[Q] Removing the TouchWiz Mini Apps Tray - Samsung Galaxy Tab Plus

Hi everyone. First of all, many thanks to Gary for Root. It was quick and painless.
Now that we have root, I was wondering if anyone knows what needs to be deleted in order to get rid of that pesky pop up menu you get by pressing on the Chevron/Arrow in the middle of the bar.
I have the Wizz Bar (what an unfortunate name) installed and it does the job so much better. If you're wondering what Wizz Bar is, it basically allows you to pick your own applications or commands and bind them to the little Chevron or Arrow in the middle of the Honeycomb Bar (also called the "Mini Apps Tray")
However the built in action that pops up the Task Manager/World Clock/Calculator etc also initiates. Is there some way to remove the TouchWiz Apps Tray?
Or does this require more tinkering than a simple apk deletion from system/apps

somebody9 said:
Or does this require more tinkering than a simple apk deletion from system/apps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's much more involved. That aspect of touchwiz is buried somewhere in the frameworks. The last time I checked (a month ago), several people on both the Galaxy Tab 10.1 and 8.9 forums were looking for the same thing, but I haven't seen any good solutions.
If you find something over in one of those forums, try to get information on HOW they did it, and I'll try to reproduce it with ours.

I know with HTC phones modding such things requires the knowledge of decompiling, compling and signing apk's using apkTool or apkManager and editing smalis in notepad ++. You would have to track down which particular file contains the code and then know how to edit it to hide the taskbar. As an example just the simple task of hiding the clock in the notification bar of my HTC Incredible phone required the addition of 2 lines of code in the clock.smali file inside SystemUI.apk and the only way to get it to work was to push the file back to the phone and set permissions with adb. You couldn't just copy and paste it back in.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I actually did go look at a bunch of 10.1 and 8.9 ROMs and it looks like there may be a solution out there. I've contacted one of the ROM developers for an answer.

If someone tells you what file to edit and what lines of code to use please post it as it will be useful to the community.

You may install honeybar form market to hide/unhide the bottom bar(notification and clock as well)
Sent from my GT-P7500 using xda premium

i just tried honeybar and it doesn't work for me. I also have go launcher ex installed so not sure if it's conflicting. I see the white box for honeybar, but pressing on it multiple times does nothing (it even goes away eventually as described in the install notes).

Honeybar isn't the solution that most of us are looking for. I myself love the Honeycomb default bar. It's the Mini-Apps Tray that is entirely useless. The least that Samsung could have done was to make the shortcuts changeable by the user.
The whole point of quick access to shortcuts is to have a quick access to the applications you use the most without flipping through homescreens or going to the Apps Tray. Thanks Samsung, I really need the World Time and Calculator more than I need the Browser and Settings Panel.

somebody9 said:
Hi everyone. First of all, many thanks to Gary for Root. It was quick and painless.
Now that we have root, I was wondering if anyone knows what needs to be deleted in order to get rid of that pesky pop up menu you get by pressing on the Chevron/Arrow in the middle of the bar.
I have the Wizz Bar (what an unfortunate name) installed and it does the job so much better. If you're wondering what Wizz Bar is, it basically allows you to pick your own applications or commands and bind them to the little Chevron or Arrow in the middle of the Honeycomb Bar (also called the "Mini Apps Tray")
However the built in action that pops up the Task Manager/World Clock/Calculator etc also initiates. Is there some way to remove the TouchWiz Apps Tray?
Or does this require more tinkering than a simple apk deletion from system/apps
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've wondered whether there was a way to intercept the trigger that touching the chevron activates and just redirecting it to another command (such as what happens when you hit the "home" button after you've installed a home replacement). That way we wouldn't have to worry about hacking the touchwiz dock for customizing, we just replace it altogether so something else is invoked by touching the shortcut.

rEVOLVE said:
I've wondered whether there was a way to intercept the trigger that touching the chevron activates and just redirecting it to another command (such as what happens when you hit the "home" button after you've installed a home replacement). That way we wouldn't have to worry about hacking the touchwiz dock for customizing, we just replace it altogether so something else is invoked by touching the shortcut.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Re-mapping the function would be more involved than just turning it off but it is possible if you know what you're doing. For HTC phones there's a mod called rosie remap which does just about the same thing but its a complicated hack. It remaps a + button on the phone that ads apps to the homescreen, the mod allows you to reassign the button so it opens any app you want. I believe this is a framework-res.apk mod. Eventually someone who is familar with touchwiz will do these mods, if they haven't already for the 8.9 or 10.1, which should all be pretty much the same.
Edit: I think the chevron function would be in the touchwiz apk located in system/app but I don't know what Samsung calls it. HTC calls their Sense UI Rosie and you mod Rosie.apk to do the remapping of their UI specific buttons. If the chevron is part of honeycomb itself then it would be in the framework-res.apk file I bbelieve.

