A coworker showed me earlier that he has an icon on the Droid to launch the car dock manually. There is no such launcher for the Atrix.
Is there a way of creating one?
Coming from wm I find it odd that there is no obvious way to create a shortcut in the filesystem and I gather that rooting it wont change that. Then again, if it was that easy we'd already know how to launch the Webtop mode without a dock...
It is frustrating seeing the car dock listed under running apps but notbeing unable to launch it. I already have a decent universal phone mount in my car (vent mounted) so I don't particularly care to purchase a new one which likely wouldn't be as convenient.
Note: this is my first android phone so treat any silly questions accordingly.
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
I know, my friends Droid X does this, and my atrix doesnt. Pretty lame!!! I'd rather not buy the car dock, but I want the car dock mode.
I just bought the car dock for $30 at local retail store. To me, it seems pretty good. atrix has nice user interface when it is in car mode and has 3.5 mm jack which you can use car's aux port to use audio instead of phone's speaker. It just shame that dock does not include usb charger (usb cable is included with audio jack attached to it).
Digicrat said:
A coworker showed me earlier that he has an icon on the Droid to launch the car dock manually. There is no such launcher for the Atrix.
Is there a way of creating one?
Coming from wm I find it odd that there is no obvious way to create a shortcut in the filesystem and I gather that rooting it wont change that. Then again, if it was that easy we'd already know how to launch the Webtop mode without a dock...
It is frustrating seeing the car dock listed under running apps but notbeing unable to launch it. I already have a decent universal phone mount in my car (vent mounted) so I don't particularly care to purchase a new one which likely wouldn't be as convenient.
Note: this is my first android phone so treat any silly questions accordingly.
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The easiest way to get the car dock (or desk dock) to work without actually using a dock is to use a 3rd party launcher (like ADW.Launcher or Launcher Pro).
Here's the steps for ADW.Launcher, I'm sure it's similar for Launcher Pro
1. Long press home screen and tap "custom shortcut"
2. Tap "Pick your activity"
3. Tap "activities"
4. Scroll down to "CarDock", tap to expand it and tap "CarDock(.main.CardockMainActivity)"
5. Rename the custom shortcut or just tap "ok"
Now you can launch the car dock from the homescreen. Like I said, it also works for the desk clock that is called "Desk Home".
Hope that helps!
You can do it with Any Cut too. Just make a shortcut to the first car dock on the list under activities.
Awesome find. Now if only I could put these shortcuts in a folder...
I also got a shortcut for the alarm clock interface, might have to sit down and make myself a bedside charging/alarm clock dock.
SG Pillar said:
Awesome find. Now if only I could put these shortcuts in a folder...
I also got a shortcut for the alarm clock interface, might have to sit down and make myself a bedside charging/alarm clock dock.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No problem, just use Folder Organizer (combined with Launcher Pro or any other app that will make shortcuts from activities)
FO >> new Shortcut >> LP Activity >> CarDock.MainActivity
FO >> Tags >> Edit Items >> Add Shortcut >> [select previously created item]
From Home
Long Press >> Folder Org Item >> Tag containing the above
CAR MODE CONTROL app in market. It just adds a toggle to click car mode on. Works fine on my Atrix
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
fabrijack said:
CAR MODE CONTROL app in market. It just adds a toggle to click car mode on. Works fine on my Atrix
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
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Click to collapse
Installed the app, it puts it into carmode just fine. Issue is that everytime I leave car mode and then hit the HOME button, it takes me back to car mode instead of the home screen. Anyone else getting this? I needed a restart to put it back to normal. Tried killing the dock app and the car mode app
@DT
Actually found out about folder org in the post your homescreen thread and stumbled on this myself. Thanks for the tut though, definitely will help anyone trying to do this from now on.
Sent from my MB860 using XDA App
Thanks. Both the ADW.Launcher and the AnyCut methods mostly work for me.
One caveat with either method, which will get annoying if I want to listen to music and use the GPS at the same time, is that hitting the home button will exit the car dock mode. The back button will take you back into the car dock, but doing so forces the navigation application to close. Pressing the home dock does not close it, but returning is tricky. Launching the Nav app from my home screen shortcut takes it directly back to navigation mode, but the shortcut in the car dock asks for destination again which needs to be dismissed by pressing the tiny (defeating the purpose of cardock) map button to return to navigation.
I tried ADW.Launcher first, but uninstalled it after realizing I didn't care for it's Apps menu (I keep dragging icons to the home screen instead of scrolling...), though I do like it's ability to sort apps into groups. An App menu with a look like the stock one but that adds the ability to filter by category (preferably by swiping horizontally) would be ideal. I guess finding an alternative will be my next search .. and probably a discussion better suited for another thread.
