am i the only one who cant figure this out?!?

[tortoracer]

Created a profile after countless aids from this very forum, so for that i must thank you all :hail:

but tech support couldnt help me (not surprised at all, but did try), and a few google searches made me believe im the only person who ever used a few of these features:

I remember before the update, i was able to be at my middle home screen, and press the home button again to bring up thumbnails of all my home screens, and jump to any home screen i wanted. likewise i could be on any home screen, swipe my finger up from the very bottom (worked with the soft keys at the bottom up to the real screen) to bring up the same thing. this allowed me to jump from my far left to my far right screen easily (or any screen to any other screen).

is there anything similar in ICS? surely they cant just ditch a feature that was so easily accessible, by a potentially accidental double tap of the home button.


second thing: when im texting with the screen keyboard, often its a quick and easy text. before the update i could type the first word, and the word prediction would almost always be able to guide me through the whole text (auto-correct off, but it showed me what it thinks is next, and what im typing as im typing). after the update, it stopped predicting the next word; i googled how i can fix this. the best i could come up with is in the language & input settings, the settings next to motorola input, auto correction set to aggressive (i think i found it works set to any of them). This now also turns auto correct on, which was not wanted in the first place (it also doesnt tell you the difference between modest, aggressive, and very aggressive...).

so how can i have it predict the next word without enabling auto-correct? i have had the auto-correct mess up a text within the 2 minutes i used it...changed ik to OK :icon_evil:


based from the first, is there a list of gestures that ICS accepts? i remember reading somewhere that its more gesture based, yet i dont know any.

 

[LocoRon]

As for the first: ADW Ex still has the "home screen previews" feature that you describe, so if it's really important to you, you can try out some launcher replacements (which I highly suggest anyway; as much as I want to like the default launcher, it has never been quite right for me, on any of my devices).

 

[Bilgediver]

I'm an adw launcher ex guy, but for a great free replacement, try go launcher ex or lately holo launcher is winning me over.

Sent from My Droid RAZR MAXX with Tapatalk.

 

[reybie]

I think GO Launcher has that same thing too, I just ditched it for the ICS default launcher.

 

[TisMyDroid]

I think most third party launchers have the option to view all home screens and also have features to set up how to access it (swipe, flick, pinch, long press, etc). There are some great launchers designed specifically for ICS.

My stock Swype keyboard does not have word prediction, which I just noticed because I never use it. But there are many keyboard apps that will probably do exactly what you want.

I am purely speculating here but I believe that when they designed ICS, they made stock as basic as possible. Why? I think because most people prefer to use a different app other than the stock app... bc what works best for me will not work best for you...so I choose an app that does what I want. Having all those extra features on stock apps that I never use just boggs down the phone...imho!

Sent from my DROID RAZR Maxx using Droid Forums

 

[tortoracer]

Thanks for the replies.

What are the benefits of using another launcher? I never really explored that as this is my first droid.

Same with sms apps, i love the stock one, almost everything about it...can i make them look and act like the stock one and have word prediction?

Off the original topic; how can i truly personalize my home screen? Like make it look completely unique and how i want it. Does it need to be rooted? If so, what are the real risks? I have the insurance plan, but will that be void if they figure out it was rooted if something happens?

 

[BoGenobo]

Thanks for the replies.

What are the benefits of using another launcher? I never really explored that as this is my first droid.

Same with sms apps, i love the stock one, almost everything about it...can i make them look and act like the stock one and have word prediction?

Off the original topic; how can i truly personalize my home screen? Like make it look completely unique and how i want it. Does it need to be rooted? If so, what are the real risks? I have the insurance plan, but will that be void if they figure out it was rooted if something happens?

You're thinking like an iphone owner. Rooting is for the "big boy" stuff, all the complicated ROMs and such. Deep customization comes with simple apps. Home replacement apps will do just the thing, with some time spent in the settings. If you have ICS, I recommend Apex Launcher. But there are many options to do just the thing you want.

 

[ambrown]

I like Go Launcher EX a lot, and find it more stable than the stock launcher. But then since it's an app it gets regular updates while the stock launcher does not. It is smoother than the stock launcher and more customizable.