This is good info flowing in. I'm gonna see if I can figure out some more.

On a positive note - guess what Samsung changed? Exactly what I was *****ing about :
Mini Apps : Upgraded so you can choose and edit your own Mini Apps tray. You can easily access favorite features such as Calendar, Email, or PenMemo as a pop up over full screen applications.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

somebody9 said:
On a positive note - guess what Samsung changed? Exactly what I was *****ing about :
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Was there an update that I don't know about that allows this??? I really like the idea of the mini app tray, but like was said before, not having the ability to put your most used apps there makes it pretty useless.
Please explain how apps can now (or in the near future) be changed in the tray.
Thanks!!!

I guess until they release 7.7 we won't know. Unless there's an update out on KIES. But I really doubt it.

Confirmed:7.7 has fully customisable mini apps tray...i'm disappointed in Samsung for releasing 'premium' products in such close succession that are so different in functionality. Why did they not include this basic and important feature on all new of their new tablet products? I actually feel somewhat conned now
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

rEVOLVE said:
i just tried honeybar and it doesn't work for me. I also have go launcher ex installed so not sure if it's conflicting. I see the white box for honeybar, but pressing on it multiple times does nothing (it even goes away eventually as described in the install notes).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
doesn't go launcher ex look like **** on the tab+? i installed it yesterday and when i found out that i can't remove the dock, i uninstalled it.

diospada11 said:
doesn't go launcher ex look like **** on the tab+? i installed it yesterday and when i found out that i can't remove the dock, i uninstalled it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Pare, actually like it better because i don't like stock honeycomb desktop and app drawer. I set swipe up gesture to hide/unide the dock and also changed the stock dock icons.
Once we're able to customize the Touchwiz shortcuts, or hijack the launch command so we can tell it to launch something else, I'll be much happier.

For those who've not seen this function in action yet, check it out in this video at 2.05: http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=tBpzweqvKJA
Surely Samsung can put this function in tab plus on an update ... and they need to. The app tray is almost functionless otherwise. The presence of this thread is sufficient evidence that there is a high demand and several unsatisfied customers. Many customers have spent over £400 on this tablet. Why did they put it onto the 7.7 which was going on sale only a few days/weeks after the tab plus?
Sent from my GT-P6210 using xda premium

Just for my two cents, I would also like to see the app tray made editable. I've only had my unit for a couple of days, and I already feel its wasted on me for what it holds. Hoping for that to change in a coming update.

somebody9 said:
On a positive note - guess what Samsung changed? Exactly what I was *****ing about :
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Where is this "mini apps?" Did I miss something?

Related

[REQ] a non-rooted themer

After seeing the Gloss Suite I have to make a plea for the non-rooted (don't hate, just don't want to risk it till I know for DURN sure how the warranty issue shakes out or the bootloader can be relocked) for a SIMPLE Themer... don't take away the Nexus UI style, leave the number of screens alone, don't add extra docks or task bars...
... just a way to change the icons/clock/wallpaper (ok maybe multiple wallpapers). Don't add in another layer of complexity. There are PLENTY of Home Replacements out there that make it look like a Hero, iPhone or whatever, and add extra crash-able things.
Icons/Clock/Wallpaper(s)... and maybe the Weather/News widget.
It isn't really feasible without using a home replacement that has its own version of each app that you want to theme, so that the themer can theme the home replacements version of it.
Well then, just a simple HOME that leaves the Nexus UI intact and does the iconography
ilanad said:
Well then, just a simple HOME that leaves the Nexus UI intact and does the iconography
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you talking about Icons within the tray? Or icons on the screen? If on the screen, you could just use bettercut.
david1171 said:
It isn't really feasible without using a home replacement that has its own version of each app that you want to theme, so that the themer can theme the home replacements version of it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wait. No. (thats' what I get for being asleep when reading these).. no you mean things like OpenHome, Home++, PandaHome are carrying a full compliment of apps? Or just stubs.. cause on my G1's, when Google Maps got updated, the Icon's in their themes got updated..
No, I'm just looking for a dirt, dumb simple Home replacement then, that LEAVES the Nexus UI alone (the HOUSE, the scrolling of the apps there, etc.. ) just let me make an Icon/Wallpaper set and don't add tons of extra things..
and AnyCut/BetterCut, maybe.. but then would have to do it on every icon, every time...
Now that the 2.1 source is out you could alter the launcher2 source to reroute the resource calls. You have to refactor the namespace as well though as a non-rooted phone wouldn't allow you to install a second com.android.launcher2. Though like openhome/dxtop/ahome that would only alter app icons in the launcher, app icons elsewhere (long press home/settings/etc) would still have their "real" icons
Not hard, but not really fun either.
This is, at best, ridiculously difficult and, at worst, impossible.
It's not worth the effort because rooting is dirt simple, so if you want it done, you'll probably have to do it yourself.
Buy BetterCut and replace shortcuts on the homescreen - they'll still be the original in the launcher, but it's the closest you will get without root.
Casao said:
This is, at best, ridiculously difficult and, at worst, impossible...... but it's the closest you will get without root.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then how do OpenHome, aHome, Home++, Freshface, et.al. do it ... without root.
ilanad said:
Then how do OpenHome, aHome, Home++, Freshface, et.al. do it ... without root.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They completely replace home, and I'm not aware of any of them changing the actual icons for the .apk files. They might be creating custom shortcuts, which is possible, and if you reprogram the launcher you can do whatever you want. That's not a skin though, that's a completely redone launcher.