Update: I just tried the "Car Mode Control" application jiggytom suggested while writing the previous post.
Car Mode Control appears to be the best option for launching the car dock mode and remapping the home button.
To permanently exit the dock mode, you must select the "Car Mode" icon again. This can be done from the home screen after temporarily exiting the dock with the X, or within the dock by making "Car Mode" one of your shortcuts.
Digicrat said:
is that hitting the home button will exit the car dock mode. The back button will take you back into the car dock, but doing so forces the navigation application to close.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hm, I don't seem to be having the same problems.
I typed in a location on my phone, Navigation opened up, got directions, and calculated my course.
I hit home, and it returned me to Car Dock mode. When I clicked on Nav, all I did was click my recent location, and it kept going where it left off.
After I posted this, I noticed my home button would keep taking me back into Car Dock mode. Strange.
Uninstalling AND rebooting will undo the Home button stuck to Car Dock
I'm posting in this thread to hopefully get an answer for organization later down the road... All the apps I assume are:
Widget Dock
Car Dock
Webtop Dock
Desk Dock (Home)
HD Entertainment
Quick Office
Am I leaving any out? Please continue to update on decent launchers or other workarounds.
Related
I have not seen this mentioned anywhere yet. If it's a re-post, my apologies.
I downloaded Any Cut so I could quickly and easily access the phones Test settings, instead of having to dial the *#*#4636#*#* every time I wanted to make changes.
I noticed that there were shortcuts available for Car Dock (3 of them) and Desk Home so I went ahead and added the shortcuts to these items. Both launched and ran just fine. I am glad to be able to use the car dock features of this phone now without having to actually buy a car dock. The Desk Home is great for use when the phone is sitting on the night stand.
If you'd like to give this a try:
1) Download and install Any Cut from the market
2) Launch Any Cut and select New Shortcut
3) Select Activity
For Car Dock
1) Scroll down to the first Car Dock listed and select it
2) Rename if you wish and/or click OK
For Desk Home
1) Scroll down to Desk Home and select it
2) Rename if you wish and/or click OK
Thank you for the tip, but Desk home does not have an icon.
Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk
Negative. I believe it does not have an icon because it is not supposed to see the light of day. It is not supposed to be a user launched app and Any Cut does not assign a default icon to this application's type evidently.
Thanks for the tip! Although your method does not produce a shortcut with an icon (OCD sufferers beware) that fact is offset in that you now get to enter desk home mode without having to download Launcher Pro or ADW Launcher which will take up more memory than Any Cut.
Cool didn't know launcher pro plus cold do this thanks for the info guys
There is an icon for Desk Home in the Task Manager.
Not being a programmer (yet), and having a very mild case of OCD I'm in the process of finding a way to pull that into the Anycut shortcut.
If I do succeed I'll post a how to here.
Lol I dialed in that code and pressed talk and now my phone wont stop ringing. I dialed it again and now its ringing twice as much!
Sent from my MB860 using XDA Premium App
Good find. Been wanting something like this.
I made a couple of mods to the generic.kcm to have the L and R buttons function as search, app_switch, home, and power.
L1 app switch
L2 search
R1 power
R2 home
I've tested this on the latest stock it's been working fine for me for a few days. I had made a version using the y and u buttons and I noticed when using filepwn that the the app commands would overlap, but I haven't come across any other apps that have a similar issue.
Using root explorer or similar app, go to system/usr/keychars. Make a backup of your generic.kcm and paste my version in it's place. Set permissions to rw,r,r and reboot. I had trouble once, it seemed that it wasn't overwriting the default file, I just deleted it first and then pasted mine.
Hope someone finds this useful as I searched for this and couldn't find it.
Download: http://db.tt/iGTuboYn
I thought I'd throw in here a link to the modded netflix app for way better resolution. It stops playback when the ouya controller turns off :-\ pretty annoying, but I used I ps3 controller to get around that issue.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2305091
Enjoy kinda
How does this effect gameplay?
What effect does app switch have?
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4
It shouldn't affect gameplay at all. I used the fallback function just like the O and A buttons will work as D_PAD CENTER and BACK but in games they will normally be mapped to other commands. Although if you encounter issues I would like to get some feedback.
App switch brings up the recent apps so you can easily go back and forth between whatever apps you are using. It's the old gingerbread style though. I'm eventually gonna edit android_policy.jar to make it the newer style but I haven't had time to mess with that yet.
