Database Users

[Q] Bored of the "On Screen Buttons" Nexus 7

Hey guys,
I've had my Nexus for just over a month now and apart from a few minor issues I'm really enjoying my experience with my Nexus.
BUT: One thing that really p*sses me off is the total waste of screen real estate being the "on screen buttons". I can sort of understand the device having as few as possible buttons is pretty cool but when it starts invading your screen size that is NOT COOL.
I have a few questions for google: Why oh why did you make the background for the navigation buttons black?? Why not transparent? Or transparent with a blur effect? Personally I would prefer just transparent with faint white back, home and app switcher buttons. It would make more of the screen available to see.
If I were to root my device, are these things that i could schange in the System or Framework RES folders? Or would it be much more complicated than that (i.e. changing color hex's in .xml files?)?

Search for how to enable the tablet UI. I had to enlarge the font to make things a bit more comfortable for me, but I really do like the true tablet UI.
sikodemon said:
Hey guys,
I've had my Nexus for just over a month now and apart from a few minor issues I'm really enjoying my experience with my Nexus.
BUT: One thing that really p*sses me off is the total waste of screen real estate being the "on screen buttons". I can sort of understand the device having as few as possible buttons is pretty cool but when it starts invading your screen size that is NOT COOL.
I have a few questions for google: Why oh why did you make the background for the navigation buttons black?? Why not transparent? Or transparent with a blur effect? Personally I would prefer just transparent with faint white back, home and app switcher buttons. It would make more of the screen available to see.
If I were to root my device, are these things that i could schange in the System or Framework RES folders? Or would it be much more complicated than that (i.e. changing color hex's in .xml files?)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

You can make it smaller.
Here's a guide.http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1844878
Beamed from my Grouper

Hmm, nearly, but I still don't understand why the navbar background color has to be black, I just really don't get what the advantage is. It would just make so much more sense if it were see through.

sikodemon said:
Hmm, nearly, but I still don't understand why the navbar background color has to be black, I just really don't get what the advantage is. It would just make so much more sense if it were see through.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe it was carried over from the gnex.
It's black on the gnex to take advantage of the AMOLED screen.
Beamed from Maguro

Hi
sikodemon said:
Hmm, nearly, but I still don't understand why the navbar background color has to be black, I just really don't get what the advantage is. It would just make so much more sense if it were see through.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Presumably it is because it is dead space. Applications don't/can't expand into that area as it is protected. For example if you had an application open to the maximum behind translucent soft buttons, and that application required you to press something towards its bottom edge, you can't as it is now behind the menu buttons.
Ideally the buttons would be below the display and printed onto the touch screen as they are with my HTC One X, presumably they are not for either cost reasons or flexibility of the design.
Regards
Phil

sikodemon said:
Hmm, nearly, but I still don't understand why the navbar background color has to be black, I just really don't get what the advantage is. It would just make so much more sense if it were see through.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'd guess that it doesn't make sense for it to be transparent because there is nothing under the navbar. Its a part of the screen that is separate from the application, if you allowed the navbar to be imposed over the application and transparent then the bottom part of the screen would be unusable in the application because touching it would activate the navbar buttons rather than the applications.
That said on the launcher it would be easy to just extend the wallpaper over the navbar and make it transparent and in apps you could colour the navbar with the average colour of the application background etc, though of course Apple has a patent waiting for that http://www.phonearena.com/news/Appl...xed-video_id34472?ratelimit=-10&sort=threaded

Not true because you can hide the nav bar on certain roms and that space it was using up is definitely usable. Hey OP I forgot what it's called but there's a launcher somewhere based on nothing but gestures so you don't even need a nav bar and you can use that extra screen space you seem to desperately need.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

sikodemon said:
Hey guys,
I've had my Nexus for just over a month now and apart from a few minor issues I'm really enjoying my experience with my Nexus.
BUT: One thing that really p*sses me off is the total waste of screen real estate being the "on screen buttons". I can sort of understand the device having as few as possible buttons is pretty cool but when it starts invading your screen size that is NOT COOL.
I have a few questions for google: Why oh why did you make the background for the navigation buttons black?? Why not transparent? Or transparent with a blur effect? Personally I would prefer just transparent with faint white back, home and app switcher buttons. It would make more of the screen available to see.
If I were to root my device, are these things that i could schange in the System or Framework RES folders? Or would it be much more complicated than that (i.e. changing color hex's in .xml files?)?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agreed with you. Is there anyone that can port Motorola's Transparent Software Buttons, so it will be better?

