Database Users

Coming Soon: HotDesk/HotDesk Designer

** Update 3 **
There's another beta coming out soon, with lots of exciting new features.:
* The promised 'folder widget' - display the contents of a folder on your device in a virtual screen. I use this as my 'podcast folder' (inside a dock) so I can select one to listen to.
* Directly select a folder/executable on your device whilst in the designer. Obviously you have to have your device plugged in via USB for this to work.
* A QVGA example desk (previous versions only had VGA)
* Lots of bugfixes.
** Update 2 **
Still working hard to get a preview release to you guys. A lot of the current work is in making the PC-based designer as intuitive as possible - an important factor I believe - don't want any complaints about crashing, etc (I hate that the most - you put hours into something, and it explodes).
Anyway - Some of you have expressed concern that you won't be able to get to your today bar icons (the icons down the bottom of the today screen) - while HotDesk is running. The current solution to this is a context menu bound the the desktop click action - that allows you to clip the window to a certain (configurable) height, whilst simultaneously minimizing all other windows - allowing you to see the today bar behind.
This screenshot demonstrates:
Shot
I hope to have a preview release (that won't have all the features that the final release will have, but will still have lots of cool stuff) - to you by the end of next week. Features expected in the preview release:
* Desktop designer, allowing drag'n'drop drawing of all desktop widgets (of course)
* Background widget - set your background, per virtual screen, to an image of any format that PocketPC can read (png,gif,jpg,bmp)
* Picture widget - place a picture at any location on your virtual screens. Handy for non-active element theme customisation.
* Button widget - Define up/down state images, and an action for your buttons (Actions such as 'go to next/previous/specific vscreen', 'start program', 'show/hide dock window' etc)
* Today item Widget - place any today item installed on your system onto any vscreen
* Gauge widget - Text/Graphical gauges linked to system properties (battery,disk/mem free etc). Graphical gauges have customisable background images, and gauge-bar size/image/location.
* Directory widget - place an icon box of any directory on your PocketPC inside a Virtual Screen or Dock - I use this inside a dock, so I can click an icon saying 'My Podcasts' - and up pops a dock sub-window inside my HotDesk with an iconbox with an icon for each of my podcasts. Think of it as a mini-filemanager in a Dock.
More features to come in the final version - but I just want to get this out there for now so you guys can get the creative juices flowing.
More news soon.
** UPDATE **
Got some screenshots of HotDesk running on my JasJar.
A bit of explanation:
Shot 1: The main screen of the demo desktop I'm working on. Here you see 4 application launchers, 2 text gauges (time/date), and a graphical gauge (battery). The Gauge designer can be seen in the designer screenshot at the bottom of this post.
Shot 2: A 'dock' demo. Clicking the 'folder' icon triggers a 'visibility toggle' action on the dock window. The dock window is a Virtual Screen like any other - it just happens to be nested inside another Vscreen.
Shot 3: A demonstration of nesting Today Plugins inside HotDesk. This is more difficult to code than it sounds: essentially you have to reimplement all the message calls/events that the Today screen does. Surprisingly, this was one of the hardest things to code in HotDesk so far. As you can see, I haven't done background transparency for Today plugins yet, but that is coming soon.
Shot 1
Hi All,
I'm creating a new desktop design tool for WM devices. Its aim is to be both friendly to designers, and also to be powerful enough that it's a useful replacement for the today screen et al.
I won't beat around the bush: I *hate* the today screen. I won't launch into a religious argument about that here - I'm just here to show you the work I've been doing.
Announcing: HotDesk.
Hotdesk contains two components: A program that runs on your WM device, that loads '.desk' files - files which contain all the art, logic etc - of your custom designed desktop. The other component is hotdesk designer - an early screenshot of which I've attached to this post.
The designer will be familiar to anyone that has used any kind of vector graphics tool. You simply drag/drop/move - your components on the 'virtual screens' of your desktop.
HotDesk is based around the concept of 'vscreens' - a desktop contains one or more VScreens - that are tied to an orientation (landscape or portrait). Based on the current orientation of your device, the desktops you design for that orientation are displayed - and the user moves between them using buttons that are tied to the 'change vscreen' action.
I'm sure most of you have seen offerings such as 'Wisbar Advance Desktop', and others. Don't get me wrong - Chris does a great job with Wisbar/Desktop - but HotDesk aims to go far beyond products such as these - by creating a rich set of embeddable components that can be customised to your needs. On my PPC, I often find myself jumping between a thousand separate tiny little applications that perform a certain task, or display a certain device statistic - HotDesk aims to allow you to tie almost any action to a button - or connect any device statistic to a custom graphical gauge (as can be seen in the screenshot)
Current features:
Custom button launchers. Definable graphics for up/down states
Completely customisable gauges (gauge image, cursor image, data source)
Multiple virtual screens, and programmable screen change logic
Different screens for portait/landscape views
File list control - e.g. display files in a folder for easy selection (I use this as a popup from my 'podcast folder')
Embed today plugins - In my opinion, today plugins are generally memory hogs - but if you must, you must
Tab widget - have a tabbed dialog within a vscreen
This application is not yet complete, but I must admit I'm excited by what it does so far. I'll be releasing a beta soon - so watch this space. If you have any feature suggestions (e.g. something you've been aching for, not found in other desktop-type apps) - now is the time to speak up.
Oh yeah, here's the screenshot (sorry for the size):
Designer Screenshot
Alex.