TwitchyEye said:
It shouldn't affect gameplay at all. I used the fallback function just like the O and A buttons will work as D_PAD CENTER and BACK but in games they will normally be mapped to other commands. Although if you encounter issues I would like to get some feedback.
App switch brings up the recent apps so you can easily go back and forth between whatever apps you are using. It's the old gingerbread style though. I'm eventually gonna edit android_policy.jar to make it the newer style but I haven't had time to mess with that yet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I didn't think there was a way to open recent apps. I'll have to try the Nova launcher shortcut. I probably had the kill processes when closing selected at the time.
Would it be possible to map a key to jump the cursor from the home screen to the dock when using a custom launcher like NOVA Prime? If you could do that it would make using Nova with a controller awesome. I like being able to toggle the dock with ES File Explorer, Android Tuner, Titanium Backup, OUYA launcher and the app drawer on all screens but hate the touch pad.
Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk 4
I'm using apex launcher in tablet mode. I haven't really looked into it much but ideally I think mapping the cursor to the right analog stick would be where I would take it that way a ps3 controller could be used for everything without the need for the lame touchpad.
TwitchyEye said:
I'm using apex launcher in tablet mode. I haven't really looked into it much but ideally I think mapping the cursor to the right analog stick would be where I would take it that way a ps3 controller could be used for everything without the need for the lame touchpad.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nova home screens can be navigated with d-pad, the only annoyance is that the only way to get to icons on the dock is when you reach the furthest right home screen. I toggle the dock double tapping the touch pad which is great, but I don't want to use it to select things.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 4
Is there a way to make a shortcut or even make an app (like using App Factory in Tasker) to quickly open up two multi window apps without needing to use the side bar?
I've installed Car Home for when I have my phone docked in my car and want to use one of the buttons on the home screen to run Google Music and Maps. This way when I'm driving and listening to music and want to navigate somwhere I can just hit the home button to go into Car Home's main screen then hit the shortcut button (which is a nice large easy to see button while driving) to run multi window. Anyone have an idea on how to do that? I've tried digging around but can't find a way. I'm also rooted and running xposed/wanam if that makes a difference or if there's a module which allows this that someone knows about that I don't.
Thanks.
rebdogg said:
Is there a way to make a shortcut or even make an app (like using App Factory in Tasker) to quickly open up two multi window apps without needing to use the side bar?
I've installed Car Home for when I have my phone docked in my car and want to use one of the buttons on the home screen to run Google Music and Maps. This way when I'm driving and listening to music and want to navigate somwhere I can just hit the home button to go into Car Home's main screen then hit the shortcut button (which is a nice large easy to see button while driving) to run multi window. Anyone have an idea on how to do that? I've tried digging around but can't find a way. I'm also rooted and running xposed/wanam if that makes a difference or if there's a module which allows this that someone knows about that I don't.
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have not seen any way to open up 2 windows without using the sidebar.
How about putting an NFC tag on something like a piece of cardboard you keep in your car. When you want the multi - windows to appear, just move the cardboard near the phone. Thoughts?
Sent from my Galaxy Note III; Previous owner/hacker of Galaxy S III, Galaxy Nexus, Droid X, HTC HD2, HTC Touch Pro 2, HTC Tilt, HTC 8525, O2 XDA II, O2 XDA.
After using the Fire TV for a while I figured I would share my most inportant app. Its an app that I never really cared about using on other devices, but could not live without it on the Fire TV. Dock4Droid is awesome on the fire TV. Not only does it make multitasking funtional, but it gives you the ability to uninstall apps from anywhere. If you have an app open, just click the gear and the app info will popup and let you uninstall it. So you can uninstall several apps withing seconds without having to go all the to the actuall setting menu. If you have the app store apk that shows all your apps on the home screen you can simply open the app, hit the gear, delete the app, delete cache/data, and move on to another app. You can keep apps and shortcuts permanantly on the dock, so if you wanna do a fast reboot from anywhere, you can. It makes using multiple apps super fast. I have mine set to open apps with two finger so all I have to do is just put the cursor near the app and let go of the mouse button and it opens. I do not use the dock background, cause it looks horrible, but the color mist background looks great, and can be set to any color. The only problem is that it causes an artifact along the top and left side when the cusor passes over, but I have found that all apps that can be opened from an activation area do the same on the fire TV. Sidebar, Fancy Switcher etc all cause the same square artifact. Anyway, just thought I would share incase someone was looking for something to make their Fire TV a little easier to navigate through. Feel free to share other apps that are important to use on the Fire TV. No games or entertainment apps, just apps that make using the Fire TV easier or better.
