So to give you a bit of a background I have the HTC M8. I use Skydragon rom that is based on Sense 7. I love the Sense interface, especially blinkfeed. I love the ability to swipe my homescreen to the left to access blinkfeed without even having to open any app.
So that's the thing, I'm big on news apps. I'm big on reading up on everything I can, whether it be politics, gaming, college basketball, nba, android development, etc. I have Flipboard and I love the layout, but Flipboard can't really replace Blinkfeed since you have to actually open the app instead of swiping from the homescreen to access it like Blinkfeed. So the question is, is there a way to set up Flipboard like Blinkfeed? I don't mean that in a way of using gestures to open that app, but more like how Blinkfeed works. Is there a way to swipe from the homescreen and open up Flipboard exactly like I do Blinkfeed. Instead of pulling up the app or opening anything, I could just swipe right from my homescreen and see flipboard?
I know you can use widgets and three-finger gestures but thats not nearly the same, nor can they emulate what Blinkfeed can do. To be honest, I'm not sure if it's possible, but I'm also nowhere near an expert (as you can see from my past noob questions.) Would this require a custom rom to even attempt, or what?
Let me know your thoughts because to me this would be an awesome feature
Flipboard created Breifing it's the same as blinkfeed but for samsung only. A better question would be if someone has ported it for use in other roms
Related
I tried out CM6 today, and there are some things I absolutely LOVE about it. It's VERY responsive, more so than any other ROM I've tried. I love the launcher and the transparency to the wallpaper when you're scrolling though your apps. And I love the 3d gallery.
There are some dealbreakers for me though.... I don't like:
1- The camera app, I much prefer the HTC once.
2- The contacts list, I loved he way the stock one synced w/facebook updates and user pictures.
3- The calendar, which again synced with dates from facebook (birthdays, events, etc).
Are there apks that I can download to replace the ones in cm6 with? Or will I have to use a Sense ROM to get those?
No. It won't happen. If you want Sense, go to Sense. Otherwise, just look for alternative apps on the Market.
short answer, no
long answer;
sense widgets only work with the sense launcher. download official facebook app to sync with cyanogenmod or syncmypix. for the calendar, use ebobirthday to grab facebook birth days then sync to gmail and in gmail under calendar on the left at the bottom click "other calendars" then add "browse interesting calendars", then more tab, then subscribe to "Contacts' birthdays and events" as for the camera, someone made progress getting it working on the n1 but have not seen anyone trying to get it working on evo. right now, it is still a bit ugly and some things do not work, but they will soon enough. when cyanogen and the rest of the team are done, you will be able to do way more with their camera than you every could with the stock on. infact you already can with a large assortment of codecs and fine tuning options. hope this helped
You could try LauncherPro Plus. It won't give you a camera app, but it has an ever-increasing assortment of Sense-like widgets.
@DomSim: Thanks for the long answer =] I though from reading another thread that CM6 didn't link the contacts w/facebook, but you're telling me otherwise, so I will give that a try (I'm flashing CM6 again as I post). Honestly, the larger font on the contact list still bothers me, I wish it were smaller =[ And thanks for the info on getting the calendar sync, I don't think I EVER would have figured that out, hahaha!
@Noxious Ninja: Thanks for the suggestion. I will give it a whirl once I'm flashed back on CM6. =]
One more thing I missed: The stock Sense clock/w weather! I love that clock =[ But I actually like the clock from CM6's lock screen better. Is there a widget for that?
Beautiful Widgets
skyyhacylon said:
One more thing I missed: The stock Sense clock/w weather! I love that clock =[ But I actually like the clock from CM6's lock screen better. Is there a widget for that?
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Hey guys,
I have finally decided to make the switch to Android with this phone, however I do have a question I was hoping to answer before I switch...
One of the features I missed on my Iphone was being able to turn on my phone and have the homescreen display my outlook calendar and to do list(windows phone). I have tried doing some research and some hands on the Verizon store so I know about widgets...although the ones on the droidx I played with were very small.
So my question is...can I set my homescreen to give me half the screen worth of outlook events/tasks and then move everything else to other pages? Sorry if this is a repeat/stupid question but I appreciate the help!