You app sounds like it will take customizing the today screen to a new level!
Looks very promising. Will I have the ability to turn my today screen into a dial pad?

kewl!
shud support QVGA / VGA & Square Screens..that's a plus..!
and abillity to change phone dial skin if possible..

Looks COOL!
If I read that right, it'll allow you to have more than one Today screen? Like a virtual desktop?
If so, is there a way to make the inactive one truely inactive so it doesn't use much RAM? That's probably asking waaaay too much, but would be awfully cool!
Either way, I'll be (not so) patiently watching....

blazoner said:
Looks COOL!
If I read that right, it'll allow you to have more than one Today screen? Like a virtual desktop?
If so, is there a way to make the inactive one truely inactive so it doesn't use much RAM? That's probably asking waaaay too much, but would be awfully cool!
Either way, I'll be (not so) patiently watching....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Already done this - there are two 'memory modes' - light and heavy. Light mode dynamically loads each screen (including today plugins). If you don't go to the screen with the plugin, it doesn't load it.
Of course, the trade off is screen load time.
Heavy mode loads all screens at once - heavier on RAM, but faster.

b_sphinx said:
shud support QVGA / VGA & Square Screens..that's a plus..!
and abillity to change phone dial skin if possible..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As for the QVGA/VGA - each vscreen has a preconfigured size - the device-side application chooses the correct default vscreen based on the res/orientation. You specify the default starting vscreens in the designer.

so... when is the beta release??

Thanks
Greetings,
Hope to see your product soon,
and yes do make it compatible with omap 850 processor coz its little slower than
others.
And also if you could add minimizing windows like we have in desktop it would be great.
Hope you'll giv it for free cuz i dont have any credit card or any other card to pay. I'll love to have your application.

samy.3660 said:
Greetings,
Hope to see your product soon,
and yes do make it compatible with omap 850 processor coz its little slower than
others.
And also if you could add minimizing windows like we have in desktop it would be great.
Hope you'll giv it for free cuz i dont have any credit card or any other card to pay. I'll love to have your application.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll come up with some arrangement for people participating in the beta - more information soon.

Hi!
This app seams like "the thing", but will it be WM2003SE compatible?
Regards,
PK

Testing
I would like to be part of the beta testing when avalible. GreggSymington(@)Sbcglobal.net . Looks great so far.

I would also love the opportunity to be in your beta group.
Would it be possible to lock one or more of your Today screens separately?
Also, will there be a toggle for accessing the main (or user defined) Today screen, similar to VJTodayButton?
Both of these functions would be really convenient.

Cool
Greetings,
Yes i will be participating in beta ver.

Is there a testing version yet?

Hi LordChaos
Been playing around with theme development and would love the opportunity to beta test your product
rgds, GA

datruth said:
Looks very promising. Will I have the ability to turn my today screen into a dial pad?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm going to assume your answer is no.

datruth said:
I'm going to assume your answer is no.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If there's enough interest I''ll code a TAPI wrapper - thus allowing this.

Any news?

WoW, nice way of creating virtual desktops. It reminds me to the Wisbar Advanced Desktop plugin for Wisbar Advance 2 but even better since you are also developing a proper tool for PC!!!!!
Congratulations!!!
Oki

Great Work
This looks fantastic. Would love to be in the beta test of this. Keep us posted.

