Hey guys,
I've hadmy HD a while and think it is by far one of the better phones I've used. Though like many reviewers and people have said the interface could do with a face-lift of sorts.
It just occured to be that maybe this would give the HD more appeal and with XDA being the largest resource of designers and coders for Windows I don't see why it can't be done.
Basically here are a few of my ideas, not all of them are applicable and I'm not a programmer as such and nor do I know the major workings of Windows mobile and I know there are alternative applications for these things but some of us just want a new skin not a new program.
Ok let the ideas flow:
SMS/MMS: This one I truly find depressing. I don't feel there is a need for a seperate program but if someone could just skin the display it would make sending messages that extra bit more 'entertaining'. I know people here dislike the iPhone I don't blame them but just have bubbles around threaded messages could really make a difference and improve communication. If I recall a lot of these edits can be doen through XML files. I've seen a cab which increases the size of the message box so it looks like atleast some change is possible. So adding more colour and imgry I think would be of benifit here.
Calendar/Tasks: Both I feel could do with a major new modelling but I use Calendar Touch so I've found my alternative. Though I think just making the display match Outlook on the PC a bit more of just making the buttons and fields bigger if possible would make the applucation more usable.
WMPlayer: I've tried MortPlayer and Pocket Player, the former crashed my HD as it wouldn't unistall so I had to hard-reset and the latter I left was good but just needed to appear more complete (some menus didn't match the styling of the player skin - also very confusing to use at times). Enter good old WMP, I enjoy using the skins already available, but the menus are still small and the fact I have to click the song then 'Play' I think is backwards, where on earth is double click! Is it possible to skin the menu to be bigger and look more user friendly?
These are obviously my thoughts and opinions but what I'm look/hoping for is for someone to code something that modifies these problems. Ofcourse this is open to discussion and people please do discuss.
haha, I had the exact same idea. I thought of some htc style cover for the wm interface and new apps for sms, notes, calendar etc.
going to move my thread to this section, will probably get more attention.
WONDERFUL!
It's good to see people with on a similair though pattern.
Any views, opinions or ideas?
There is a game on the iPhone called Lights Out where the object of the game is to light up or knock out all the lights in a 5x5 grid. When a square is selected that square and its four immediate neighbours, above, below, and to each side invert. There is no wraparound. The object of the game is to get all the squares black.
At the risk of revealing my age, I saw a hand held version of this game in the early 1980's.
When mastering any new programming platform, this application becomes the standard with which I start. I know the logic, so the problem merely becomes getting the thing to run under the new platform. I wrote this in 2005 while fighting my way through the very steep learning curve of Embedded C++. Previous platforms for this program have been, ZX81, BBC Micro, DOS, Windows and finally Windows Mobile. Next stop Linux!
It is an example of minimalist programming on WM. Written in Embedded C++ as a Win32 application it is targetted at ARMv4 chipsets. As such it should run on all PPC versions from Windows Mobile 2002 onwards. The menu is limited to two main items, so WM 5/6 will display it as a WM 5/6 app. Minimalist programming means it can be distributed as as a single .EXE file of a mere 9.5 Kb in size. The DLLs it calls are already on your device, there is no need for a .CAB installation.
It has 5x5, 7x7 and 9x9 grids, all are solvable.
I hope you enjoy it. It will keep you quiet but it might drive you totally nuts!
UPDATE!!! Now works with 480x800/240x400 devices, see later posts for the details.
UPDATED!! Version 1.2 released.
Changes: 11x11 grid added. It is solvable, but it took me a while to figure it out!. You may need a stylus as fingers may be a bit too awkward. For that reason, I do not intend to go to 13x13 and beyond.
The short display glitch on initial program load now fixed.
Game and drawing code optimised. (There are often better and faster ways to do things, if you take the time to look.)
UPDATED!! Version 1.3 released.
Now also runs on both Pocket PC and SmartPhone devices. Now runs on any sized screen, even those that have not been released yet! The blank screens that were reported in later posts are now a thing of the past. Here's the method, take the width and height of of the client area and size the game to 90% of smaller of the two. Why did I not think of that in the first place?
SmartPhone users:- Welcome aboard! Image attached below: The white square is the target square. Move it to the square you want to change with the D-Pad/Arrow buttons, then press 'Enter' to change it. Smartphones prior to Mobile 6.0 may not have the 'File Explorer' application. (It depends on the OEM build). In this case, use ActiveSync. Connect to your phone and drop the unzipped 5x5.exe file via the 'Explore' option into the \Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Games\ directory, and it will appear alongside Solitaire and BubbleBreaker in the games menu of your device. Smartphone 2002/2003 users need to use \Storage\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Games\
Pocket PC users won't see any change, just tap the square you want to change. The program looks at which platform it is running on, and behaves accordingly.
UPDATED!! Version 1.4 released. - The Knight's Gauntlet.