[Q] Hope this isn't a repeat Q, but is there an app to hide certain apps?

hey all~
so i rarely have posted here so first an intro. as my user name suggests, my name is jason and i run ubuntu on all my pc's and laptop!
i'm a new android fone owner! i have a nice samsung captivate galaxy s!
i'm really into security stuff, mainly internet security. i have some it security/testing apps on my phone but would really like to have them be 'hidden'. [i have an app locker ... which prevents others from launching them but i want more lol]
i've looked thru the forums and found similar questions [like in the g1 forum, but they were looking for something to just hide what shows up in the app drawer] but nothing that is quite what i'm looking for ....
i do NOT have a rooted fone [i want to make sure i could replace the fone if i briked it before i root it ] and i do not have programs to do stuff via a command line [so moving apps to a 'hidden' folder isn't really an option] ...
so how about it? are there applications out there that can hide applications on your fone?
thanks
~j
p.s.
i hope to post more and maybe one day write an app or two of my own !
Both ADW and LauncherPro home screens have the options to "hide" apps that are listed in the app drawer.
As for an app that will do what you want, I don't know of any :/
Golauncher will do the same and its a pretty damn good launcher and I believe lock my apps has a hide feature
hey guys~
first off, thanks for the quick answers! i appreciate it [and like i said look forward to being able to help others on this site!]
being a noobie with android, if i install any of the programs mentioned [adw, launcher pro or goLauncher] will it mean i loose my current home screen?
i know adw and launcher pro are homescreen alternitives correct? do i need to uninstall touch wise then? [the overlay samsung uses]
i'll look the mentioned programs up in the market to learn more about them ... thanks
~j
Installing other launchers
You need not uninstall any other launchers. After installation make sure you select Launcher Pro or ADW as default launcher. In any case if you need to go back to touch wiz you can still do.
I was looking for an app like this to avoid the prying eyes of authorities at the airport or other searching my device for no good reason. Is there an app that might be a little more secure in doing this?
The ideal app would make it seem like not much if any interest is installed on the device. I could lock the device but am worried i will be ordered to unlock it.
Sent from my LogicPD Zoom2 using XDA App
hey all~
thanks for the input ... i guess i'm going to install them all one at a time to test em an see which one i like the best!
i'll let ya know if they meet the needs [what im looking for ]
~j
hey all~
so my update ... i tried all three apps mentioned and fell in love with launcher pro [will be upgrading to plus very soon]!
i love everything about it! it hides the apps [which i also filtered in to a shortcut program that is secured by applock ... so i have easy access to them if need be ... or i can use my terminal emulator to navigate the long way to them!]
thanks
~j

[Q] Cleaning up the bloatware - Kidzone?

