So, I'm well-aware that the reason icons can't be changed easily on the Android home screen is because the icon image is stored in the APK file, and editing that image is, essentially, near impossible.
However, I had an idea that could potentially fix that problem, and I'm just curious how realistic the solution is:
As most G1 users know, AnyCut is a great application that can allow a user to create a shortcut to any number of actions on the phone. These shortcuts are customizable by name, and, for the time being, have a limited number of icons, one for each shortcut type.
I also recall using an app several months ago to change the icons of bookmarks (Bookmark 2, I believe it was called). With this app, a user could choose exactly what their icons would look like on the home screen, except, of course, that these icons could only link to bookmarks.
By combining these two applications, wouldn't an icon changer be quite possible?
Using this same methodology, wouldn't it be possible to create "shortcuts" to applications on the home screen, and thus, allow the user to rename apps and change their icons, at least on the desktop? I know that the icons would not be changed in the pull-out drawer or elsewhere on the system, but wouldn't this be a temporary workaround, until a better solution is reached? I have quite a few programs with horrendous icons, and it really takes away from the aesthetic of the home screen.
Again, all I'm asking is if there's a way to place a shortcut to an APK on the desktop, and preferably to customize that shortcut's icon, not the actual apps.
It is possible to edit .apk's and change the icons. Just look at the forum for theams.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=450
soundwire said:
It is possible to edit .apk's and change the icons. Just look at the forum for theams.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/forumdisplay.php?f=450
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, I know that the icons can be edited in a theme, but can non-stock icons be edited as well?
And also, my concern with that is that it seems like a lot of work to update a theme everytime a new app appears on the market. I'm a little OCD, so if I were able to change all the icons on my home screen, I would want them all to be absolutely uniform (like the themes' icons are). However, if a new, super-useful app were to appear on the market, and I absolutely needed it on my home screen, it would seem much easier to simply add an image to my phone, and make a shortcut using that image, than to have to edit an APK, resign the entire package, and reflash the phone each time. While I know my way around the G1, and I'm comfortable with basic rooting, I am by no means a developer, and just like most G1 users, I would probably be more comfortable making shortcuts than updating firmware.
Do you understand where I'm coming from?
I too, would also like to know how to change "non-stock" app icons. Bump.
jayaustn said:
Well, I know that the icons can be edited in a theme, but can non-stock icons be edited as well?
And also, my concern with that is that it seems like a lot of work to update a theme everytime a new app appears on the market. I'm a little OCD, so if I were able to change all the icons on my home screen, I would want them all to be absolutely uniform (like the themes' icons are). However, if a new, super-useful app were to appear on the market, and I absolutely needed it on my home screen, it would seem much easier to simply add an image to my phone, and make a shortcut using that image, than to have to edit an APK, resign the entire package, and reflash the phone each time. While I know my way around the G1, and I'm comfortable with basic rooting, I am by no means a developer, and just like most G1 users, I would probably be more comfortable making shortcuts than updating firmware.
Do you understand where I'm coming from?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have yet to try this, but (provided you have root), you should be able to use adb to pull the apk for an app off your phone, edit it as described, and push it back to the same place. I will give this a go tomorrow, as I'm rather sleepy, and it's probably not a good thing to mess about with superuser stuff when I can't think straight.
If there's any flaws in my theory, I'd be happy to hear them.
RE: Changeing Icons!
I have a video on you tube on how to change icons. Here it is!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjnV_d9b22E
Hope you enjoy and your able to Change Your Icons.
Good Luck!
bms122223 said:
I have a video on you tube on how to change icons. Here it is!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjnV_d9b22E
Hope you enjoy and your able to Change Your Icons.
Good Luck!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Video doesnt show you how to change "non-stock" app icons, only icons for the original apps.
Well, I kind of figured out how to change the non-stock icons. But got stuck at the end...here's what I did...
1) Install/Open Astro.
2) Back up the app you want to change the icon for.
3) Grab that backup apk file off of your sdcard and put it on your computer.
