Develop Bugs

Screen brigthness, negative value?

This is a two part question. What screen brightness do you usually leave your phone at? I leave mine on what seems to be 0 (see next paragraph for explanation) and my screen still always uses around 60-70% of my battery. I don't understand how it can use that much without the backlight on.
Next question - When adjusting the screen brightness and the slider is all the way to the left is that 0? I'm asking because every widget out there when set to 0 is a a few times brighter than when I manually move the slider all the way to the left. Also, after using a widget to toggle to 0 and I check in the display settings, the slider isn't all the way to the left.
So I'm wondering what is true 0? What the widgets set it to or with the slider all the way to the left? Could the slider being all the way to the left actually be hurting my battery life?

No zero on the slider is technically not zero. You can confirm this checking your brightness sysfs file. You have to decompile framework and adjust some numbers. We can take it down to true zero or slightly above which would be much dimmer.
I did this for the atrix. Im surprised it hasnt been done yet for the nexus.

I know it is not actually 0 because if it was I wouldn't be able to see anything on the screen.
Is there anyone that has insight on my questions though?

I dont understand your question. Zero is not true zero unless we mod the framework. So your backlight is not "off". I dont know why youre getting so much drain.
But we should mod this anyway. Use root explorer and go to sys/devices/omapdss/display0/a6e8aa0 and open the brightnesd file. Note that value with your slider at zero and you will see a reading of 30 (0-255). So we can lower that down to maybe 5-10 and zero on the slider will be much dimmer = battery saving.

I have a similar problem. The max brightness is piercing and the min brightness is just a tiny bit too dim.
I have tried used root explorer to change the maximum brightness from 255 to 100 hoping that the slider may be more granular after. For some reason however I cannot update the max brightness file. I have ensured that it is r/w mounted and tried changing the permissions too. It says that the changes have been made and the original backed up. When I reopen the file it hasn't changed.
BTW, my 'brightness' file is at 10 when placed at the minimum brightness.

Try the newest AOKP.
Brightness controls.
I actually have NEVER used auto brightness...even back in my OG days.
And my X days.
Even when custom auto-brightness options were around I ignored them.
I'd simply keep it at around %20 of the default lowest value.
BUT...this is slightly annoying when you step into the sun and can't see anything.
With the newest AOKP you can even set the amount of brightness changes.
I set up four values.
I've mine set up for a pitch black room to lowest.
Average room to my previous 20%ish.
Bright (sunny) to 100/255
SUPER sunny to 240/255.
I didn't notice any added drain today.
But this was my first test.
I think this feature was actually kanged from CM9, but I'm not certain.

So far I have resisted the temptation to get flash happy and I am on stock 4.0.2 but rooted. Do I have any options without changing ROM?

aidanbree said:
I have a similar problem. The max brightness is piercing and the min brightness is just a tiny bit too dim.
I have tried used root explorer to change the maximum brightness from 255 to 100 hoping that the slider may be more granular after. For some reason however I cannot update the max brightness file. I have ensured that it is r/w mounted and tried changing the permissions too. It says that the changes have been made and the original backed up. When I reopen the file it hasn't changed.
BTW, my 'brightness' file is at 10 when placed at the minimum brightness.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We cant change that brightness file with root explorer, even mounted, unless we mod the driver first. It will likely just revert right back to its previous value.
However it is possible i bet to edit the driver. Would be a cool project. You could also try to echo your desired value in terminal. ie echo 255 > brightness. But you prob will get the same result as using root explorer.
Maybe ill look at the driver with my limited skills heh. Or the alternative is to mod the framework which is def possible to fix this, and easier. We did exactly this on the atrix. And the sgs2 had it done too.
Edit: i think i found the code for your granular request. Check lines 30 or so.
https://github.com/ogdobber/android...0/include/linux/platform_data/panel-s6e8aa0.h
Still would be easier to do in framework instead.

How to dim the GN screen even more?

I find the dimmest screen toggle still too bright. I find it embarrassing to use in dark public spaces.
Is there a way to dim the screen even more?

Download the screen filter app from the play store. Literally puts a filter effect on the screen to make it appear darker making it much easier to use in the dark.

Yes its possible to take the screen much lower, but we have to edit the framework. Nobody had done this mod yet for some reason.

