aHome: Extreme Phone Customization

Christopher Earle — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 22:11:33 +0000

One of the most fun things to do with your T-Mobile G1 with Google is to customize the overall appearance and functionality of the home screen. aHome is currently the most popular home replacement in the Android Market.

If customization is your passion, aHome is your home replacement. It even includes a Cupcake like soft keyboard.

aHome: Extreme Customization

There are a number of home replacements for the G1 available in the Android Market. Of all them, aHome has been rated the highest and downloaded the most. aHome is a highly customizable home replacement that supports an incredible number of features. There are an incredible number of free themes that can be downloaded and stored on the SD card. There are also a good number of paid themes available. Paid themes are stored in the phone’s memory.

Widgets
aHome comes with a couple of additional widgets. The first is a customizable weather widget that shows forecasted highs and lows and wind speed for a particular location. The other widget is a horizontal digital clock, which can be used in place of the default analog clock. aHome supports third party widgets. A number are available in the Android Market, including several fun battery monitors.

Extreme Customization
Customizing aHome is particularly easy via the aHome console. The console connects to aHome servers and the Android Market to make downloading customizations quick and easy. The console offers access to free themes, font packs, and widgets.

On the off-chance that you don’t want your wallpaper to scroll, aHome allows you to turn off that feature. It also supports auto-rotation of the home screen. Simply tilt your phone and the wallpaper rotates. A really handy feature of aHome is Auto Clear Item. It clears the icons from deleted apps from the home screens, saving you a step when you remove an app.

Custom Screen Names
aHome supports up to 10 screens and allows for modification of the screen indicator. By default, the screen number is indicated by the number of dots between the screen and the dock bar. Screens can be given custom names, or can be labled with Arabic (1, 2, 3, etc) or Roman numerals. An interesting feature is its support of Chinese numerals and Chinese celestial stems. It also supports naming of screens with sequential upper or lower case numbers. Any of the screens can be set as the main home screen.

Soft Keyboard

Drawers
Another interesting feature is the app drawer to the left of the screen and the widget drawer to the right. The app drawer works like the app drawer in the native home screen app. It contains all of your applications listed alphabetically. The widget drawer contains all available widgets. It is also sorted alphabetically. The contents of the widget drawer can be replaced with icons for the most recently used applications. The widget drawer can also be disabled.

Dock Bar
The most unusual and unique feature of aHome is the dock bar. The dock bar keeps track of your most recently used apps and displays them across the bottom of all screens. A combination of the doc bar and the ability to customize the widget drawer to show recently used apps make getting to your most frequently used apps a breeze.

Conclusion
For people who like extreme customization, aHome is a great home replacement. All of this functionality does come at a price, though. aHome and its associated themes, fonts, and widgets are big. The developers seem to be aware of this and are allowing more and more custom features to be stored on the phone’s SD card.

aHome for Android
Version: 1.6.0
Developed By: mAPPn
Price: $4.99
Filesize: 513KB

Customize Your Android Home Screen With Widgets and Themes. aHome, dxTop, and Open Home.

Taylor Wimberly — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 02:53:59 +0000

Why did three new Android applications shoot to the top of the Market this week? They all included one key element: customization. Ask any user what excites them most about Android and they will tell you its the freedom allowed by the open platform. All three of these app are desktop replacements which allow you to change the default Android home screen. Included with these apps are sorely missed features such as widgets, themes, and expanded desktop space.

With three new applications all fighting for the same spot, the competition has already heated up. Which one deserves to be installed on your phone? What features set them apart? Do you even need to install a desktop replacement? Read along as we break down all the details.

Price Point

dxTop Home Screen

aHome: $2.99 (for a limited time – normally $4.99)
dxTop: $3.99
Open Home : TBA (expect paid version soon)

dxTop came to market first with the $3.99 price point. They were soon undercut by aHome at $2.99. Recently Open Home Lite has launched as free. It is no surprise that Open Home has the most downloads with 5,000-10,000. aHome and dxTop are currently tied with 1,000-5,000 downloads. I expect the full version of Open Home will eventually be $2.99 like the other Better Android app Better Cut.

Winner: Tie. All 3 apps offer free demo or lite versions so this is a wash. aHome is going up in price and we don’t know for sure what Open Home will cost.

Widget Support

aHome: 2 included. 3 paid widgets on market.
dxTop: 1 free, 6 paid widgets on market.
Open Home: Coming soon.

dxTop holds the lead with 7 total widgets so far. I grabbed the memory monitor from the Market since it was free, but I’m not sure how useful it is. My favorite widget of all is the weather widget included with aHome. I will note that in aHome, it is much easier to add widgets. In dxTop you have to search for a widget before it can be added(hope they fix that).

Winner: Tie. Same developers are releasing their widgets for multiple apps. Open Home has yet to implement any new widgets, but I would expect to see similar items. Nothing stands out at this point.

Themes and Skins

Glossy Theme for Open Home

aHome: 1 free on market. iPhone theme.
dxTop: None.
Open Home: 6 free on market. Many more ports coming from XDA forums.

Winner: Open Home. Since Open Home is porting skins from XDA, he has an endless supply. It will be interesting to see if the other two follow his lead. I expect we will soon see a marketplace for paid themes popping up soon.

Extra Features

aHome: Dock bar. Multilple UI settings. Up to 10 desktops.
dxTop: 4 desktop areas. Enhanced navigation
Open Home: 7 desktop ares.

All the apps provided extra space on the desktop which is nice. dxTop also allows you to use all your existing bookmarks which is a huge plus. I love the 1-swipe navigation of dxTop as well. aHome offers a dock bar similar to iPhone which can be turned on and off.

Winner: dxTop. With the improved navigation, any app is only a swipe away. Developer is soon adding the ability to organize apps into folders in the tray.

Updates and Support

aHome With Widgets and Dock

aHome: Online forums, but no change log. Frequent Updates.
dxTop: Full website with change log. Frequent Updates.
Open Home: Blog with updates, but no change log. Frequent Updates.

Since all of these apps are in the early stage of development, they have been releasing new updates each day with bug fixes and added features. I really like that dxTop includes an easy to find change log on the front page of their site. With all the updates going on, it is nice to be able to see what is new or has been fixed.

Winner: dxTop. Thank you for posting your change history. I wish every developer would do this.

Summary

Each one of these desktop replacment applications ads new features not currently available on Android. Customers will find different things they like with each one. I consider myself a power user and I really like the navigation of dxTop. All three of these apps are installed on my phone, but I have dxTop set as the default. It performs the quickest and I have had the fewest problems with it. I encourage you to download and use the free versions of each one of these applications and send your feedback to the developer.

If you have had a chance to play around with any of these, which is your favorite desktop replacement? What other widgets or features would you like to see added? Do you think the price point is right for a desktop replacement?

Android and Me » g1 ahome