Homescreen Plugin suggestions?

[Guest Foxman]

Hi all,

I am somewhat new to windows mobile, but have been programming for years and I would like to take a crack at a homescreen plugin to get my feet wet. I own an MPx220 to test with, but I have the SP 2002 and 2003 emulators from Microsoft. I would like to get some suggestions for some plugins, so please post them in as much detail as possible and I will have a look. Please feel free to use this post to debate useful features.

Here is an example of a homescreen I am working on with a XP Pro feel to it. It has RJShortcuts and RJTasks included:

ss000.gif

[Guest arman68]

A simple World Time plugin would be great.

Something that just displays a City name along with the time, can change city when scrolling right or left, and can go to a setup menu to select cities when clicking on it. Ideally it should be easy to format it, so that it can be easily included in any homescreen.

Minute updates rather than seconds are probably wise to conserve battery life.

[Guest crafty]

Wow the world's gone homescreen plugin mad lately - DrBlow's gonna be so happy ^_^.

Welcome to the site Foxman, always great to have more active members around who want to contribute. I've ogt a few suggestions to throw out there:

- Improved Message plugin, must have the ability to not be visable with no new messages, also must show who the message is from and maybe display some of the body of the message.

- Improved Media PLayer control, Orangewinger's Media Player Control [here]is great but it lacks a few things such a being able to skin alll buttons when pressed and not pressed and displaying track name now playing and time.

How about those to get ya started - i'm sure you'll get a ton more suggestions!

Good luck!

[Guest Skunkchild]

Totally agree with Crafty's ideas.

Any chance of a plugin just like the spacer plugin but with the ability to display an animated gif on the homescreen ? nice and simple to get started with.

Or does this already exist ?

[Guest Foxman]

Here is a homescreen I did today. I should have a CAB built by Monday.

techiess.jpg

[Guest drblow]

OOH! So many plugins, so little time!! :lol:

Welcome indeed to the forum m8! Like Crafty says, new plugins are always good.

I second the message plugin idea!

[Guest Foxman]

- Improved Message plugin, must have the ability to not be visable with no new messages, also must show who the message is from and maybe display some of the body of the message.

So, by "must have the ability to not be visable with no new messages" you mean something like

[Guest demichve]

For customers of T-Mobile with Twinbill sim-cards: a plugin could be very useful, which displays the actual status of the sim (private or business). You can see the actual status, if you click on '1' and '#' . The first entry of the simcard is private or business.

[Guest Foxman]

For customers of T-Mobile with Twinbill sim-cards: a plugin could be very useful, which displays the actual status of the sim (private or business). You can see the actual status, if you click on '1' and '#' . The first entry of the simcard is private or business.

Is this a function available in the US, or just in Europe? If it is not in the US it is going to be kinda of hard to test something like this. I think i might go with the messages plugin as my first attempt. Something that is easily supported by the API.

[Guest drblow]

I think the more configurable the better in the case of the message plugin. Not showing when there's no messages wouldn't be a priority for me. More important would be just a bit of stuff if a message comes in, eg. the name of the sender, the first few lines of text in a preview? That kind of stuff. :lol:

Here's another idea which I have suggested to drfonz too, what about a calls counter plugin? Somethign that woudl display the total in minutes of outgoing calls made as per a certain day of the month, so you can track your call total for your monthly subscription, know what I mean? I'm not entirely certain if thats the kind of info that can be called up by a plugin, but it would be grrrrreat if it could! 8)

[Guest nickcornaglia]

A simple World Time plugin would be great.

Something that just displays a City name along with the time, can change city when scrolling right or left, and can go to a setup menu to select cities when clicking on it. Ideally it should be easy to format it, so that it can be easily included in any homescreen.

Minute updates rather than seconds are probably wise to conserve battery life.

This one exists already. It's included with the CityTime program by CodeCity.net

[Guest demichve]

Is this a function available in the US, or just in Europe? If it is not in the US it is going to be kinda of hard to test something like this. I think i might go with the messages plugin as my first attempt. Something that is easily supported by the API.

I think, this is only available in Europe. I already tried to develop it, but I am not so familiar with C++. The functions already exist. It seems to be easy to read the first entry of the SIM phonebook and display it with "SimReadPhonebookEntry". In the first entry there is "Private" or "Business" depending on the SIM-status.