porkenhimer said:
After using the Fire TV for a while I figured I would share my most inportant app. Its an app that I never really cared about using on other devices, but could not live without it on the Fire TV. Dock4Droid is awesome on the fire TV. Not only does it make multitasking funtional, but it gives you the ability to uninstall apps from anywhere. If you have an app open, just click the gear and the app info will popup and let you uninstall it. So you can uninstall several apps withing seconds without having to go all the to the actuall setting menu. If you have the app store apk that shows all your apps on the home screen you can simply open the app, hit the gear, delete the app, delete cache/data, and move on to another app. You can keep apps and shortcuts permanantly on the dock, so if you wanna do a fast reboot from anywhere, you can. It makes using multiple apps super fast. I have mine set to open apps with two finger so all I have to do is just put the cursor near the app and let go of the mouse button and it opens. I do not use the dock background, cause it looks horrible, but the color mist background looks great, and can be set to any color. The only problem is that it causes an artifact along the top and left side when the cusor passes over, but I have found that all apps that can be opened from an activation area do the same on the fire TV. Sidebar, Fancy Switcher etc all cause the same square artifact. Anyway, just thought I would share incase someone was looking for something to make their Fire TV a little easier to navigate through. Feel free to share other apps that are important to use on the Fire TV. No games or entertainment apps, just apps that make using the Fire TV easier or better.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice find, porkenhimer. What are you using for a mouse? I own Dock4Droid, used it on my Samsung tablet for quite a while.
Would it work on the Fire stick?
Thanks.
I am actually using an offbrand keyboard with touchpad that I got new on ebay for around $5. To be honest this cheap ugly keyboard/touchpad has worked better than anything else I have used on the fire TV. This $5 keyboard has more features and runs better than my $50 dollar keyboard. Not bad for a cheap chinese made keyboard. I use it exclusively for the Fire TV now and it combined with Dock4Droid make my Fire TV amazing. I rarely use the remote unless I am using Kodi. With Dock4Droid I can just go from app to app without ever needing to go to the homescreen too ofton. Plus I can force close apps from anywhere with Dock4Droid, so if an app is acting up there is no need to go all the way to the manage apps screen I can just close it instantly with Dock4Droid. I can be watching something in Kodi and need to look something up on google, I just popup Dock4Droid and open the browser while Kodi still plays in the baackgroud for me to listen, which is nice., cause I do not have to use the home button. I am pretty sure it will work on the stick too.
porkenhimer said:
I am actually using an offbrand keyboard with touchpad that I got new on ebay for around $5. To be honest this cheap ugly keyboard/touchpad has worked better than anything else I have used on the fire TV. This $5 keyboard has more features and runs better than my $50 dollar keyboard. Not bad for a cheap chinese made keyboard. I use it exclusively for the Fire TV now and it combined with Dock4Droid make my Fire TV amazing. I rarely use the remote unless I am using Kodi. With Dock4Droid I can just go from app to app without ever needing to go to the homescreen too ofton. Plus I can force close apps from anywhere with Dock4Droid, so if an app is acting up there is no need to go all the way to the manage apps screen I can just close it instantly with Dock4Droid. I can be watching something in Kodi and need to look something up on google, I just popup Dock4Droid and open the browser while Kodi still plays in the baackgroud for me to listen, which is nice., cause I do not have to use the home button. I am pretty sure it will work on the stick too.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply, porkenhimer, I really appreciate it.
I can't figure out how to get to the configuration options. I'm only able to get to the screen to turn it on and off.
Just go to manage all apps and open Dock4Droid.
I can open it but there is only around 4 options. I can't find any of the configuration options as shown in the YouTube video. There's a part at the bottom that shows Launchers, but it's empty.
Jedis said:
I can open it but there is only around 4 options. I can't find any of the configuration options as shown in the YouTube video. There's a part at the bottom that shows Launchers, but it's empty.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Check your inbox on here, cause I sent instructions to you.
I gave it a try. I guess if you are using a keyboard with mouse mode all the time it is handy. It would be more useful if the app bar would stay active after being clicked. I can only figure out how to select an item from the bar by keeping the mouse button pushed and scrolling around to highlight the app icon and letting go.
Unless I missed a setting somewhere ... I dont see how to be able to use the app without using both hands and multi-touch.
mscroggi said:
I gave it a try. I guess if you are using a keyboard with mouse mode all the time it is handy. It would be more useful if the app bar would stay active after being clicked. I can only figure out how to select an item from the bar by keeping the mouse button pushed and scrolling around to highlight the app icon and letting go.