slick_rick said:
Not true because you can hide the nav bar on certain roms and that space it was using up is definitely usable. Hey OP I forgot what it's called but there's a launcher somewhere based on nothing but gestures so you don't even need a nav bar and you can use that extra screen space you seem to desperately need.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're both right and wrong. The launcher you're thinking of is probably the PIE launcher available on many custom ROMs, as well as its app equivalent (which I believe is called LMT). But your reasoning as far as hiding the navbar is incorrect. If you hide the navbar on a ROM (or even the way it's done in many games and the YouTube app), the navbar disappears, i.e. it's no longer protecting the screen space that it's not using. Making it transparent would do no such thing, and even if you forced an app to use the space beneath the navbar, you'd wind up with three floating navigation items that would probably conflict with an app's bottom navigation.
Pegasus195 said:
I agreed with you. Is there anyone that can port Motorola's Transparent Software Buttons, so it will be better?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you want to look into custom ROMs, some will allow you to mess around with your navbar icons/actions (the main one I like is the replace Recent Apps with a Last App switcher). Paranoid Android also allows you to change the color (and I believe that includes alpha transparency), including a "chameleon"-style bar that changes color based on the active app's predominant scheme.
Also, to respond to something from earlier: black is better because as a static color, it uses less resources to draw and has the benefit of being power-efficient on AMOLED screens. In addition, while it might look neat, it's pretty well accepted in UI/UX lore that you should keep navigational elements as clearly and visually distinct as possible to make them easier to hit. Shoving white/grey buttons on top of an active-blurred background can create quite a headache.
There's a great example of this in the screenshots of Apple's control center for iOS 7. For some backgrounds, the control center is clearly visible despite the background bleeding through, but on others, you basically can't read the buttons because the blur is too distracting.

Hiding Status Bar/Nav Bar to Prevent Burn-in?

I'm looking to get a Nexus 6P, but I'll be using it for around two years (give or take, depending on what devices I can choose from in two years), and I've heard that AMOLED burn-in may become prevalent within a year or so. For some probably won't notice, even I probably wouldn't if I didn't find out that burn in exists, but I'm paranoid, so I'm thinking to use GMD's Hide Nav Bar (Root) app that I've been using on my Nexus 4 (for the sake of extra screen real-estate).
I'm wondering if this will minimize and effectively prevent burn-in of the Nav/Status bars? My main concern is the Nav bar, as Samsung's devices don't have them, making burn-in far less of an issue.

well it does minimize the effect but honestly I did not notice the burn in on my N6. I didn't even know that such thing exists. after reading an article about it, I downloaded an app and saw how nav bar area was worn out more than the rest of the screen. I was able to notice that only because the app creates a high contrast ratio between the nav bar and the rest of the screen.

valapsp said:
well it does minimize the effect but honestly I did not notice the burn in on my N6. I didn't even know that such thing exists. after reading an article about it, I downloaded an app and saw how nav bar area was worn out more than the rest of the screen. I was able to notice that only because the app creates a high contrast ratio between the nav bar and the rest of the screen.
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Click to collapse
Yeah, I don't think I would notice it either if I didn't know about it, but since I'm paranoid I'll probably get root and at least hide the nav bar

A launcher like Nova can hide the bar without having to root.

grubbster said:
A launcher like Nova can hide the bar without having to root.
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Click to collapse
Not in apps though, which isn't as nice as being able to make use of the extra space.

custom roms like pure nexus have options for expanded desktop which hide the status and nav bars until you swipe up from the bottom of the screen. which after you swipe up they only appear for as long as you need them.

ncsuwolfs said:
custom roms like pure nexus have options for expanded desktop which hide the status and nav bars until you swipe up from the bottom of the screen. which after you swipe up they only appear for as long as you need them.
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Click to collapse
Yeah, the app I'm using is pretty much the same. The status bar/nav bar are the only places that are still affected by this issue nowadays, no? Unless I leave a static image on for hours, of course.

Why does my Moto G4 Plus have a weird preview of other apps?

