To Sense 4 from Cyanogen 7 - minor annoyances

revrob330

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May 10, 2012
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First - Thanks to everyone at this forum, and the mole at InsideSprintNow - You all kept me sane, and laughing throughout this whole customs debacle!

So, I just got my EVO4gLTE last night, and am exploring everything I can do in Sense.

I upgraded from a dying HTC Hero, where I was running Cyanogen 7 (I can't remember the exact version, but something fairly recent.)

I am enjoying Sense, and I am trying to commit to using for at least a month before I start looking for another ROM. (It will also give all the good folks who put them together time to iron out various ROM bugs.)

I did root last night with the method from XDA folks sparkym3 and Dan Rosenburg, and posted by zedomax. (Thanks again, it worked like a charm.)

Sense 4 has a lot to love - the contacts, the widgets, the keyboard. . .

However, as much I am impressed by Sense 4, there are a few (admittedly minor) things that either I miss about CM, or just are annoying about Sense 4. Does anyone know work arounds/substitutes for these?

1.) Screen lock - in CM you could add a buffer between the screen shutting off and the system requiring an unlock. I think I had mine at 10-15 seconds. This was handy when reading and getting distracted, or playing a game, but needing to check in something in real life for a moment. Now it shuts off at a minute, and I have to re-unlock to get back into the phone. Any way to tweak this?

2.) Icons - With a screen resolution as high as this phone has, I really thought I'd be able to pack more icons, shortcuts and widgets into the homescreen. I was surprised to see that we are limited to 4x4! I can understand that HTC wants to show off the pretty wallpaper and so has those huge bumpers - but it really bugs my OCD. I'd love to be able to pack this into 5x5 (I think they should be able to fit). I feel like I am not taking the best advantage of all this lovely screen space.

3.) Controls on the pull-down - When I first went to CM, I didn't like these (for data, bluetooth, airplane, etc. . .) and stuck to homescreen widgets. After about a month, I started using these, and quickly ditched the widgets on my homescreen. Are there any programs that could add these to the pull-down? I am alternating between using the sense/stock power control widget, and Power Controls by Painless Death from the Play Store, but it isn't as satisfying.

4.) Notification Bar - I almost never use the GPS and so I keep this off 99% of the time. Is there any way to remove the ? symbol from the bar - I don't need to be reminded the compass is OFF - All I want to know is if I ever turn it ON.

5.) Messages - I used Chomp and Handscent before that for texting. I loved having a dark background behind the text bubbles. The stock messaging app is working just fine, for now. Is there a way to tweak the background?

6.) App specific permissions - For the most part I never touched this, but there are a few apps that wander into things they have no business touching, such as silly casual games that *have no adds* and don't have downloadable content, or highscores posted online that want to access the internet. I'd love to be able to shut this off.


As I said, these are all relatively minor things - I can certainly live without them. I do think that fixing these would make this just about perfect.

Or perfect until I have had the phone more than 24 hours, and have more time to dig around for other annoyances. ;)

I'm not looking for a new ROM (at least yet).
Do any of you know good ways to address any of these?
Do you have any other gripes along these lines?

Thanks!
 
I ran CM7 for several months and an alpha version of CM9 for several weeks prior to getting this phone. I have a lot of the same minor annoyances you do.

2.) Icons Can be addressed with a different launcher. Try Apex or Nova (I preferred Apex). I haven't tried it on this phone yet, so I don't know what you "lose" from Sense when you switch.

3.) Controls on the pull-down I loved that feature and is the one thing I really miss. I believe Widgetsoid will let you put toggles in the pull-down. I haven't had a chance to give that one a try yet either.

5.) Messages I couldn't find any UI tweaks in the setting for the stock messaging app. I think I'll be going back to Handcent very soon.

I've already replaced the stock keyboard with Swiftkey.

Other than those things, I'm pretty happy with it so far.
 
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nemo,

Thanks for the tip on LBE Privacy Guard - this looks like exactly what I need. Downloading now.

kbp08tls,

Widgetsoid looks great, I am checking this out also. I'll wait a bit on the alternate launchers until I see what I'd lose from Sense. I'll probably stick with the stock messaging for a little while at least.


Anyone else bugged by any of these? Any advice on #1 and #4?

Great help, I appreciate it.
 
stock messaging was nice but i went back to GoSMS... anyone know how I can bring my old texts from my OG Triple OG EVO?
 
Has anyone used go launcher? I saw that someone mentioned gosms and I've been partial to the options that go launcher has. I'm coming from my og evo running cm7, and really did not care for sense at all.

Sent from my antique evo 4g.
 
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I loved Go Launcher on CM7, but when I tried it on CM9, it looked too much like gingerbread for my taste. Apex or Nova are native to ICS so they fit better IMO.

Sent from my E4GLTE using Android Central Forums
 

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