Unless I missed a setting somewhere ... I dont see how to be able to use the app without using both hands and multi-touch.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you have it set to open apps with a finger up swipe then all you have to do is put the cursor anywhere in the area of an app that shows the label and let go of the mouse button. You do not really need to do a finger up swipe to open apps, just put the cursor in any apps area and let go of the button. The app that shows a label will be the app that opens. Also to get the dock to stay on screen all you have to do is set it to open apps with one click or two clicks and when you activate Dock4Droid it willl stay up til you click once or twice on the app. Some other settings I have set is making the icons 12pix, cause the icons become sharper the smaller they are. I also have my activation area set to the bottom at 100% with the smallest width and invisible, cause that way it does not interfere with anything else on the screen. All I have to do is put my cursor in the bottom right corner and press the mouse and it activates.
porkenhimer said:
If you have it set to open apps with a finger up swipe then all you have to do is put the cursor anywhere in the area of an app that shows the label and let go of the mouse button. You do not really need to do a finger up swipe to open apps, just put the cursor in any apps area and let go of the button. The app that shows a label will be the app that opens. Also to get the dock to stay on screen all you have to do is set it to open apps with one click or two clicks and when you activate Dock4Droid it willl stay up til you click once or twice on the app. Some other settings I have set is making the icons 12pix, cause the icons become sharper the smaller they are. I also have my activation area set to the bottom at 100% with the smallest width and invisible, cause that way it does not interfere with anything else on the screen. All I have to do is put my cursor in the bottom right corner and press the mouse and it activates.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm Are you running this on a stick? I finally got it to basicallly work.. I was never able to get the bar to show without clicking the mouse and moving the cursor at the same time. My issues had to do with which keyboard I was using .. There were a bunch of settings I could not get to. I could scroll down a poage.. but no further... doing alt->down would bounce me to the bottom page, but I was never able to get to the pages inbetween. My ipazzport has a <<<<>>>>> bar on the touchpad that would let me get to the settings between the top page and the bottom page.. I was able to get some things set and then go back to my other keyboard. My normal keyboard mini BT keyboard has mouse buttons on the left and right side.. which makes the multi touch thing fairly easy. I will play with it and see how I like it over time.. On the surface, I think maybe the firedtv app might be a better fit for me.. as I dont always use the keyboard.
Jacksmyname said:
Nice find, porkenhimer. What are you using for a mouse? I own Dock4Droid, used it on my Samsung tablet for quite a while.
Would it work on the Fire stick?
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
check out the FAVI Wireless Keyboard/Touchpad! This thing is great. I think someone posted a thread on it. Great reviews.
http://www.amazon.com/FAVI-FE02RF-BL-Wireless-Keyboard-SmartStick/dp/B0090BTY8Y
mscroggi said:
Hmm Are you running this on a stick? I finally got it to basicallly work.. I was never able to get the bar to show without clicking the mouse and moving the cursor at the same time. My issues had to do with which keyboard I was using .. There were a bunch of settings I could not get to. I could scroll down a poage.. but no further... doing alt->down would bounce me to the bottom page, but I was never able to get to the pages inbetween. My ipazzport has a <<<<>>>>> bar on the touchpad that would let me get to the settings between the top page and the bottom page.. I was able to get some things set and then go back to my other keyboard. My normal keyboard mini BT keyboard has mouse buttons on the left and right side.. which makes the multi touch thing fairly easy. I will play with it and see how I like it over time.. On the surface, I think maybe the firedtv app might be a better fit for me.. as I dont always use the keyboard.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
All you have to do is hold the mouse button down while moving your finger up or down on the touchpad to move from the bottom or top of the screen. Also, there is a setting to make apps open with one or two clicks, if you set them to open with one or two clicks then you only have to click the activation area and the dock will popup and stay up til you click an app once or twice.
I really like the headunit and the default launcher is good tbf but I love tinkering with things and not leave anything stock, (a reason enough for me to never be an apple product user ) so this problem is kinda frustrating because it doesn't allow me to use other launchers like carwebguru and car launcher as the fm radio is a vital part of my experience. so is there a way to make it appear or an app that acts like a shortcut or passthrough? or any other solution
car launcher in the app menu, there is a + button in the bottom left, then show all apps. go back to carlaucher home and add as shortcut.
joeling said:
car launcher in the app menu, there is a + button in the bottom left, then show all apps. go back to carlaucher home and add as shortcut.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it worked!! thanks for the help. any similar thing in carwebguru?