The calendar app has a widget which will show your calendar apps, you can sync to outlook via various means including exchange activesync for your e-mail.
You also can download a app like Jorte it has several different widgets sizes like. 1/4, 2/4, 3/4, 4/4 of the screen size.
I use Launcher Pro Plus. Great widgets (calendar, agenda, facebook, tweeter, etc). I hope app will get updated for ICS
Also the CalenGoo app has tonnes of different size widgets for all your needs!
kkh786 said:
Also the CalenGoo app has tonnes of different size widgets for all your needs!
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Click to collapse
this looks like it will work great!
soon as I switch there will be no more excuses why I forgot to do something!
you can also install widget locker and display all of this on your lock screen (the initial screen you see when you turn the screen on)
Haha as you see there are many ways to do things on Android. +1 for Possibility.
you can do almost anything on android. super customizable! That's the beauty of Android.
Jorte can do this
There is also an app called Pure that is a highly customizable widget for your ToDo app of choice and Calendar, and looks much better IMHO. Jorte is the best calendar I've seen and that's what I use as an app, but with Pure you can skin the widget (I like highly transparent) and set all sorts of options so it looks perfect on the home screen...
So yes, the beauty of Android is you have TONS of options to do what you are looking for... Granted I haven't used an iPhone before, but I venture to guess you'll have many more options than you have now.
Hi,
Wondering if anyone can give me some ideas on the ideal twitter widget for my specific needs, because I've seemingly tried them all and not found one that beats the Sense one (Yes I know most people seem to hate it, but I'm not most people )
In particular, I want a widget that either can replace or work with the HTC Twitter app.
The one feature of the HTC app which I love is the ability to preview the links in a tweet in an integrated browser. I know some other apps do this, but not in such a user friendly way (imo)
Attachment shows what I mean. While I like Plume, and it has an integrated browser, that is only full page - the HTC app lets you look at the tweet while previewing the link.
I tried about 10 apps last night, and the one one I can find that comes close to the same behaviour was ubersocial. Unfortunately, the widget seems to have a problem with sizing on the HOX, not to mention that its not scrollable.
I realise the behaviour I'm detailing above is in the app - but what I'd like is a widget I can use in Apex that will either open the tweet directly in the HTC app (or ubersocial) or another app with similar features.
At the moment I have to use a separate widget to preview the posts, then open the HTC app and find the same tweet and use the preview function. Or use Plume (whose widget I don't really like and isn't themeable out of the box) and read the tweet OR the link, but not both together.
May seem an odd request, but I can't believe I'm the only one who likes the HTC app but prefers using a different launcher?
BTW, I'm mostly talking about web page links - I know that many of the programs show images inline with the tweet.
Any suggestions as to other ones I should try?
Last night I tried the following:
Colorize widget
UberSocial
TweetDeck
TweetCaster
Android Pro Widgets
Seesmic
Twidroyd
Twitter
Plume
Pure Messenger
and none of them did exactly what I wanted, though UberSocial was close.
Any further suggestions?
Gavin
And, that's why we get HTC phones with Sense; it comes fully armed with (mostly) best-in-class widgets & apps. Sorry I cannot be of much help since I'm right where you are - only, I've given up and rediscovered why I go with HTC, and not Samsung, to begin with.
Enjoy the hunt and kindly let us know if you find a worthy replacement.
Cheers
I use Android Pro Widgets, closest thing I've found to friendstream yet and they have good widgets for bookmarks, messages, calendar if you want to ditch Sense completely and go aosp.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.rdr.widgets.core
I personaly use "plume", The widget is very nice .
Sent from my HTC One X using XDA
I need to have 3 contact groups, Family, Friends, Work. In the past I have used an old app called smart shortcuts, I could add a shortcut for each folder to my home screen, It works buts its a huge pain.
There has to be a better way
Someone must have a better way?
Thanks
Maybe try a different launcher, I have groups in Nova Launcher for contacts, media apps, social networks apps, etc.
I second trying Nova launcher. A lot of these kind of features are available and built-in. I was always an Apex user, but it just didn't seem to work as well/smoothly with Oreo and S9... they haven't updated it much in the past few years. Nova on the other hand is extremely smooth.