4) Open it with Winrar.
5) Go to the proper folder and drag your new icon into the folder.
6) Close Winrar and move the apk back to your sdcard.
...this is where I get stuck, I know the icon changed because I can see it when I TRY to install the app. But the app doesnt want to install, it says "install unsuccesful". I'm guessing it needs to be signed?
I have used astro as well, I even signed the apk the same way I sign themes and no luck.
ultra spikey said:
Well, I kind of figured out how to change the non-stock icons. But got stuck at the end...here's what I did...
1) Install/Open Astro.
2) Back up the app you want to change the icon for.
3) Grab that backup apk file off of your sdcard and put it on your computer.
4) Open it with Winrar.
5) Go to the proper folder and drag your new icon into the folder.
6) Close Winrar and move the apk back to your sdcard.
...this is where I get stuck, I know the icon changed because I can see it when I TRY to install the app. But the app doesnt want to install, it says "install unsuccesful". I'm guessing it needs to be signed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You're real close; once you replace the icon you need you need to delete META-INF folder then zip it back up, rename file extension to .apk and sign it with the test keys like the stock .apk. The META-INF is where the signature info is kept from the original author, you need to delete this so it doesn't conflict with the test keys.
Geo411m said:
You're real close; once you replace the icon you need you need to delete META-INF folder then zip it back up, rename file extension to .apk and sign it with the test keys like the stock .apk. The META-INF is where the signature info is kept from the original author, you need to delete this so it doesn't conflict with the test keys.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I will that a try. So this also mean that if author updates .apk file we will not be able to install update? Similar to google RC30 updates, we have to wait for JF to modify it.
johnowa636 said:
I will that a try. So this also mean that if author updates .apk file we will not be able to install update? Similar to google RC30 updates, we have to wait for JF to modify it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agreed; this might be a problem.
I mean, opening up the APK files is definitely a start, but it seems the shortcut approach I mentioned earlier is just so much easier. Shortcuts would allow basic users to change icons effortlessly and without fear of ruining the app, and the process could be just as easy as Bookmark 2, if a developer took charge, no?
ultra spikey said:
Well, I kind of figured out how to change the non-stock icons. But got stuck at the end...here's what I did...
1) Install/Open Astro.
2) Back up the app you want to change the icon for.
3) Grab that backup apk file off of your sdcard and put it on your computer.
4) Open it with Winrar.
5) Go to the proper folder and drag your new icon into the folder.
6) Close Winrar and move the apk back to your sdcard.
...this is where I get stuck, I know the icon changed because I can see it when I TRY to install the app. But the app doesnt want to install, it says "install unsuccesful". I'm guessing it needs to be signed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i would like to verify that this method works to change non-stock apps without pushing files or inserting apps into updates. i used 7zip but i'd imagine winrar will work fine as well. just remember to delete the entire metainf folder, not just its contents. once you have your .apk, re-sign it using stericson's auto-sign utility and you'll be able to install the app through astro.
i should also note that i deleted all instance of the unmodified app from my sdcard. i uninstalled it and deleted the backup on my sd card. this may or may not be necessary, but i just wanted to take precautions.
I've given this method a try, and it seems simply too complicated for a moderate user like me. Wouldn't the shortcut method I mentioned be so much easier to quickly change home screen icons? Would any of the developers on this forum be interested in throwing such an app together? I'd gladly donate some money if a good app was able to take care of this problem.
what are you having trouble with, exactly? i'm far from an advanced user myself, but this is probably one of the easier things to do on the g1, probably second to flashing themes.
though i will say that there are a few apps that i can't change icons for. chomp and cubik have installed but force close when opened.
i have a feeling it's something to do with the signing the apk's, but like i said, i'm not an advanced user at all.