This is kind of hard to explain but whenever I use my phone, no matter what app is open, or when I'm on the homescreen, some apps kind of show transparently on my display like it almost looks like the current app being used is translucent that I can see the other app? I can't really explain this properly. Screenshots don't show what I'm talking about.
It shows up at the very sides and top portion of the screen. It also shows when I bring down my notification shade. The grey part at the top which is supposed to be completely grey, still shows the battery icon, time, notification icons, signals, Wi-Fi indicator, etc. but very translucent. As if the grey quick toggles thing is translucent.
Again, screenshots dont capture the thingy. So I'm sure it's an issue and not intentional by Motorola.

It's screen burn issue. It has been discussed numerous times check through the forum for more help.

NikkoEmFiftyTwo said:
This is kind of hard to explain but whenever I use my phone, no matter what app is open, or when I'm on the homescreen, some apps kind of show transparently on my display like it almost looks like the current app being used is translucent that I can see the other app? I can't really explain this properly. Screenshots don't show what I'm talking about.
It shows up at the very sides and top portion of the screen. It also shows when I bring down my notification shade. The grey part at the top which is supposed to be completely grey, still shows the battery icon, time, notification icons, signals, Wi-Fi indicator, etc. but very translucent. As if the grey quick toggles thing is translucent.
Again, screenshots dont capture the thingy. So I'm sure it's an issue and not intentional by Motorola.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
it's your screen
https:// forums.lenovo.com/t5/Moto-G4-Moto-G4-Plus-Moto-G4/Display-problem-Screen-Burn-In/td-p/3395822/page/9

netox19 said:
it's your screen
https:// forums.lenovo.com/t5/Moto-G4-Moto-G4-Plus-Moto-G4/Display-problem-Screen-Burn-In/td-p/3395822/page/9
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Click to collapse
Alright. But I can't seem to find the solution anywhere?

NikkoEmFiftyTwo said:
Alright. But I can't seem to find the solution anywhere?
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Click to collapse
Install this, set on 5% black and after a while the burn images are gone. (keep the app on all the time, the one that I linked to is the one with less battery usage, from the 4 I tested)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.diaohs.cola

NikkoEmFiftyTwo said:
This is kind of hard to explain but whenever I use my phone, no matter what app is open, or when I'm on the homescreen, some apps kind of show transparently on my display like it almost looks like the current app being used is translucent that I can see the other app? I can't really explain this properly. Screenshots don't show what I'm talking about.
It shows up at the very sides and top portion of the screen. It also shows when I bring down my notification shade. The grey part at the top which is supposed to be completely grey, still shows the battery icon, time, notification icons, signals, Wi-Fi indicator, etc. but very translucent. As if the grey quick toggles thing is translucent.
Again, screenshots dont capture the thingy. So I'm sure it's an issue and not intentional by Motorola.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Gero71 said:
Install this, set on 5% black and after a while the burn images are gone. (keep the app on all the time, the one that I linked to is the one with less battery usage, from the 4 I tested)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.diaohs.cola
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As mentioned above by @Gero71 , use the app or visit the service center and ask them for a display replacement. That would be a permanent fix hopefully. :good:

tywinlannister7 said:
As mentioned above by @Gero71 , use the app or visit the service center and ask them for a display replacement. That would be a permanent fix hopefully. :good:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've seen some people complaining about the same issue after they've replaced their screens. It will still occur no matter what.
And, the app you're making me install, is just a screen filter. I use it all the time. Lowering the brightness doesn't fix the screen burn. It just makes it less prominent. But it is still there.

Can the navbar be transparent/opaque?

I HATE how the navbar turns to black on most apps.......it is so annoying
Samsung is like "here, have this beautiful, large, near-bezelless screen.....but lets shut a portion of the AMOLED screen off on the bottom with a HUGE BLACK BOX THAT MAY AS WELL BE A BEZEL."
Shouldn't there be an option to make it transparent like it is when you're on your home screen...or at the very worst, just shaded like when you're in Bixby?

Was already answered on OT
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=pl.damianpiwowarski.navbarapps

is transparent in some apps - i guess its app dependent - but it reverses to black/white or whatever is your selected colour when typing or so
i guess it's up to the app developers to allow it in their apps

tim2london said:
is transparent in some apps - i guess its app dependent - but it reverses to black/white or whatever is your selected colour when typing or so
i guess it's up to the app developers to allow it in their apps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what apps is it transparent in for you...because I can't find a single app where it is still transparent (other than Bixby and the home screen)?

well out of the top of my head?
BBC weather - sounds silly but give it a try and see

Falcon pro for example.