CM9 has the ability to change the screen lowest settings built in

B97 said:
Download the screen filter app from the play store. Literally puts a filter effect on the screen to make it appear darker making it much easier to use in the dark.
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+1. I use Screen Filter also, it's uber handy for reading at night when the light seems too bright. If you've got hardkeys like I had on my Desire, you can even turn them off.

i wrote a tutorial on how you can mod the frameworks apk. it's very easy and you can change the brightness levels to anything you want. here's the thread
screen filter only puts a transparent layer on the screen and messes with the colors. modding the frameworks will lower default brightness to any level you want. you can raise it too if you like.

Thanks for all the ideas. I went with the easiest one, Screen Filter.

AOKP also has an option to reduce screen brightness...

dynamicpda said:
Thanks for all the ideas. I went with the easiest one, Screen Filter.
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Click to collapse
Good man!
Sent from my GT-I9100 using XDA

neotekz said:
i wrote a tutorial on how you can mod the frameworks apk. it's very easy and you can change the brightness levels to anything you want. here's the thread
screen filter only puts a transparent layer on the screen and messes with the colors. modding the frameworks will lower default brightness to any level you want. you can raise it too if you like.
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Great work, I've been wondering why nobody did this mod yet for the nexus. I made that same mod on my atrix, using the sgs2 thread as well. But I've been too lazy to do it for nexus.
The above mod is the best option. Screen filter doesn't achieve the same results. The above mod reduces power draw as well when on the lower brightness setting of 5 or so. Screen filter just hides the higher brightness but has same power draw.

RogerPodacter said:
Great work, I've been wondering why nobody did this mod yet for the nexus. I made that same mod on my atrix, using the sgs2 thread as well. But I've been too lazy to do it for nexus.
The above mod is the best option. Screen filter doesn't achieve the same results. The above mod reduces power draw as well when on the lower brightness setting of 5 or so. Screen filter just hides the higher brightness but has same power draw.
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That would be correct for back-lit screens. For the Galaxy Nexus screen, though, Screen Filter does help reducing power draw as a darker screen content = lower brightness.
I used to use SF for quite a while until I got fed up of it causing stutters to most animations. After thorough examination I concluded that the Nexus's GPU is the culprit. For some reason it just doesn't like multiple graphics being updated at once. Modding the overlay XML allows it to run at full speed.
Can anyone confirm the same reduced framerate issue?. It's also the reason why some ROMs include a setting to remove the navigation buttons glow. I tested with CM9 on the SGS2 and experienced none of the stutters in cases where the GN would. Another example: sliding between sections (comments, ralated, etc.) in YouTube is laggy iff the video is playing.

fnf said:
That would be correct for back-lit screens. For the Galaxy Nexus screen, though, Screen Filter does help reducing power draw as a darker screen content = lower brightness.
I used to use SF for quite a while until I got fed up of it causing stutters to most animations. After thorough examination I concluded that the Nexus's GPU is the culprit. For some reason it just doesn't like multiple graphics being updated at once. Modding the overlay XML allows it to run at full speed.
Can anyone confirm the same reduced framerate issue?. It's also the reason why some ROMs include a setting to remove the navigation buttons glow. I tested with CM9 on the SGS2 and experienced none of the stutters in cases where the GN would. Another example: sliding between sections (comments, ralated, etc.) in YouTube is laggy iff the video is playing.
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Click to collapse
Agreed, GPU just isn't good enough. I hate the lag with the button glow animations on!
I use an app called root dim, it's really useful. Let's you use a brightness level of 1, which is really quite dim. Free, too.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App

Remoteconcern said:
Agreed, GPU just isn't good enough. I hate the lag with the button glow animations on!
I use an app called root dim, it's really useful. Let's you use a brightness level of 1, which is really quite dim. Free, too.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using XDA App
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Thanks for the tip, on the Galaxy Nexus it's possible to set the brightness to 0 by writing to /sys/class/backlight/*/brightness but the brightness is checked and reset to the minimum (default 10) every time the screen is turned on. I guess Root Dim works to the same effect so it runs as a system service. Still, it'd be an awesome addition for people who haven't bothered to mod.