Have you considered using the "edge" feature? It seems to be designed for exactly what you're looking for, without having to put shortcuts on the desktop.
I do use the edge feature for favorite/family contacts but I have something like 80 work contacts I need a seperate shortcut for and another for about 20 friends
Hi all, So i as usual installed Nova to use some of their gestures (such as bringing down status bar from swiping down anywhere on screen etc)
In the process i lost access to the google weather widget (as it isn't available through Nova launcher)
Any lightweight suggestions to replace it? or is there any way to get the google weather widget functioning on 3rd party launchers?
What about alternatives to google photos? To be honest i never really used photos , I'm going to try to start doing so but i notice that it doesn't even pick up all my folders such as facebook folder (pics downloaded from facebook).
How do i get it to recognize folders like this ? What other lightweight yet useful gallery app is out there? (not quickpic please that purple font is killing me)
Thanks in advanced!
quickpic version 3.4.9.1 doesnt have pink icons for me and its neutured down so no google drive, dropbox etc linking - just pure gallery.
virtyx said:
quickpic version 3.4.9.1 doesnt have pink icons for me and its neutured down so no google drive, dropbox etc linking - just pure gallery.
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Click to collapse
Got a trusted source for that APK?
I am seeing some of the benefits of Google photos though... wondering why i didn't use it sooner
Edit: found a trusted apk for quickpic.
How do I get google weather widget in nova
masri1987 said:
Got a trusted source for that APK?
I am seeing some of the benefits of Google photos though... wondering why i didn't use it sooner
Edit: found a trusted apk for quickpic.
How do I get google weather widget in nova
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Click to collapse
i was about to upload
how do you find it? its slim, lightweight, fast - and gets the job done without any extra add-ins which is what i like, almost like the huawei launcher plus you can change the display and it recognizes ALL your images on your phone (im looking at you google photo)
masri1987 said:
Hi all, So i as usual installed Nova to use some of their gestures (such as bringing down status bar from swiping down anywhere on screen etc)
In the process i lost access to the google weather widget (as it isn't available through Nova launcher)
Any lightweight suggestions to replace it? or is there any way to get the google weather widget functioning on 3rd party launchers?
What about alternatives to google photos? To be honest i never really used photos , I'm going to try to start doing so but i notice that it doesn't even pick up all my folders such as facebook folder (pics downloaded from facebook).
How do i get it to recognize folders like this ? What other lightweight yet useful gallery app is out there? (not quickpic please that purple font is killing me)
Thanks in advanced!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I too use Nova, for weather, I've been using Weather XL by exovoid for years, link
Action launcher has the Google widget and weather baked in. I switched from Nova to it years ago and while I'll go back to Nova briefly for change of pace purposes I never leave Action for very long. Once I got used to and understood the blinds and shutters features in Action everything else became dad's old launcher; including Nova. You can also set the Now page, assign gestures, all the usual staples of fully featured launchers.
I've used Piktures as my main gallery app for a few years. Great app.
NepoRood said:
I too use Nova, for weather, I've been using Weather XL by exovoid for years, link
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks, tried it out, looking for something a bit more lightweight, just for the purpose of widget use.
krabman said:
Action launcher has the Google widget and weather baked in. I switched from Nova to it years ago and while I'll go back to Nova briefly for change of pace purposes I never leave Action for very long. Once I got used to and understood the blinds and shutters features in Action everything else became dad's old launcher; including Nova. You can also set the Now page, assign gestures, all the usual staples of fully featured launchers.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
So i installed action launcher and I cannot find the option to build out tabs or folders within the drawer itself? Also can't remove the multidot drawer icon and just use the swipe up feature by itself
Cool thing is it did import everything almost from nova
Fuzzy13 said:
I've used Piktures as my main gallery app for a few years. Great app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah i just discovered that app ,
I also discovered that any motion photo or any other like top shot (to show you the whole selection of photos taken) etc doesn't show up in 3rd party gallery apps
You just long press and drag the icon up and out, you'll see the remove label at the top of the screen, drop it there and it's gone. The rest will take a bit of reading as Action doesn't work the way normal launchers do so it takes some explaining. Before I do you can create folders in the drawer section of the home settings, it's under folders. I'm saying this because Action doesn't really work the way Dad's old launcher used to do and there are some new paradigms in play. Don't want to deal with that then just imagine the post ends here.
