Why most people put clock widget on home screen?

[dylane]

Again, the beauty of android is you can do just about anything you want to do. You want widgets resized, use a different launcher; the play store is full of them free/paid.

But that's just it. I can and have tried a number of different launchers that let me resize widgets. I'm currently using Holo HD which lets me resize and also allows a 10X10 grid on the homescreen. All of that is great, but all that resizing lets me do is crop the widget, but the fonts stay at their fixed size, so the widget becomes pretty useless at smaller sizes.

According to the post I linked to, Android doesn't include any native way to scale widget content depending on the size of the widget, which is why you get all these widgets that have multiple sizes (1x1, 1x2, 2x2, etc...) instead of just having one widget that would dynamically rescale content (like what happens when you change the size of a window on your desktop). I'm not a developer, but this seems to be a limitation of Android that can't really be fixed just by a new launcher.

 

[Caloy]

The flashlight was just meant as a handy example. I did find another flashlight app in the f-droid repo that is icon size and works well.

My bigger issue is that Android doesn't seem to provide an easy way to natively scale widgets when they are resized, it just crops them instead. This leads to (IMO) abnormally large widgets, like the clock widgets that everyone seems to have.

Again your issue can be solved by a little patience and checking out the play store. I made my own widget that suited my needs using zooper widget pro.

-Sent using the force

 

[dylane]

Again your issue can be solved by a little patience and checking out the play store. I made my own widget that suited my needs using zooper widget pro.

-Sent using the force

Sorry, I realize I'm coming off as quite negative and I don't mean to. I checked out Zooper Widget Pro in the store, and the screen shots seem cool, not sure I know exactly what it does but I'll download and find out.

I'm still not sure though that I fully understand your suggestion. So far I've mostly played around with the widgets that came with the phone, and a few others that have come with other apps I've downloaded. Pretty much all of them seem to be bigger than I'd like. Is the suggestion to search through the market for each type of widget I want, until I find one that both does what I want, and also uses a small enough font to fit on the screen without being the only app on the screen?

This is an honest question, because I'm looking forward to putting this issue behind me so that I can start looking for the next thing that will drive me crazy and I can rant about on here.

 

[Caloy]

I'm just saying that if you're not happy with what you got, you have options. Whether or not you would like to spend time and effort to make your phone the way you want it is up to you.

I'll give an example. I would like my screen to be uncovered, no icons blocking my wallpaper, but I also would like to have apps that I use frequently on my main home screen. I also would like a time, weather and date widget where when I tap a specific widget it would take me to an app associated with that widget. For instance, when I tap my current location, it will open up the navigation app, when I tap my clock widget, it would open up the clock app where I can access count down timer, alarm, world time etc. When I hit my weather widget, it will bring me to my weather widget. There are six links that I've made myself that would take up the space of two icons. I saved space right there, I also incorporated a link (located in the front of the car) that would launch my cat dock app.

It took my half a day just to make my clock/weather/location app, moving things around, changing fonts, adding the necessary link for each info, and to make it look the way I want.

If you really want it, you'll spend time and effort to do it. Again the option is there, it's up to you to make what you want come true.

Here's my current home screen, found a few issues that required me to arrange the temperature info and behavior.

-Sent using the force

 

[dylane]

If you really want it, you'll spend time and effort to do it. Again the option is there, it's up to you to make what you want come true.

We might be talking past each other here a little bit, but I'm still not sure I understand. Is the option there to make any widget scale at the smaller sizes I use (and if so, how)? Or is it, there is the option to see if someone else has made widgets that fit my needs and happen to be small enough to fit on my screen (which seems unlikely in more than a handful of cases)? Or, is it that I always have the option of coding my own widgets that can work just for my use case (which is both beyond my abilities, and also probably not possible for widgets that are interfaces to proprietary apps)?

 

[Caloy]

All are available options. You can shop around for widgets at the play store if you want, you can design your own widget with apps available in the play store (in my case it's zooper widget pro), or if you're talented enough make your own widgets. All option require at least some time to get what you want. How to make your own widgets using another app depends on what you want. The best way to know is to get your feet wet, buy the app and play with it. It's a lot simpler than it sounds.

Edit: Sorry didn't fully understand your post (hooked on the news). I'm not sure if there's any app that can resize the app you are currently using. But there are other options if that route is not available.

-Sent using the force

 

[BigCiX]

I use it because I hide the status bar to have more screen.
Not to mention many of the weather apps include a clock.

I used to do that until I would never know if I had a message, email or miss call.

 

[pckarma112]

Caloy, I really love how you responded to his questions. Despite the comment about talking past each other...I do not believe you could have been more clear or more helpful with your suggestions. For myself at least. I found some very useful apps that you suggested. Thumb up!

 

[tube517]

Caloy, I really love how you responded to his questions. Despite the comment about talking past each other...I do not believe you could have been more clear or more helpful with your suggestions. For myself at least. I found some very useful apps that you suggested. Thumb up!

Caloy knows his stuff. All the way back to the EVO 4G. I wonder what his homescreen looks like now.