Rooting isn't necessary, but it opens the door for more internal customizations than visual ones. Such as deleting bloatware. The difference is if you want to run a custom ROM that usually has unique customizations that the stock ROM does not.

I noticed that not all my HTC widgets work with Go Launcher though, so you may have to find replacement widgets.

Overall it's up to you and what you prefer. Sometimes the stock app is great. Sometimes you want more and a third party app will be better than any stock app. Try out new things and see what works best for you.

From my Eris (rooted 2.1) using Droid Forums

 

[TisMyDroid]

Thanks for the replies.

What are the benefits of using another launcher? I never really explored that as this is my first droid.

Same with sms apps, i love the stock one, almost everything about it...can i make them look and act like the stock one and have word prediction?

Off the original topic; how can i truly personalize my home screen? Like make it look completely unique and how i want it. Does it need to be rooted? If so, what are the real risks? I have the insurance plan, but will that be void if they figure out it was rooted if something happens?

Oh tortoracer, you are about to discover things about your phone that you never thought were possible. First you can make your home screens look like pretty much any way you want... without rooting. Go to play store. Probably the most popular home launchers are go launcher ex, Apex, Nova, ADW. Apex, Nova, and Atom were designed specifically for ICS. Go launcher also works great with ICS and has been around a long long time. ADW has also been around a long time and I believe works fine on ICS. Look them over and try the one that appeals to you most. If you find that one doesn't suit your needs, try another one. When you find the one you like most, then you can uninstall the ones you are not going to use. Also each of the launchers will have other themes that you can install that will change the look if your icons and other things.

Next, look at clock-weather widgets. The most popular are be-weather, fancy widgets and beautiful widgets. There are several themes you can install for each to give you the look you want.

For SMS, if you like the stock one then go ahead and stick with it. If you want to try a different one, Go SMS and handcent are very popular and give you lots of options.

For texting, or to get a predictive keyboard, again look in play store. I use touchpal swype which has predictive function but it also does auto correct that can drive me nuts sometimes. There are many. I tried Go keyboard and that worked well. Flext9 worked well also. There is another that is not Swype but people rave about its predictive abilities. Unfortunately I can't think of what the name of it is. It may be swift key.

Have fun setting everything up. It is one if the greatest things about Android!

Sent from my DROID RAZR Maxx using Droid Forums

 

[tortoracer]

Now i noticed the forum app isnt the best when it comes to searching...any threads discussing the best launcher? Best sms app?

I knew i wanted a droid over any apple product. I knew they were infinitely better. But coming from a jailbroken iPod touch (which was a mess), i figured the goodies came from being rooted.

Thanks so much everyone!

 

[Bilgediver]

Holo launcher is awesome, too. Its jellybean themed or whatever.

Check my sig for a brief explanation on home replacements like adw in my adw faq thread.

Sent from my AT100 using Tapatalk 2

 

[LocoRon]

any threads discussing the best launcher?

I don't think there's really any one "best" launcher. I bought ADW Ex when I got my first Android phone nearly two years ago, and it's served me quite well. On my phones, I can adjust the number of screens to what I want (usually only two or three, since I don't like to swipe around a lot, and I never really use the home screen preview switcher for some reason), and on my tablet... well, I made it look and function like a Star Trek PADD.

 

[tortoracer]

I have found apex launcher to work overall best...all seem to be about the same, but apex seems to make the most sense layout wise.

Now the dilema. How do i add widgets? It keeps saying i need root access to add a widget to it? Its not the default, not sure if it matters...i dont want to make it default until im happy with it...if unavoidable il deal with making it default obviously.

 

[TisMyDroid]

I think you need to long press on your home screen and it will bring up the list of your widgets. A fault of ics is that the list has white text on a white background so in order to see the text of the widget, glide your finger over the text.

Sent from my DROID RAZR Maxx using Droid Forums

 

[tortoracer]

Got it...now to figure out how to get the icons gone on the dock so its just text...supah sexay