In action you don't really need to make folders in the drawer as it's laid out to use it's killer features, the covers and shutters. For covers you can drop a shortcut you tap as normal to open that app and then you can also swipe or tap the shortcut and it will open a folder with whatever apps you want inside of it. Those are created by dropping one app onto another to create a folder as with most launchers, open the folder you just created and tap the menu (3 dot), choose create cover and now you have it. Tap the first icon you placed and it will simply open that app, swipe it (or double tap if you select that as the opener) and it will open up the folder underneath. I'm not sure if there is an app limit for the folders, I've had 14 in one now. Using my setup for example I use Hangouts as my personal primary text and instant message app but I also use several others; I have a hangouts cover set in the dock, as its a cover I tap it and open hangouts in most cases. Because it's a cover I have the apps for texting that I use infrequently underneath that which I access by swiping the icon instead. This goes on for all the shortcuts I set in the dock. I use a 2 page dock which is all covers save for one which is a shutter and through those have quick access to 47 applications. Much quicker than finding them in a drawer, even when folder the drawer because you will need more touches to get to the app than with a cover.
The shutter is an app shortcut which you use to either open the app or by swiping it open one of that apps widget. An example would be Whatsapp is my work messaging app. I have the icon set and use it as a shutter. I touch it and go into the app as normal. I get a lot of junk messages though that really aren't for me so sometimes I'll swipe it and open up the unread messages widget. This allows me to skip straight to the more important messages first rather than sort through them all in the app itself. The menu(3 dot) when you first open up the shutter will allow you to select the widget you want to use.
Despite all that you can still access the built in long presses if the app/icon has them. What happens in all this is the app drawer itself becomes more of an initial setup bin where the apps are laying until you set your covers and on the odd occasion you go in there to open a seldom used app. In the rare cases you do need to get into the drawer the sea of icons pulled out of the bottom ala Pixel may look cool but it's slower than using the side drawer which I would highly recommend folks try. While not looking cool it's more efficient; particularly for those with many apps. Still want the bottom drawer pullout it's the default action, just get rid of the shortcut and it's there.
You're going to want to menu dive with Action because there is a lot more going on than meets the eye. You can have it match your wallpaper for the launcher theme in the quick theme section. In quickbar you have what amounts to the Goog searchbar with extra functionality that you can adjust. I don't use it as I find little need for it with all the different ways you can get to the search function and it takes up space which can be better spent showing off my carefully selected wallpaper. The icon pack section is self explanatory. Icon appearance will let you change functions and visual cues like notifications counts. App drawers is where you will decide on trying that side drawer and other related settings. Recommend if you do go to a side drawer to tell it to remember where you left it. Otherwise it will always default to the top of the alphabet. Desktop is where you will do the meat and potatos of setting your desktop, the grid, icon scale, scroll effects, infinite scrolling, etc. One thing of interest in the desktop section is it will allow you to create a quickpage. This is a page you can "pullout" from the side that is separate from simply the page to the right of home. I use it for my travel apps of which I have a fair few but only use during that time. Desktop shortcuts will take you to the settings for which functions will show up when long pressing the home screen out in the open. You'll be able to add typical actions like wallpaper, widgets and so on but also custom actions. Docks is where you'll set up the number of dock pages if any, style of dock, dock seperators (or not), etc. Folders and shutters will allow you to change functions there for those tasks. Shortcuts is where you'll define whatever gestures you want.
While all that seems like a lot when you start fiddling with it it'll start making sense. Sorry for the length of that and I hope it wasn't too boring for those that made it this far.
---------- Post added at 04:56 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:39 PM ----------
Oh, yeah... If you use a launcher that allows you to set custom action widgets (Nova, Action Launcher, etc.) you could simply install Action launcher, never use it but get use of the weather widget via custom action in Nova or any other launcher which supports that function.
Huge fan of Today Weather! Can choose which service to receive forecasts from and has a number of widgets.