Just when you thought you've mastered it, the Knight's Gauntlet is firmly thrown down. Selecting Knights from the main 5x5 menu, changes the pattern of squares that are inverted to those a knight's move away in chess, (two forward, then one to the side), as per the Knights image below. Up to 9 squares will invert on each move. As per changing the grid size, toggling the knights game on and off will restart the game.
All four grid sizes are solvable, but you are warned, it is a lot harder than the normal cross game.
It was only a small change to the game logic, and this program was all ready to go in September, but I would not release it, until I had proved to myself that it could be done. A brute force attack can be used to break the 5x5 Knight's game but as the grid gets bigger the problem grows exponentially. A quad core processor running a console C++ application, using the SSE3 PC registers (XMM) macros to play one move on the entire board in one machine instruction, was not enough.
I had to use a special version of the mobile program that could dump the state of the board and moves out to a file to be analysed by the PC later by a suite of programs that could combine boards together by the thousands. All good fun!
On and off, it has taken me three months to find the knights solutions to the 7x7, 9x9 and 11x11 games.
UPDATED!! Version 1.5 released. Now with demo mode.
For those who think it is impossible, let the demo mode show you how to do it.... But there is a slight twist........ You will be shown the same solution for each puzzle each time, but the moves are shuffled and they may also be reflected or rotated, just to confuse matters further. Shuffling the moves, rotating, or reflecting, logically, has no effect on the final result.
Happy puzzling!
18th Feb 2010 update fixes WinMo 6.5.3 Dialog box issue mentioned in http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=635063
23 June 2011 CE version added. Note this version is for Windows CE, ARM powered devices only, as is displayed in the last of the images below. Don't run this version on a WinMo device the display will look awful! As an extra caveat, it will only run properly if the OEM of your CE device has built the OS with components that are expected by the 'Standard' version of the SDK as used by EVC 4.0.
Any screenshot?
Thanks!
Nice little game.
Small problem
Hi,
I'm probably missing something here, but I get a white screen without anything I can actually do with it (using Omnia).
Any help?
Grief that is going to be addictive.
So simple yet so tricky at the same time.
works fine on a SQVGA (320x320) device to, and im after 1 minute angry ....
very nice; solved 5x5 - 9 clicks. going to try to crack 7x7
this is lot's of fun & a little tricky!
nice game
Does not work with my HTC Touch HD (WVGA 800x480)
I got a white screen.
stephj said:
At the risk of revealing my age, I saw a hand held version of this game in the early 1980's.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
LOL at remark above ^^
Nice little time waster you have here! Thanks!
Anybody thown their phone out the window in frustration yet?
To the members having trouble with high resolution devices, it was only written to run on 'standard' Pocket PC screens, 240x320 portrait/landscape and 240 square devices.
Sorry it doesn't work properly on larger screens. I'll have a look at it. I may have to borrow one of these later wizzo phones from someone, and find out what's going wrong, or I'll see what's in the WM6 SDK emulator.
May take a while, but I'm on it. Watch this space.
doesn't work on touch diamond 2 with 800x480?
any solution you might know?
anybody??
seems like a great hit, this game.....
tnx in advance
marcel
I have downloaded the WM 6.1.4 SDK from Microsoft's site. It includes a 800x480 device image.
The bad news is the program produces the effect mentioned above. i.e white screen, and nothing.
The good news is exactly that, the bug can be reproduced. This will allow me to step through it, figure out exactly what the hell is going wrong, and fix the code.
This may take few days to sort out, more later.
Fixed! Now works on 800x480 devices as well, in landscape or portrait. Use the zip file in the original post at the top, it has been updated with the new program.
The reason for the fault was that 800x480 devices return a bigger value for the long side of the screen when using GetClientRect();
The program did not recognise this value and could not figure out whether it was landscape, portrait or square, which fouled up the WM_PAINT code.
The code automatically centres the grid in the window, so that bit was OK.
Have fun, until a new screen format comes along.........
This little game is f***ng addicting!
Thanks a lot!
Keep up the good work!
[email protected] said:
Hi,
I'm probably missing something here, but I get a white screen without anything I can actually do with it (using Omnia).
Any help?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm using Samsung Omnia and I get the same problem when starting 5x5. What to do?
HOLLY BALLS! lol this game is addicting and hard. i am yet to beat it!! haha. great game thanks!
It is a kind of drug........
Reply to GreenOmnia
GreenOmnia,
This program will run on 480x800 devices as marcelvanblankers above can confirm. The problem may be that you still have the old version of 5x5 active in your phone.
On a PC you can run multiple versions of Word, Excel etc. until you run out of memory. Under WM only one version of any program is allowed to run at any one time. When a program starts it looks for the same named process. If it finds it it, it activates that copy, and then kills itself. Later versions of WM may correct this, but earlier programs still run to these rules. If you load a new version of the program to your phone and have the old version still active in memory, when you run the new one you only reactivate the old one.
Listen up everybody! Think about the above paragraph. If you have understood it, that is a real WM pearl of wisdom!