fnf said:
That would be correct for back-lit screens. For the Galaxy Nexus screen, though, Screen Filter does help reducing power draw as a darker screen content = lower brightness.
I used to use SF for quite a while until I got fed up of it causing stutters to most animations. After thorough examination I concluded that the Nexus's GPU is the culprit. For some reason it just doesn't like multiple graphics being updated at once. Modding the overlay XML allows it to run at full speed.
Can anyone confirm the same reduced framerate issue?. It's also the reason why some ROMs include a setting to remove the navigation buttons glow. I tested with CM9 on the SGS2 and experienced none of the stutters in cases where the GN would. Another example: sliding between sections (comments, ralated, etc.) in YouTube is laggy iff the video is playing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Screen filter may reduce power. But amoled screens save power with lower brightness. There is no difference between lcd vs led on this issue. And modifying the framework to bring min brightness down to 5 rather than 15 saves much more power than screen filter. Its no contest. This isn't different from lcd in this case.
---------- Post added at 03:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:14 PM ----------
fnf said:
Thanks for the tip, on the Galaxy Nexus it's possible to set the brightness to 0 by writing to /sys/class/backlight/*/brightness but the brightness is checked and reset to the minimum (default 10) every time the screen is turned on. I guess Root Dim works to the same effect so it runs as a system service. Still, it'd be an awesome addition for people who haven't bothered to mod.
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Click to collapse
Yes we can write to that sysfs file, but it gets reset. The mod to the frameworks incorporates that backlight file so its now able to go down to 1, 2, 5, or whatever you want. It makes it now stock, so you are no longer capped at 10 (actually I think 15 is the cap I see). But that mod is just removing this cap and making it lower to whatever you want. Stock.
So no extra app is needed. No additional tweak. It now makes the stock brightness able to go down to 1 by itself whenever it needs.

Tweaked brightness settings - battery saving and readable (edit through CM settings)

I've come up with some great (I think so..) brightness settings for the Razr M. I worked on this to make sure of battery savings while remaining comfortably readable under any light conditions. So here they are if you are interested in having a go:
0 lux - 4% screen brightness
2 lux - 4%
3 lux - 6%
7 lux - 8%
22 lux - 10%
63 lux - 14%
180 lux - 22%
511 lux - 31%
1447 lux - 43%
4095 lux - 57%
11585 lux - 74%
32768 to infinity - 95%
You have to edit them in manually through CM settings, attached is the smooth graph of the outcome (from CM itself):
One thing that has annoyed me on any phone I've had is the auto brightness settings, so I did a bit a research into how the human eye perceives light increase, and its based roughly on log(lux), increasing screen brightness by ^2.5 each step. Result is that I wrote an excel sheet (also attached) with some cool maths where you can adjust some variables to tailor an auto-brightness curve to your taste.
I made a few assumptions specific to the Razr M for the above settings:
- It has a minimum light reading of 2 lux even in the darkest of darks (my defy did the same thing - might be a motorola thing)
- The lux reading is approximately accurate (my galaxy note 8 and Razr M give VERY similar readings under the same light sources)
- I topped the lux reading out at 32k (it does read up to 65k) because its around the starting value of direct sunlight, and it also happens to be a nice round number
Just thought I'd share because I think I nailed the auto brightness settings on this device.
Cheers

How did you get that many step points? I only see 0, 15, 100, 3000 and 8000-infinity.
I am running CM11.2 (4.4.3).
---------- Post added at 10:26 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:14 AM ----------
Nevermind. Found it by long pressing a segment and choosing "split". Not real intuitive but it works.

Yeah you have to add in a few extra points with my setup. You could probably skip say every second point and it would work almost as well. But the built in brightness points ramped up to quickly for my liking - far brighter then necessary.

Where exactly do you go to in CM to modify these settings? I can't find them...

Display&Lights -- Brightness -- click on the settings icon next to the slider

I didn't mention in the first post, but the excel sheet is very customisable...
If you want to lower brightness there are several ways:
1. lower the maximum brightness
2. Increase the curve value (this affects the middle range of the curve mostly)
3. Increase the maximum lux value
Or if you want to increase brightness, just do the opposite of the points above. You know you have good settings when it looks the same always (ie doesn't suddently appear dim or bright). I think my default value are pretty close. I spent some time fine tuning, but like anything, there is always room for improvement
I also did this calculator so I didn't have to run another app in the background to control auto brightness.. save on a few MB of ram anyway.

Rufus said:
I didn't mention in the first post, but the excel sheet is very customisable...
If you want to lower brightness there are several ways:
1. lower the maximum brightness
2. Increase the curve value (this affects the middle range of the curve mostly)
3. Increase the maximum lux value
Or if you want to increase brightness, just do the opposite of the points above. You know you have good settings when it looks the same always (ie doesn't suddently appear dim or bright). I think my default value are pretty close. I spent some time fine tuning, but like anything, there is always room for improvement
I also did this calculator so I didn't have to run another app in the background to control auto brightness.. save on a few MB of ram anyway.
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hello can u tell me more about the curve value? which range can be set? and whats the behave on mobile?

increase lowest brightness

I'm searching for an app or something to increase my lowest brightness because pixel 2xl screen is kinda sh*tty in very low brightness. All the apps that I can find offer only the opposite by applying a filter.
Anyone knows anything that can be done?

arvylas said:
I'm searching for an app or something to increase my lowest brightness because pixel 2xl screen is kinda sh*tty in very low brightness. All the apps that I can find offer only the opposite by applying a filter.
Anyone knows anything that can be done?
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Click to collapse
Are you stock or rooted??. If rooted, you can set minimum brightness levels with a custom kernel and the EXKM app :good:

I'm not sure I understand your question.
When set at it's lowest setting, the display brightness is not bright enough?
Why not move the slider to a little brighter of a setting?