User interface yrgo 2.3 beta 5

Hi guys,
I have released new yrgo 2.3 beta 5 so you can check it out on my forum here.
If you are new in yrgo - yrgo is highly customizable User Interface Shell written for Windows Mobile 5/6 Professional devices. It allows much more that any other Shell and goes more deep into the system - the memory footprint is also held low.
I highly recommend to see the presentation video (the video was recorded with older version - doesn't have as nice graphic as it is there now and it has much less functionality, but it is good to understand yrgo's concept).
So let me know what do you think .
UPDATED: There's a bug in the version I linked to my forum - it has only Czech version. Please scroll down the thread there, download English.zip a follow the instructions in the post to get the English version working. Sorry for that.
Regards,
Luky

Oh yes,
the gadgets for almost all resolutions are not arranged properly - it is still the beta version and I will work on this this week.
But you can of course easily re-arrange it however you want very easily (just check the video I have mentioned above).
Thanks.
Luky

it is really nice and fast. on start up there was too much gadgets on screen, I would say try to make the desktop really clean aligned properly on startup. but it's a good work you're doing.
I'm not sure if this is a bug: using the file manager to explore my windows directory seems to hang the app, or maybe my windows directory is just really big. after it hanged and I terminated it manually, the app still populated my top and bottom bar, and half my screen, I had to soft reset.
plus how to change background?

Hi,
thanks for your feedback. I'll check out the problem with Windows folder.
To change the background image, just find such image in the yrgo's file explorer and use Context menu and scroll down to get ability to use such image as a desktop background.
Regards,
Luky

I really like your app. your design mode is very innovative, resizeable icons, etc.
*why the "hide" button? after going deep in the settings and want to go back to the home screen I had to click back button all the way back to home. it is possible to make the hide button "home" button so one click will bring me back to home? I know I can click on an empty spot and it will bring me to home, but I don't think everyone will know that.
*when not in full screen mode some of the icons/info is cut off at the bottom because the icons\layout doesn't resize accordingly.
*is it possible to add the "running applications" button as a gadget?
*also could there be some transition effect from desktop to desktop?
know I'm asking for a lot but I wouldn't be saying anything if I didn't like the app.

Hi,
thanks for your feedback. It's ok, your questions are really relevant and helpful for me.
Yes, you're right. It makes more sense to have button "Home" instead of "Hide". I'll change it.
I know about the problem when switching off the full screen mode. The previous version had auto-rearraning the gadgets but it made a big mess when you switched from landscape/portrait mode so I temporarily removed it.
Yes, running appliactions can be add to the desktop easily - as any other item in yrgo - just 'tap and hold' on the Running application icon a use "Add to desktop"
Yep, some transition effect would be nice - but at this moment it is not my priority. I need to release current 2.3 as soon as possible. After that I'll start to think about new feature.
Again, thanks a lot for your feedback- it was very helpful.
Regards,
Luky

[REQ] 6.5 Home Screen Suggestions/Ideas

Hey guys,
XDA developers obviously has some of the best mobile phone developers, so I thought I'd give suggestions for any bored coders on ideas I have for panels on the new 6.5 interface.
The WMP panel is pretty useful apart from the fact it only applies to WMP, there's a S2P alternative which I think is a good move but wouldn't it be better to create a program that lets you pick the player of your choice (e.g. S2P) from a list and then it will display the information and controls for that player. This means would mean less single players panels and a more all-in-one solution.
To this day I do NOT understand why tasks are such a pain in WinMo, on my old N95 tasks it displayed tasks on the today screen or atleast the amount I had stored. I think there's already something of this nature on the forum so ignore this one.
A quick lauch would be great considering the old 6.1 start menu was like that, but I'm not too sure if many people will want this feature back.
That's all of the ones I can think of, but if I get more I'll update this thread. Please state any thoughts or opinions you have .

150+ views and not one opinion! Geez.
I don't know if anyone has used the i8910 HD but the today screen work/looks really good and the fact there's a lock button on the today screen I think is a good move, maybe a lock panel on 6.5 would be a good step forward.

150+ views and not one opinion! Geez.
I don't know if anyone has used the i8910 HD but the today screen work/looks really good and the fact there's a lock button on the today screen I think is a good move, maybe a lock panel on 6.5 would be a good step forward.