TruLuvNvrDies said:
what are you having trouble with, exactly? i'm far from an advanced user myself, but this is probably one of the easier things to do on the g1, probably second to flashing themes.
though i will say that there are a few apps that i can't change icons for. chomp and cubik have installed but force close when opened.
i have a feeling it's something to do with the signing the apk's, but like i said, i'm not an advanced user at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I opened up the APK using WinRAR, replaced the icon.png with my icon of choice, and then I'm stuck. I known I have to auto-sign the APK, but am not exactly sure how. I have Stericson's auto-signer tool, and used command 4 to manually enter the APK path, but once I do that I get a bunch of errors. If need be, I can copy down the exact error I get.
ultra spikey said:
Video doesnt show you how to change "non-stock" app icons, only icons for the original apps.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice video!
jayaustn said:
I opened up the APK using WinRAR, replaced the icon.png with my icon of choice, and then I'm stuck. I known I have to auto-sign the APK, but am not exactly sure how. I have Stericson's auto-signer tool, and used command 4 to manually enter the APK path, but once I do that I get a bunch of errors. If need be, I can copy down the exact error I get.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you probably need to delete the contents of the meta-inf folder. there should be three files in there, delete them all. if you extracted the contents of the .apk, zip them back up with an .apk extension. if you didn't extract them, you're at the last step, which is to re-sign the .apk. you don't actually need to manually re-sign the file through the console on stericson's re-signer. just right-click the .apk file and at the very top, there should be an option that says "resign .apk". click on that and your app will be re-signed and ready for an install attempt.
though, as i said before, this method is not 100%. of the 6 apps that i modified so far, i was only successful with 4 of them. even if you do all of the steps correctly, you might not have a working app at the end. the apps will install but will automatically force close when launched. i don't know what causes this, actually, and any suggestions would be appreciated.
I agree with the OP, while it is easy enough to edit the apks, resign them, copy them back onto your phone it would be far more elegant (IMHO) if you could have an application that allowed you to copy "Icon Packs" onto your SDCard, and then add links to applications on your home screen giving you a choice of icons from the aforementioned "Icon Pack".
Theme developers could then distribute the "Icon Pack" with the theme, and end users could easily add custom icons to your home screen from your phone without having to mess about on a PC.
liamw said:
I agree with the OP, while it is easy enough to edit the apks, resign them, copy them back onto your phone it would be far more elegant (IMHO) if you could have an application that allowed you to copy "Icon Packs" onto your SDCard, and then add links to applications on your home screen giving you a choice of icons from the aforementioned "Icon Pack".
Theme developers could then distribute the "Icon Pack" with the theme, and end users could easily add custom icons to your home screen from your phone without having to mess about on a PC.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So what everyone wants is Anycut that can do custom icons.
I installed the stock MMS.apk file on my de'odexed stock rom (rooted of course). Everything worked well and the app runs, but when reading text threads there is an ugly white border around the edge of the screen, its strange. Its not present when viewing the list of conversations, only in the thread view. I'm not sure if that's how its supposed to look or not, but if not, anyone have any idea how to fix this?
I'll get a screenshot up as soon as I get home.
I first obtained the MMS.apk from the cyanogen rom, then thinking that it might be modified and thus creating my problem, I grabbed the AOSP version from this thread:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=789493
Any help will be greatly appreciated.
UPDATE:
Found another thread where people are experiencing the same issue, apparently its a problem with how sense handles the application:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=752604
I attempted to open up the Mms.apk (AOSP version) with APKtool and play around with the xml files for the UI, but wasn't able to get it to recompile and test any changes I made, the app would just crash on launch. I simply made a few changes to the colors, but I admittedly don't really know what I'm doing and it wouldn't run. If anyone who's more experienced in this area could offer some advice I'll try again.
That's a picture of the issue, it appears in both landscape and portrait mode.
Texts were blacked out just for privacy sake.
Well after a few hours of messing around in the XML files for the AOSP messaging app, I was able to find a solution to this issue. I modified the XML file to have it correctly display the black color background when using the black theme. I was not able to eliminate the border entirely, but by changing the scrollbar type from Inset to Overlay I was able to make it uniform and far more visually pleasing.