Badger50 said:
Are you stock or rooted??. If rooted, you can set minimum brightness levels with a custom kernel and the EXKM app :good:
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Click to collapse
Stock rom with flash rooted. I don't see anything that could help in exkm.

Az Biker said:
I'm not sure I understand your question.
When set at it's lowest setting, the display brightness is not bright enough?
Why not move the slider to a little brighter of a setting?
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Click to collapse
That's what I do until now. I was curious though if I can automate it and not mess with the slider all the time. I keep it at the middle with auto brightness but in the dark the brightness gets too low and the black crush and ghosting is unbearable.

arvylas said:
That's what I do until now. I was curious though if I can automate it and not mess with the slider all the time. I keep it at the middle with auto brightness but in the dark the brightness gets too low and the black crush and ghosting is unbearable.
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Click to collapse
You mean like this at the bottom of the pic?

For those not rooted...https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.vitocassisi.luxlite
I bought full version awhile ago, not sure what restrictions if any there are in free version.

arvylas said:
That's what I do until now. I was curious though if I can automate it and not mess with the slider all the time. I keep it at the middle with auto brightness but in the dark the brightness gets too low and the black crush and ghosting is unbearable.
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Oh. So you want to set the perfect brightness as the lowest settings so you just have to swipe all the way left instead of finding the sweet spot with the slider?
Still crazy, but now I get it

Badger50 said:
You mean like this at the bottom of the pic?
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Click to collapse
I think the right expression is blind as a bat. Thanks mate. @azbiker something like that. I just couldn't find an optimal setting for both day and night.

arvylas said:
That's what I do until now. I was curious though if I can automate it and not mess with the slider all the time. I keep it at the middle with auto brightness but in the dark the brightness gets too low and the black crush and ghosting is unbearable.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Auto brightness at 50% still gets you crushed blacks? Can't test that now cause I'm on DP2 but I'm pretty sure when I had that same setting, it was too bright for me actually.
Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

Try this to automate completely! :good: Integrates with Tasker and a tasker plugin named Twilight to change based on home or not, sun rise or sun down, travel speed (brighter walking / dimmer in a vehicle). Incrediable app, I've used it for 4-5 years on many devices. Does not require root but works well if you are rooted.
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1910521

EeZeEpEe said:
Auto brightness at 50% still gets you crushed blacks? Can't test that now cause I'm on DP2 but I'm pretty sure when I had that same setting, it was too bright for me actually.
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I set it around 40-45 and in a dark room is really bad. Well reading is ok at that brightness but everything else is a nightmare.

Screen brightness messed up in P beta 2(dp3)?

I upgraded my phone from 8.1 to 9.0 yesterday and noticed that my brightness slider is now much higher up to 100% than it used to be. I have to make it go much higher to get bthe same brightness. Going to my old brightness setting makes the screen really dim. Is this a bug?

BoboBrazil said:
I upgraded my phone from 8.1 to 9.0 yesterday and noticed that my brightness slider is now much higher up to 100% than it used to be. I have to make it go much higher to get bthe same brightness. Going to my old brightness setting makes the screen really dim. Is this a bug?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nope. New linear scale on the brightness slider...

jaytv said:
Nope. New linear scale on the brightness slider...
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Click to collapse
What does this mean though? Because now it's really dark until you get to over half of the bar then it shoots up quickly. Doesn't make much sense to me. I'm not using auto brightness btw.

BoboBrazil said:
What does this mean though? Because now it's really dark until you get to over half of the bar then it shoots up quickly. Doesn't make much sense to me. I'm not using auto brightness btw.
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Click to collapse
Something to do with the non-linear (logarithmic) scale being closer to real world physics or something like that, not exactly sure why it should matter, but Google and others have decided so. It just means that the "graph" of the scale is not a straight line but a curve.

Brightness was fine before the June update. After the June update I have to set it to 83% brightness to get what I was getting at 50% brightness. It's a bug. I flashed back to 8.1 for now.