Say, I have a new Browser icon I want to use... what's the next step?
Can 'o' worms question, I know...

Personally I use folder organizer (from the market). It allows you to change an icon for a particular app or create a folder with several app in it. For example, a games folder with the icon of your choice will open a folder with whatever games you put in it (and can customize those icons as well)
Hope that helps.

Thanks Steve, I'll take a look at that now.
EDIT***
Okay, sorta works but a little too convoluted... You have to change each icon individually then add each app you've changed as a widget. I'm looking to do something more in the way of an icon pack that will swap out all the icons at once (of the ones I've made and apps supported).

I use Desktop Visualizer; however, this is also a 'one at a time' process.
I am not familiar with a process to change the icons 'en mass'.
This is a great thread for icon packs and there's some basic information on changing icons in the first post. It's possible though, that one of the icon developers listed in the thread will be able to answer your question.

Thanks for the info Franwella
I'll make my morning reading.