There are already QuickLaunch plugins for Titanium.
The music plugin would be a great idea, but unfortunately, I think it would take up too much space and too much developing time. I think we should develop the ones we have first.
There's one thing I wish Microsoft added to 6.5, unfortunately, I don't think there's much we can do about it on XDA. I think if we added the ability to hide the Titanium panel and easily open it again. Maybe if they took like the Hide/Show Desktop button from Windows 7 (the rectangular one) and added it to the left side of the home screen. So you hold it and slide it out, and the Titanium Menu unfolds... I'll have to work on mock ups of the idea in Photoshop.

I think an RSS plugin would be awesome

apreichner said:
There are already QuickLaunch plugins for Titanium.
The music plugin would be a great idea, but unfortunately, I think it would take up too much space and too much developing time. I think we should develop the ones we have first.
There's one thing I wish Microsoft added to 6.5, unfortunately, I don't think there's much we can do about it on XDA. I think if we added the ability to hide the Titanium panel and easily open it again. Maybe if they took like the Hide/Show Desktop button from Windows 7 (the rectangular one) and added it to the left side of the home screen. So you hold it and slide it out, and the Titanium Menu unfolds... I'll have to work on mock ups of the idea in Photoshop.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
about showhide desktop button
if you have used manila 2d there was 1 such app(manila control) for which would hide manila and return to normal today screen and vice versa
maybe someone can do it with titanium
or maybe second today(the name of app is "second today") will work

Good to hear people's ideas.
The launcher does it use MortScript I was looking for something more stand alone.

For what it's worth, i would really like to see an Overclocking utility plug in for wm6.5 I use homescreen but i hate not to be able to see the cpu speeds and temperature in the plug in, i cant even tell if homescreen is working when its unchecked and the default titanium plug in is enabled.

O and O said:
Good to hear people's ideas.
The launcher does it use MortScript I was looking for something more stand alone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
CLauncher uses Mortscript to set up but can be changed and be set up directly in the registry.
GLauncher from gullum does use an own Editor and supports more pages, moreover you can set one program to start from the panel, displayed on the left icon (pictures in the registry) and another set on the left softkey and displayed on the icon top right (icon in the registry).

Hide taskbar, start button, and bottom toolbar

I'm a big fan of eBooks and have bought many books from Fictionwise. Generally I buy them in the eReader format and so I'm limited to using that reader.
The main downside of the application is the lack of a fullscreen mode. Since they seem to have stopped active development on the tool I thought that the next best thing would be some way of hiding or dimming the WM6 elements while I'm reading.
I can assign a hardware button to run the tool and then run it again when I want the elements back. An alternative might be that they're automatically hidden when eReader has focus.
So my questions are: does a tool already exist for hiding/dimming the taskbar and toolbar? If not, is it something that can be done with Mortscript? If not, is there anyone out there that wants to quote me a price for making something to solve this minor headache?

Extend screen height
I want to know the same.
Ain't it possible to remove these bars, rotate screen, play movie? That would be realy cool.
Btw, can somebody tell me how to remove the bar that sits above the bottom toolbar? It now shows me an icon of CERD.EXE (remote control for Windows CE Version 2.03) constantly when i use this program.

Dipperson, you seem to be asking two entirely unrelated questions:
1. Can a movie be played in full screen?
Answer: Yes, nearly every video playing app for Windows Mobile supports such a feature.
2. How do I remove the small system tray bar at the bottom of the Today Screen? Answer: This is a common request and there are a few solutions available via a quick Google search.
My question relates to the tweaking of Windows Mobile during the running of an app in order to hide these elements when the app itself does not have a "full screen" function.

Windows 8 Desktop Keyboard Launcher/Starter Quick Access

Hi All, I recently acquired a Samsung Ativ Smart Pc 500t. So far so good. One problem I have is that in desktop mode, many apps have input fields but the Windows 8 keyboard does not automatically launch for most desktop apps (unless there is a setting I do not know about....) I auto hide my taskbar to have more screen real estate, so I have to do multiple jesters to get the keyboard on the screen. I created a simple button program that has 2 buttons, one for the OSK.EXE and one for the new windows 8 keyboard. It's not pretty, but it works. The source code and the executable are in the attachment, so you can build it if you don't want to run the executable. Hope this helps you! I am looking for a way to do this same thing by adding buttons to the title bar, so this will come when I figure out how to do this. Enjoy!