I tried searching the forums and found nothing...
Like a lot of others, i dont like most of the applications that come bundled on my phone and like to get rid of most of them. I cant seem to figure out what .apk file to remove to get rid of the "Kidzone" application. Any ideas?
If any root-level file explorer works, download Absolute System from the Market. It's about two bucks but it's worth it. You can use it to remove any bloatware from your device.
blackknightavalon said:
If any root-level file explorer works, download Absolute System from the Market. It's about two bucks but it's worth it. You can use it to remove any bloatware from your device.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not in this case. We do not have S-OFF.
Freezing the apps with titanium backup lasts between reboots, luckily. Won't remove them completely but they will be prevented from running or showing in the app drawer.
Only problem is I'm having trouble finding the package names of a couple bloatware apps, namely kidzone, highlight, friend stream and t-mobile mall. If anyone could find the names of those packages it would be great. I'll look up the names of the apps I did find in a little while and post them for you.
vimk said:
Freezing the apps with titanium backup lasts between reboots, luckily. Won't remove them completely but they will be prevented from running or showing in the app drawer.
Only problem is I'm having trouble finding the package names of a couple bloatware apps, namely kidzone, highlight, friend stream and t-mobile mall. If anyone could find the names of those packages it would be great. I'll look up the names of the apps I did find in a little while and post them for you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Download Absolute System from the Market.
Sent from a Western Union telegram.
vimk said:
Freezing the apps with titanium backup lasts between reboots, luckily. Won't remove them completely but they will be prevented from running or showing in the app drawer.
Only problem is I'm having trouble finding the package names of a couple bloatware apps, namely kidzone, highlight, friend stream and t-mobile mall. If anyone could find the names of those packages it would be great. I'll look up the names of the apps I did find in a little while and post them for you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I cant figure out what process is Kidzone either, but i think the T-Mobile mall was called "AppPack" (MallLite-4.0.92.apk)
Gumpo10k said:
I cant figure out what process is Kidzone either, but i think the T-Mobile mall was called "AppPack" (MallLite-4.0.92.apk)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
also tried removing the app pack, and it does not remove "kidzone"
Kidzone appears to basically be a locked down version of the home screen that only lets you turn on Youtube, Internet, Bejeweled, and T-Mobile TV from that screen. It requires you to setup a password for the lock screen. It appears to be built into sense. It's not really an application. Mostly a replacement lock screen. There's nothing "kid" about it honestly.
Akujin said:
Kidzone appears to basically be a locked down version of the home screen that only lets you turn on Youtube, Internet, Bejeweled, and T-Mobile TV from that screen. It requires you to setup a password for the lock screen. It appears to be built into sense. It's not really an application. Mostly a replacement lock screen. There's nothing "kid" about it honestly.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is there a way to remove the shortcut from the app drawer?
electro_chef said:
Is there a way to remove the shortcut from the app drawer?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I second that request!
I made a thread in "themes and apps" about cleaning up bloat - still no luck on kidzone though.
I am fiddling around with dumping sense now, that will probably do it. I'll post back here if I can figure out how to make kidzone go away.
Meantime - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=16739548#post16739548
okay - sorry to post after myself but I got rid of kidzone.
First, I restored a CWM backup I made right after root/busybox installation.
So, my phone state is fresh S-OFF/Root with SU & busybox installed.
It may be important to note that I did a factory reset to my phone just before S-OFF/Root & had a freshly formatted MicroSD card.
I then installed ADW Launcher from the Market, and hit my "home" key. Selected "Use Default" and chose ADW Launcher.
Now my phone defaults to ADW as it's launcher.
I then installed "Absolute System" from the Market, and used it to remove "HTC Sense"
Closed out Absolute System, then scrolled between all 5 ADW desktop screens, powered down the phone, then powered up again. (*NOTE fastboot = off)
Booted fine, was able to ditch sense without issue, and KIDZONE IS GONE!
As always, make sure to do a fresh system backup before messing with anything like this, but Kidzone is linked to sense, and replacing sense with another launcher will remove it.
HTC Sense was the only app removed from the phone, and I haven't checked everything to make sure it works yet, but no HTC crash report to send, and no force close issues. (yet - to be determined)
I've been itching to ditch sense since I got the phone, and this was my first quick test at it. Works good so far.
Edit to add:
Checked the "personalize" option at the top of the "settings" list. This just brings you back to the main desktop, doesn't throw an error.
I knew this one thing would be messed up somehow after ditching sense, but the fact that it doesn't make a problem and just closes the menu is fine by me.
I'll spend the rest of the day testing out my phone without sense to see how it runs. I'll post back how it went tomorrow.
Edit - 11/01/2011:
When I said "without sense" I meant without the sense launcher. I expanded on and clarified that in another thread (that app thread) but never cleared it up here.
To fully remove sense is one heck of a project, and will take much more then just switching your launcher.
This is great info - but with this last method - can you still use the stock/factory camera app? Is the camera fully functional, it might not be a big deal to some but would be cool to retain full factory camera functionality.
Wow, feels like going back in time -
Yep, stock camera app works fine.
It's tied to sense, and there is no true AOSP ROM out there yet, so pretty much no matter what you do you should keep stock camera functionality.
Actually, keeping the stock camera functionality/app is the main reason why there is no AOSP ROM yet, it's been generally decided that losing that would be...undesirable.
Kidzone is part of Rosie.apk, which is the Sense launcher. You lose it once you switch to another launcher (adw, go, etc...) and uninstall rosie.apk
Blue6IX said:
Wow, feels like going back in time -
Yep, stock camera app works fine.
It's tied to sense, and there is no true AOSP ROM out there yet, so pretty much no matter what you do you should keep stock camera functionality.
Actually, keeping the stock camera functionality/app is the main reason why there is no AOSP ROM yet, it's been generally decided that losing that would be...undesirable.
Kidzone is part of Rosie.apk, which is the Sense launcher. You lose it once you switch to another launcher (adw, go, etc...) and uninstall rosie.apk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly.. + 1 for blue.
Sent from my Senseless Doubleshot using xda premium