Jimmmycrackcorn said:
I HATE how the navbar turns to black on most apps.......it is so annoying
Samsung is like "here, have this beautiful, large, near-bezelless screen.....but lets shut a portion of the AMOLED screen off on the bottom with a HUGE BLACK BOX THAT MAY AS WELL BE A BEZEL."
Shouldn't there be an option to make it transparent like it is when you're on your home screen...or at the very worst, just shaded like when you're in Bixby?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Did you end up working this out?

Thats why i have immersive mode on.
Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

juzzystar said:
Did you end up working this out?
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Click to collapse
I wish
I wouldn't even mind as much if the navbar could be white in all Google apps....but it's black.
No matter what I change, I can't get it to stay white. It basically makes the onscreen navbar and softkeys appear to be on a huge black bezel.

neles86 said:
Thats why i have immersive mode on.
Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk
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Click to collapse
cliffs on immersive mode?

Jimmmycrackcorn said:
cliffs on immersive mode?
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Click to collapse
Immersive mode looks amazing on this phone. Haven't had any issues with any apps. Do note that some apps, like Samsung messages, have their text field all the way at the bottom - so it's a little annoying to swipe up to bring up the navigation bar since it also touches the field which brings up the keyboard. It takes a bit to get used to on certain apps.
The app i'm using to get the Immersive mode toggle is ShortCutter Quick Settings - from the play store.

Dumb question: how to activate the immersive mode?

AirSupply said:
Dumb question: how to activate the immersive mode?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
right? I wish it were as simple as it being in the settings....but it's not.

There's another way I saw this morning, but you need to be able to use adb - and you should know how!
http://www.themefoxx.com/2017/04/ho...r-and-status-bar-on-the-galaxy-s8s8-plus.html

Jimmmycrackcorn said:
I wish
I wouldn't even mind as much if the navbar could be white in all Google apps....but it's black.
No matter what I change, I can't get it to stay white. It basically makes the onscreen navbar and softkeys appear to be on a huge black bezel.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly! what would be perfect is the opaque way it looks on the launcher screen. I've looked everywhere and tried all different things but for some reason thats just not a thing! Would be so good is Navbarapps had an option to toggle transparency

juzzystar said:
Exactly! what would be perfect is the opaque way it looks on the launcher screen. I've looked everywhere and tried all different things but for some reason thats just not a thing! Would be so good is Navbarapps had an option to toggle transparency
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Click to collapse
but they don't.....

Am I wrong? When I just got the S8 it seems most apps had the nav bar transparent. Even twitter, Chrome, etc.
Now it's always black. Only transparent/ opaque in some Samsung native apps.
I thought the whole point was to make it less bezel.
Any idea what's going on?

Jimmmycrackcorn said:
right? I wish it were as simple as it being in the settings....but it's not.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rascarlo.quick.settings.tiles
https://imgur.com/a/qFrUh

mannequin said:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rascarlo.quick.settings.tiles
https://imgur.com/gallery/qFrUh
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Click to collapse
If you hide the nav bar with this app how do you access it then and move/ navigate around=? Can it be swiped up or something?

MXS801 said:
Can it be swiped up or something?
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Click to collapse
you bet.

Notification panel turns black on its own.

My notification panel turns black on its own. Then it stays black for some time and then return to its original white color. Although it is not much of a concern to me, but i would like to know whether this is normal, and what causes the color of the notification panel to change?

Yup .. Noticed that too. My notification panel turns dark when I put dark wallpaper, and when I change to light wallpaper, itu turns white .

MosheHC said:
Yup .. Noticed that too. My notification panel turns dark when I put dark wallpaper, and when I change to light wallpaper, itu turns white .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the reply. I tried it and it is as you said. Never thought of that. I mostly use dark wallpaper so never noticed that. Now i wonder whether this happens with other phones or it is just limited to this phone. Overall, i think it is a great feature.

siwi09 said:
Thanks for the reply. I tried it and it is as you said. Never thought of that. I mostly use dark wallpaper so never noticed that. Now i wonder whether this happens with other phones or it is just limited to this phone. Overall, i think it is a great feature.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Material dark theme cannot be implemented system-wide without root changes / third party app. This is default optimization by Google for Android (not their best work for sure), will probably be corrected in Pie.