/Michael

[Guest scott2eyes]

Here's another idea which I have suggested to drfonz too, what about a calls counter plugin?  Somethign that woudl display the total in minutes of outgoing calls made as per a certain day of the month, so you can track your call total for your monthly subscription, know what I mean?  I'm not entirely certain if thats the kind of info that can be called up by a plugin, but it would be grrrrreat if it could!  8)

Excellent idea.

8)

[Guest Lyle]

how about a plugin or shortcut to WRITE SMS MESSAGE?

[Guest Alien18]

Thats a really good idea actually, cos its always annoying when you want to send a text. Having to go to the inbox then new then SMS, etc.

[Guest scott2eyes]

A few more suggestions;

-A customisable version of the iconbar plugin- the same old iconbar is pretty much ubiquitous, and as a result it's starting to look a bit boring- but I still find it pretty much an indispensable use of those 20 pixels (I miss it evey time I make a homescreen without it!) Although there are some excellent alternatives for showing the battery and signal status, it would be helpful to have alternatives to the other icons.

-Something that will allow more than one plugin to occupy the same horizontal space (eg. have a clock alongside the message counter.) Could cause problems if both are selectable, I suppose...

-Further to the call counters idea, one thing I really like (even though I've yet to find any practical use for it!) in iMeter is the log it keeps of signal strength over time- looking at the graph it makes and figuring out when I was moving around/going underground etc. is kind of cool. Something like the BioRhythms plugin that showed that kind of info would be great! (I really like having graphs on the homescreen, even if they're fairly meaningless!)

-Anything else with graphs, meters and gagues!

-A countdown plugin where you set a date, and it tells you how many days there are left until it. Would be a nice touch for themed homescreens- eg. telling you how many days until an upcoming film is released. #cough#

:wink:

[Guest Cabana]

A clock in the upper bar would be nice - I know Xbar has this, but I bet a lot of people would like a standalone plugin for it.

[Guest nikjensie]

If you're still looking into the message plugin, there's a thread about a feature in the Orange ROM where you can have a pop-up when a new message has arrived, since it's in the Orange ROM, at least it's possible to make, but us non-Orangers would like it too...

Maybe be able to specify sender in the pop-up as well...?

Nik

[Guest nickcornaglia]

Instead of a new plugin how about a new homescreen shell that will allow plugins to be placed side by side.

Another way around this could be that all the functions of many plugins are included as ONE plugin so elements could be placed anywhere in that plugin.

[Guest lukeap69]

is that possible? that seems to be terrific.

[Guest nickcornaglia]

I always say...if you can imagine it....it can be done. Now I have no idea how to do it....but maybe someone else does. :lol:

[Guest lukeap69]

maybe. considering those genius guys creating wonderful plugins nowadays. hope this can be done and it will be another plus for SmartPhones that was envied by symbian users. i read from symbian's forum about it. of course, i myself have n6600 and se p900.

lukeap

69

[Guest sajosh]

Foxman, are you getting tired of all the suggestions, yet? well if not here's a new one ...

how about extending the Automatic profile to include more than just two states (normal and meeting). could you let it have indefinite (?) states so let's say the phone will automatically put itself into night profile at certain times or into loud mode (like when i'm traveling to and from work or at home where the phone is often far away).

the tinygps plugin comes close but it's positional and not temporal.

i second the motion on the other suggestions too ...

- message text

- multicolumn homescreen

- all in one plugin

[Guest Face]

I would like to repost my plugin request here.

I am after a plugin which shows the text "Screensaver:Off" on the screen when it is selected it puts the screensaver on, or off depending on the status.

Something in the same manner as the following alarm plugin

code

Alarm:

Alarm:

/code

I have now an alternative thanks to crafty which only toggles the screensaver but it cannot show the status of the screensaver.

[Guest nickcornaglia]

I made this suggestion in another thread:

http://smartphone.modaco.com/viewtopic.php?t=118627

I've reverted back to a simple homescreen featuring my little guy and had a thought. Wouldn't this be a cool idea for a plugin....

Using the screenshot below as an example...a time plugin where you could change the plugin's background image by clicking right or left with the joystick.

The plugin could look in a specific directory for the appropriately sized photos (ie. if your plugin is set for 150px high then all photos in the directory must be 176 x 150). The plugin would scroll thru all available JPGs in the directory alpa/numerically.

The time could be positioned via the XML in any postition within the plugin via x/y values. Maybe it could be an expanded carrier plugin where time, date and carrier are options to make it more useful to more people.

You wanna make it??? I'll use it!!!