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No buttons?

Don't see much difference than what's at the bottom of the screen. So these are in the screen instead of under it?
 
Don't see much difference than what's at the bottom of the screen. So these are in the screen instead of under it?

They can fade away so you can practically use the full screen size, when playing back video for example. The don't completely disappear though so you can still access them.

I don't know if you can, but I wonder if an app can change them to other app-specific buttons?
 
They can fade away so you can practically use the full screen size, when playing back video for example. The don't completely disappear though so you can still access them.

I don't know if you can, but I wonder if an app can change them to other app-specific buttons?

I hope you are right about video playback and the buttons disappearing. In HoneyComb, the buttons never go away. I mean they do fade, but the area they are in is still not used by the video, it is just black.
 
I hope you are right about video playback and the buttons disappearing. In HoneyComb, the buttons never go away. I mean they do fade, but the area they are in is still not used by the video, it is just black.

That's what makes me wonder how much of the 4.65 inch screen is actually viewable screen.
 
That's what makes me wonder how much of the 4.65 inch screen is actually viewable screen.

Exactly what I am wondering too. If it has not been changed in Honey Comb I am not so sure I will be very happy with future phones losing some of the screen area to buttons. For now it should be ok as all phones have buttons and even on ICS nothing will change.
 
Exactly what I am wondering too. If it has not been changed in Honey Comb I am not so sure I will be very happy with future phones losing some of the screen area to buttons. For now it should be ok as all phones have buttons and even on ICS nothing will change.

I saw a side-by-side picture, and it looked the the viewable screen is the same size as a 4.3 viewable. Having a 4.65 in screen means nothing to me if only 4.3 of that is viewable.
 
I saw a side-by-side picture, and it looked the the viewable screen is the same size as a 4.3 viewable. Having a 4.65 in screen means nothing to me if only 4.3 of that is viewable.

My understanding (and it all speculation at this point) is the "buttons" can hide the same way your Windows task bar can be set to hide. So they would disappear completely until you tap that spot on the screen...
 
My understanding (and it all speculation at this point) is the "buttons" can hide the same way your Windows task bar can be set to hide. So they would disappear completely until you tap that spot on the screen...

They may hide or they may not. In Honey Comb they never do.
 
Shrug, I don't think the tablet OS is a good comparison, it has too much real state...

But from what I've read ICS is based off of Honeycomb in an attempt to eliminate fragmentation.
I guess we won't know until it's released, which is why I usually wait for user feedback before making a purchase.
 
Hey guys, watch this at 53 seconds:

Stuff site player

It is INDISPUTABLE that the buttons will hide when watching full screen video. Additionally, the SDK provides a way to hide the buttons when user input is not required. This isn't speculation - the buttons WILL HIDE during video and CAN HIDE in any area of an app that doesn't require user input.
 
Cool video! One thing I still haven't seen is the menu button. On Honeycomb it tends to appear and disappear based on whether it's needed or not. It will have to exist for nothing other than backwards compatibility.

Maybe everyone demos the ICS specific stuff which don't require it but it will appear for legacy apps.
 
I haven't seen a video demo of any app that wasn't a native, new ICS app.
 
Cool video! One thing I still haven't seen is the menu button. On Honeycomb it tends to appear and disappear based on whether it's needed or not. It will have to exist for nothing other than backwards compatibility.
If it's like HC, then as you say, the menu button will appear in context.

Any other time, a given app always seems to have it's own menu/settings button located somewhere in the UI, where you can get all the usual functions.

I will say, though, that it's not very consistent. Sometimes you're looking for the familiar software "menu" key, other times you're looking through the app UI to alter settings.

My question is, what happens if you install a different launcher? I haven't done this on HC, but those uniquely rely on the menu button. For that matter, what happens to apps which previously took advantage of the search button? I have quite a few binded to mine, currently, so I'll wait to see.
 
My concern is what happens if the phone freezes for some reason? or the screen is non responsive. I have a droid eris and recently i haven't been able to swipe down to see the notifications so i hit the menu perma button, what happens if part of the screen doesn't work any more? These buttons also happen to be on the edge of the screen where i seen some phones have problems with.
 
My concern is what happens if the phone freezes for some reason? or the screen is non responsive. I have a droid eris and recently i haven't been able to swipe down to see the notifications so i hit the menu perma button, what happens if part of the screen doesn't work any more? These buttons also happen to be on the edge of the screen where i seen some phones have problems with.

Just don't crack your screen... :p
 
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