App theming idea( icons )

Ok, so I've been really getting into theming my Transformer Prime, and like most people I think, get frustrated when I have to redo things after flashing a new ROM. I find using Nova Launcher to be pretty spot on with backup then restoring settings which, most times, will get all your widgets working correctly with little configuration needed from there.
So the only thing I'm really left with is a good way to change, backup and restore app icons. Nova launcher is good at restoring the icons for the home screen, however I'd like something that would change the default app icon for installed apps.
I found this thread on StackOverflow that states that you can change the app icon by just replacing the image for it -without- unzipping the apk. This is great in theory, however when you update the app to a new version you'll loose that customization obviously.
I'm looking for an app, that when run, will present a list of all installed apps, let you choose it, then pick a custom icon. The app would then change the apps -default- icon, meaning that change would propogate everywhere in Android, so you wont have to mess with setting different icons for your launcher, and launcher X widgets, and drawer would also get changed.
When you update your apps and run the app icon themeing tool then it would, again, present you with a list of installed apps and you could just choose the newly updated apps and change the icon again( or better yet the app would do that for you! ).
Anyways, I have no idea if this is possible. I'm not sure if the icon in the apk for an app are all standard named, if it is, this seems possible. If it's not, then if it's in the apks manifest file then you could extract the name of the icon, and copy the new one in it's place under the same name.
If either the icon names are always the same( doubt it ) or if it's in the manifest file this seems pretty doable to me.
What do you all think? Have you seen anything like this app out there? What do you do to change / restore app icons( system wide preferably, not just in a particular launcher ).
Vote above and if it gets enough traction maybe we can convince a dev to look into it. Obviously you'd have to be rooted, but I think most everyone would be ok with that
EDIT: I did find this thread, with a windows tool to do kinda what I'm talking about. If it had / has backup, restore for when you update apps then it would be perfect. Would prefer an on device app, but I'll take what I can get.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=890876
Really, no input here? Am I the only one wishing we had this?
Sent from my Transformer Prime TF201 using Tapatalk 2
RubenRybnik said:
Really, no input here? Am I the only one wishing we had this?
Sent from my Transformer Prime TF201 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
your not alone, I've been looking for exactly that for a long long time. please pm me if you do find it.

[Q] I need a better clipboard functionality

One of the things that I loved about my ASUS Padfone 2 was the near stock UI.
The things that got changed by ASUS were mostly very useful, like the clipboard.
If I long pressed a textbox on my Padfone 2, the usual "paste" icon showed up accompanied by a second icon "clipboard".
When I clicked that icon, a panel slid up from where the keyboard normally is, which had the last copied elements as a small preview, with an additional button to edit the contents. In edit mode, I could delete elements or mark them as permanent (I guess the system would overwrite them when the cashe would be full at some point otherwise).
I miss that useful function on my Nexus 5.
Does anyone know a mod or custom ROM that does that?
I have looked into this on the play store, but the apps there require to run in the background or to switch to a third app to access the copied content.
You will have to look at the ROM feature list, but this is the first time that I have heard of this feature. If my memory is correct there aren't any ROMs with the feature but don't quote me. Third party app is your best alternative. This phone has 2GB of RAM it'll be ok in the background.
edit: You could also check xposed or make a request in the xposed thread.
I use clipper which is still a 3rd app but it works well for me. I use switchr to swipe in from the screen edge to access it.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
Thanks for the replies.
I am not worried about the RAM running full, but I don't like to have any more notification icons than necessary.
Looks like I'll have to compromise clean look for functionality.
I wish google implemented the way ASUS did it into AOSP. It was really perfect.
Maybe Cyanogenmod will do this.
Thanks again for your comments.

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