Plug-In Requests

[Pony99CA]

I thought I'd start a thread for people to suggest cool Home screen plug-ins they'd like to see. I'll start it off with three:

• A freeware program launcher plug-in. It's similar to the MRU plug-in, but the user controls what's in the bar. (I know that Facade can do this, but it's not freeware.) UPDATE: It may exist. Check out RJ Shortcut in the list below.
• Speed dial plug-in. Display a configurable number of speed dials showing the speed dial number and either the name and number or program associated with that speed dial. (Photo Dialer can do something similar, but it's not quite the same.)
• Windows Media control plug-in. Allow displaying the currently playing item and pause/play, stop, previous track and next track controls. UPDATE: It may exist. Check out MP Home in the list below.

If any of those exist, post the link here and I'll edit the post. Others can do the same.

Here are some non-standard plug-ins that I know of for your Home screens:

1. CityTime -- Displays times in other time zones
2. Fizz Monitor -- Displays battery & memory information
3. Fizz Traveller -- Displays various travel-related information
4. Fizz Weather -- Displays weather information
5. Frieger SmartBatt -- Display battery status
6. MadBeetle Animation -- Displays an animation
7. MadBeetle Clock -- Displays an analog clock
8. MobileRob's Alarm Info -- Displays alarm information (free)
9. MP Home -- Displays a Windows Media Player controller (I think)
10. Oxios Tasks -- Displays your Tasks (free)
11. pocketMax phoneAlarm -- Displays toolbar including missed messages and other information
12. RJ Shortcut -- Displays a program launcher bar
13. RJ Tasks -- Displays a count of tasks due
14. RJ Time -- Displays date and time in different time zones (and an analog clock)
15. RSS Home -- Displays RSS feeds
16. SmartMonitor -- Displays battery and memory status
17. SBSH Facade -- Displays tabbed Calendar, Tasks & Launcher
18. Sci-Fi Soft plug-in -- Allows interesting layouts
19. V2R PhotoDialer -- Displays photos of people on the Home screen so you can dial them
20. Verizon Wireless Sync Notifier -- Displays a bar with E-mail, SMS, picture messages, voicemails and missed calls (free -- just install Wireless Sync)

Maybe we'll make this into a useful sticky thread.

Steve

[ppcinfo]

Great ideas! For the quick launcher, is there no freeware available? That shouldn't be too difficult to create.

The media player plugin that you mentioned might be tough to do, since the plugin will need to send the correct messages to the running Media Player appilication.

ppcinfo

[Pony99CA]

Originally Posted by ppcinfo

Great ideas! For the quick launcher, is there no freeware available? That shouldn't be too difficult to create.

The media player plugin that you mentioned might be tough to do, since the plugin will need to send the correct messages to the running Media Player appilication.

Actually, I might have found plug-ins for both the launcher and the Media Player. I've updated my first post with a list of plug-ins that I know of, so check out RJ Shortcut and MP Home.

Steve

[smeg36]

The plugin I want is really just some tweaking of the homescreen I already have. I've been reading about the Orange .dll for hours now trying to figure out exactly how to put two plugins on one row, and am more confused now than ever. I already have the .dll and registered it, I just need some help figuring out a couple things.

1) I want to place the Bluetooth plugin on the same line as the Profile plugin to free up some space. They both take up less than half the width of the screen, and could easily be placed on the same line.

2) I really liked the website links on the homescreen that the VZW Q had. I tried copying that plugin from my old VZW homescreen to my Sprint Q, but it doesn't work. I want to put a couple custom web links on the homescreen.

[ppcinfo]

From what I've learned over the last few days, each plugin is placed on a single line (or row). That's how the Homescreen layout is designed by Microsoft. That way, you scroll up and down to access each different plugin.

Now, my Moto-Q Verizon phone came with what appears to be a special plugin that allows you to define two "shortcut" icons on the same row where you can define an application name and arguement list for each plugin. I customized these two shortcuts to bring up Internet Explorer with two different web pages. Since this is a single plugin, the two shortcut items could be placed next to each other on the same line.

So, I don't think you can put two distinctly different plugins on the same line on the Homescreen. You would need a special plugin that was able to communicate to other multiple plugins to get that to work, and that would be quite a tasks from what I've discovered!

Having said that, it shouldn't be too difficult to write a plugin that had the profile and bluetooth items on a single line (similar to the special VZW plugin that I mentioned previously). I'll see what I can do about putting it together as my "first" plugin project.

The most difficult part of plugin programming, appears to be parsing out the XML code that handles the formatting, positioning, etc. that the plugin must process. Luckily, there's lots of good resources on the net for answers.

ppcinfo

[smeg36]

That's precisely the point of the 4orangeh.dll. It allows you to place multiple plugins on the same row. I've been at it for hours now and still can't manage to get multiple plugins on the same row though. Basically the only thing I can try is reading through other people's XML that have it working, and trying to make sense of it. It's not very easy or successful though. Anyone who knows how to use it care to enlighten me a little on how to place those two plugins on the same line?

Also, I tried to do some tweaking of my MRU plugin. I don't like that it only displays 10 icons, then leaves a blank space that another 2-3 icons could fit into. I tried editing it to allow more than 10, but only 10 showed up. I wonder if that's the max for the MRU plugin or something.

[Vettedrive]

[quote=smeg36;17571]That's precisely the point of the 4orangeh.dll. It allows you to place multiple plugins on the same row. I've been at it for hours now and still can't manage to get multiple plugins on the same row though.

Here's my xml that uses Orange and Facade... it's fairly well documented, so it may help.....

[smeg36]

Thanks, that is a helpful XML. Very well documented compared to the others I've checked out. Unfortunately I still can't get it working. At least I know the 4orangeh.dll is working. Now for the other part of my plugin desire, does anyone know of a way to link a couple websites from the homepage on the Sprint Q? The VZW plugin doesn't work on the Sprint Q.

[Pony99CA]

Originally Posted by smeg36

2) I really liked the website links on the homescreen that the VZW Q had. I tried copying that plugin from my old VZW homescreen to my Sprint Q, but it doesn't work. I want to put a couple custom web links on the homescreen.

Did you try the RJ Shortcut plug-in I linked to above?

Steve

[qwho]

The problem with RJ shortcut is that there are a number of problems.

1. It has a maximum width that limits it to only being as wide as non-widescreen smartphones.

2. It only supports 16x16 and 32x32 pixel icons, which is pretty small on the Q's screen.

3. The selection box around each icon is messed up unless you use icons from a DLL archive. Unless you can package custom icons in a DLL you get ugly results.

4. It is impossible to know just where each icon is kept on the Q, in which DLL etc. -as far as I know. Maybe someone can help with this.

5. The developer is MIA, if we could get a hold of the source code for it maybe we could make the necessary changes to make it what it is potentially.