I have attached my modified Mms.apk file, feel free to test it out.
For the specifics of what I did for those who are interested:
Two files were modified in the apk
- /res/layout/compose_message_activity.xml
- /res/layout/compose_message_activity_black.xml
In both files I changed the scrollbarStyle propery to "insideOverlay", in addition to removing the reference to always show the scrollbar track.
In the black xml file I changed the background color to "@android:color/black".
The original XML files were extracted using APKTool and Recompiled to their binary format, then reinserted into the original apk without resigning.
This is awesome! ... Except it doesn't filter out the VVM message streams that come through. :|
I haven't encountered this problem though I use google voice so I'm not really sure what it is you're referring to.
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App
ty!
beautiful ty!!!!!!!!!
Imma cry
I cant send mms!
Try turning off wifi while sending/receiving mms
no wifi
i don't have wifi on when i do this i just have 3g on so i can send mms!
i zipped the file with the one that had the white outline .is there a way to make this new apk. file into a .zip file for me ?
I'd imagine you could simply replace the APK file in your zip with my modified one and install that way. Use a program like winrar or 7zip to replace the apk within the zip.
tehpsyc said:
I'd imagine you could simply replace the APK file in your zip with my modified one and install that way. Use a program like winrar or 7zip to replace the apk within the zip.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sorry but i cant find either of thoses programs u mention to replace the APK file in my zip with your modified version .is there another program or a manual way of doing this process ?
how do i install this? since it's an APK, i thought i'd just install it from Astro but it says it's already installed and asked if i wanted to uninstall.
To install this you need to either delete or rename the Mms.apk that's already on your phone in the /system/app directory (I just rename to Mms.apk.bak) and then copy the modified one into that same directory followed by a restart of the phone. Because its a system app you cant install it the same way you would a regular apk, at least from my understanding.
You will need to get write access to the system directory to accomplish this (I used an app on the market called root explorer, though you can also do all this through the ADB shell)
my first attempt into creating a new theme it's just a swype keyboard however i get fc when i try to open it. i am on starburst 1.95 i wipe after applying before launching. i modded png files compressed them originally i thought the apk being 6 megs was my issue but i have the same issue after compressing them. I didn't know if the apk needed to be resigned so i first tried without signing then with signing with the same result. can someone help me find what i screwed up.
didn't download your file to look but did you change any .9.png's ?
if all you changed were png's the .9.are probably causing your problems.
try this.
if just changing normal pngs just unzip the .apk (its a zip file) edit your png files and zip it back up.
see if that works.
once you get that going there are quite a few good tutorials out there on modding .9 files.
they take a few extra steps.
they are all .png
i have noticed swype themes for other phones don't completely work or they don't swype at least, but they do work for standard typing. my failed theme however just force closes so i am thinking this is a different issue not necessarily compatibility. the swype i modded was pulled from starburst, my current rom.
their is a com.swypeinputmethod file under data/data i am not sure if or how this effects the swupe.apk in system/app. thanks for the reply
try replacing the png files without decompiling the .apk first
just rename .apk to .zip and extract to a folder then rezip and change back to .apk
or easier just open the zip without extracting and copy the files to thier spots and close.
this way you don't have to worry about all the decompiling and signing.
it works
i got it
since it is a no install system app i just put it into the rom and installed the rom, i also got a fresh apk to dump the png's into not sure what did it but it is now working and i can look for something else to theme, skin or play with.
thanks guys
Sorry for such a simple question but this is driving me nuts. I'm running the recently released deodexed Jelly Bean 4.1.1 ROM and I am rooted. I want to change some of the system icons and I've found most of them. I'm not having any luck with the phone ico,however.
I found the SecPhone.apk and it looks like that is where it is. But it must be somewhere else because every time I've changed it, I always get the same result...the little green phone.
Here is what I did:
I copied the SecPhone.apk to my computer and replaced the icon with the one I wanted.
I zipped it.
Signed it.
Then changed the zip to apk.
