Auto-lock the phone - Blackberry style

[Guest WillDroid]

Right, recently it's been bugging me that my fabulous Blade is lacking one key feature of the Blackberry Curve (and possibly all Blackberries for that matter). I noticed that in the official Blackberry case/holster things, there is a small magnet, and when the phone is inserted into the case the phone automatically locks itself and unlocks when the phone is removed. For my Blade, I use a Nexus One android pouch, and I was wondering if there is any way to replicate the functionality of the Blackberry using the phone's proximity or light sensors, or a combination of the two.

I think that this is a must-have, and I fail to see why it hasn't been done already for android.

Will

PS: I did search :huh: but nothing came up so I'm presuming it's not been mentioned before. I also google'd it but only found a dead end for the Motorola Droid.

Edited February 24, 2011 by WillDroid

[Guest thedandyp]

You know that you can just set the screen turn-off time to 15 seconds right?

When the screen goes off effectively the phone locks itself, and you have to go through the unlock screen to actually use the phone from this point onwards. Why do you need the screen to go off the instant the phone enters your pocket/pouch?

[Guest IronDoc]

Try out tasker? Probably doable, though I don't see the need.

Edited February 24, 2011 by IronDoc

[Guest WillDroid]

Thanks for the replies :huh: I did have it on the 15 second timeout, but I thought it might be cooler to do it like the Blackberries :)

Will

[Guest isambard]

Yes it can be done with a hardware hack. Just install a reed switch via the serial port connector at the back and then write some code to detect the change.

[Guest Drem]

You might be able to do something with the compass maybe?

[Guest The Soup Thief]

Try out tasker? Probably doable, though I don't see the need.

I agree - can get tasker to lock the phone when it's in a particular orientation (eg upside down, as you might have it in your pocket). Not too hard

[Guest The Soup Thief]

I agree - can get tasker to lock the phone when it's in a particular orientation (eg upside down, as you might have it in your pocket). Not too hard

Just had another idea

Doing this would be beyond my ken, but it is clearly doable

There are lots of metal detector apps available

Using whatever code they use to interpret the compass' / position sensors' output in such a way as to to detect metallic objects, it would be easy enough (once you'd worked out the variables this changes) to get Tasker to lock the phone if this was triggered

In this way you could keep a lump of metal or magnet or somesuch in your pocket and whenever your phone detected it it would lock

Whether you want to set tasked to unlock when it leaves the proximity of the magnet/lump of metal is up to you (and your battery, which would be drained by listening to the sensors constantly)

TBH, although this is an interesting thing to work around, it's actually much more trouble than it's worth

Until some bright spark writes an app to do do the whole thing (fairly doable I would have thought given the right skills, given how many metal detector apps people have written) I wouldn't bother as the inconvenience of waiting a whole 15 seconds for your phone to lock itself is minimal!

Sledgehammer to crack a nut!

EDIT - sorry - didn't see Drem suggested the compass already

Edited February 25, 2011 by The Soup Thief