To fix the problem, if your version of WM has Task Manager, use that to kill the running version of 5x5, or use Settings->System->Memory->Running Programs and then select 5x5 and end it. Delete all versions of 5x5 from your phone, then reload the new version from the top post in this thread and retry it.
If all this still doesn't work, I will post a test program to run on your device that reports the actual size of the client area window.
We'll take it from there.
My idea :
To actually have all the menus, scrollbar, default program backgrounds,the dropdown menu(the 1 on whcih we click when in File-explorer to jump from My Device to Storage Card),the Contacts Background,the Messaging Background..etc.
All of them transparent like Glass..This is just a Personal thought as in to change the feel n look of the OS.
WM6.5 all ready has titanium with the kind of glass panels m talking about.
Due to which it enhances the Wallpaper used i mean u can use almost any wallpaper.
And about the Visibility issue which will occur in almost everyone's mind after reading this post i think we can make it translucent the same way it becomes when we click on start menu..the icons r very much visible even with a complete white background.
So i think the backgrounds in the programs like file-explorer,windows media player-library,my pictures,SMS,Contacts etc. can be made the same.
I Wish some expert graphic designers and Programmers make my imagination come true and give all us Windows users a completely new interface.
I think for this .pngs & .jpgs of the system will have to be altered or replaced with the new ones and program them accordingly.
I am not at all good at programming and neither Graphics and i dont even know whether my idea can actually be implemented or no?
so many views n no single reply..
I am no coder, but Windows Mobile does not support transparencies like that. Only specific applications that are contained in themselves (aka titanium renders over itself so it has transparency. Mobile shell renders over itself so it has it too, etc.) But i could be wrong.
i don know either even m not sure about my concept..but i think .pngs can be useful...lets c..i have just put forward an idea..
Ive always wanted that feature too, part of the reason why I like Titanium so much, but as Shadowline pointed out, I think it's a limitation of the OS itself, even WM 6.5.
Then again, hope someone can prove us wrong.
yaah hoping for the same!!
Let's flood microsoft with this so they put it in wm7.
Hello,
I have 'created' (to an extent) the first Horizontal Theme , based off of the built-in CPR file, for Titanium Homescreens on WM6.5, however I have a setback...
This theme is being developed initially, and probably mainly, for the T-Mobile DASH (HTC Excalibur/S620) which as a 320x240 screen. In order to make this work, i need a very simple background program running. This is what the program should do:
Detect a certain set of pixels on-screen, and check to see if colors match up with predefined values (much like MortScript's "ColorAt()")
If the values match up, swap UP/LEFT and DOWN/RIGHT (to emulate horizontal movement)
likewise, if it detects that the active window is the Desktop/Homescreen, it will Swap
If not, it will not do anything
This program needs to be low RAM usage, and not all that big (which is optimal for every program). The reason I have it check pixels is for people, like myself, who run SmartToolKit , which adds a 'mask layer' over the HomeScreen, making it harder to detect if it is actually the homescreen. If someone can create a better way of doing this, then thank you!
However, my main concern is getting a coder to make this application for me, without it the theme can essentially not exist. More details will be given upon contact.
If you are interested, please PM me or E-Mail me (both are provided by XDA through my profile).
Thank You all!
I am going to work on the actual theme today...
Is there anyone who could make this very simple program for me?
Hey,
I dont know if this is considered 'double posting' since these posts are weeks apart...anyways.
I am in DESPERATE need of some kind person to lend me a hand as far as making really a simple app. I do not have the environment set up for making Windows Mobile applications (i do not have Visual Studio as microsoft insists I do). The app would be:
1- ButtonSwap:
This one will check certain pixels on the screen and use them to confirm if it is the HomeScreen. If it is, then it will swap keys, if not, it wont do anything.
So PLEASE, if someone is willing to do this VERY SIMPLE task, i would be very very grateful!
Sincerely,
Max B.
Cyclonezephyrxz7
Hi Everyone,
I don't know if I'm just reinventing a wheel here but I encountered a problem with screen lock software and prying eyes. Basically it doesn't take long for repeated use on a single part of a touch screen to be visible at certain angles.
I had one idea to help prevent this and made a quick demo/beta app.
Wondered if anyone on here had any thoughts on the project before I commit too much time into it.
I'll work on screen shots...
The installation is pretty painless - there isn't one (lol) - just unzip the exe and run, make sure you have .NET 3.5. There's a ABOUT page displayed (with a real exit menu) and details / default PIN.
Comments welcome, but remember its the concept on display, not the desing (and distinct lack of graphics).
More Information
It is obviously developed for touch screen devices without a keypad, which I imagine circumnavigates this problem.
It has been tested in the emulator on 320 screens, and on Touch HD. I'll try it on the Magicinan, and Hermes later.
If anyone would develop such app, it would be great ! I was searching for months for something like this. Please, if anyone can develop such app for WVGA screen (SE Xperia X1) it would be great & very appreciated.
For avoiding the mess with downloading, unzipping, copying to emulator dir, running the emu etc, it's usually wise to post screenshots so people immediately grasp the idea.