I then pasted the apk to my sdcard on my phone.
I then went into ES Explorer with root access and replaced the apk in /system/app with the new apk and made sure the permissions were correct and then rebooted.
(Note: I tried to install it but it would not let me. I read a how-to that stated placing it in the folder and rebooting would work the same way. Probably not true, looking back on it now.)
After all that (many times) the damn green phone icon pops back up when the phone re-boots, just sitting there, mocking me.
It's probably evident from my post I'm a noob with modding but this seems like it should be much easier than what I'm going through right now. Any help with this is much appreciated. Thank you.
if I'm not mistaken phone n contacts are switchd so to speak.extract the SecContacts.apk like you did phone. find 5 or 6 folders that start with mipmap-xxxx and replace ic_launcher_phone in all of them. Do the same in the drawable folders as well
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll give it a shot. I figured there had to be other copies of that icon and I just hadn't found the right one yet.
You were correct. There are about 10 copies of ic_launcher_phone in the different folders exactly where you stated.
Guess I should match the sizes of the icons I'm replacing too. These can't all be the same dimensions, can they? This is an awful lot of work to change one icon. LOL. Thanks again.
evoliphant said:
You were correct. There are about 10 copies of ic_launcher_phone in the different folders exactly where you stated.
Guess I should match the sizes of the icons I'm replacing too. These can't all be the same dimensions, can they? This is an awful lot of work to change one icon. LOL. Thanks again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol no problem
Pretty sure they're all the same.You should be safe
billard412 said:
lol no problem
Pretty sure they're all the same.You should be safe
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sort-of. Only the one for your phone's DPI is going to get used, so if you make them all the same it just means you can't run the same .apk on a tablet. Also, it might screw with you if you use HDMI out and the icons get made smaller to match the lower DPI of a monitor (100 vs 300+ on the SGS3), but I don't have the MHL adapter yet so I haven't tried that myself.
Well, unfortunately it didn't work. I did finally get rid of the green phone icon, but mine was no where to be found! Plus, com.phone.blahblah kept forcing close. Whatever I did, 4.1.1 didn't like one bit.
Oh well.
I followed the same process as I put in the OP for this except I did it for both SecPhone.apk and SecContacts.apk. Pasted both with Root Explorer, rebooted and then the home screen would come up, the phone icon was gone and then it would hang and give me the FC error. I just reflashed and gave up for the time being. Hopefully someone has an answer. The only other thing I might try differently is using adb? Would that be a better option than using the Root Explorer copy/paste method?
I wonder if I took the 4.1.1 Rom and opened it and changed the files in that and then flashed the whole ROM again if that would be any better. Would I basically just do the same process I did with the individual apks, except instead of just installing the single apk, the whole ROM goes in with it.
I just can't for the life of me understand why changing png icon images would cause the com.phone process to FC.
Try to use 7zip to extract the icon located in 'res/mipmap-xhdpi' of SecContacts.apk, edit it, and the use 7zip to drop the edited icon directly into the apk. Don't rezip or sign..
That did it! Thank you so much. I actually went ahead replaced all the pngs with my icon in all folders of the SecContacts. I did it first in just the folder you suggested but that didn't change anything. I then changed them all using 7 zip and put them in system/app and rebooted. Boom, Green phone gone! Looks like it was zip/signing problem. 7zip is the answer to my modding woes I guess. Thanks again.
evoliphant said:
That did it! Thank you so much. I actually went ahead replaced all the pngs with my icon in all folders of the SecContacts. I did it first in just the folder you suggested but that didn't change anything. I then changed them all using 7 zip and put them in system/app and rebooted. Boom, Green phone gone! Looks like it was zip/signing problem. 7zip is the answer to my modding woes I guess. Thanks again.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It may be expecting the file to be uncompressed as well - maybe 7z is putting it in the same way it was. The other issue is it needs to be 4-byte aligned, which you can get via the zipalign program that comes with the SDK - and maybe 7z does that automatically as well.