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StatusBar+ Customize Your Notifications Status Bar!

Posted Tuesday, October 18th, 2011 at 10:15 am by Paul Wilks 0 Comments

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StatusBar+ is a cool and highly customizable notification panel, or status bar, for Android. Styled in a similar design to the status bar users of Windows Phones get, so this can be either a perfect compliment to a WP7 skin or a smart and customizable addition to any Android homescreen.

Price: Free, ~$1.38

Tested on: HTC Desire HD
Content Rating: Everyone

AndroidTapp.com Android App Review:

Pros & Cons:

Pros

• Gives you lots of control over your status panel!
• Choice of colors!
• Easy to edit!
• Perfect compliment to WP7 skins!

Cons

• Cannot display notifications such as email or SMS
• Currently limited to pre-set icons.

Features:

Modders and fans of canny design should pay attention here. StatusBar+ is a status bar replacement app that gives you more control over what you see at the top of your screen.

Your status bar is something you perhaps do not currently have that much control over. You might change the look of it a little- for example, if you run Cyanogenmod 7 you can change the way it looks by using a different theme, but most don’t let you control the content as such- it’s still basically Wi-Fi, cell signal, battery and clock. Sure there’s variation, but you’re basically dressing up the same thing. This is where StatusBar+ provides far more control.

The app lets you pick and choose what content is there. The list to choose from is as follows: Signal, Data, Roaming, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Language, Battery Percent, Battery and Time. The beauty of this is that you can select as many or as few of these as you like. Want a completely clean screen? Remove them all. How about just the time? Just select Time and that’s all you will see. Not only this but you can change the color of the bar, or the color of the text.

Further options allow you to ensure the status bar is set upon boot, so you don’t have to activate it. You can also enable/disable the bar from your lockscreen. An incredibly pleasing feature is the ability to have icons hidden, but display for a set period by tapping the status bar. The icons duly drop down with a rewarding bounce, and disappear again after so many seconds. This looks very cool indeed! A similar homescreen app, Launcher 7, comes to mind but differs in ways.

The only genuine downer about StatusBar+ is that it cannot display notifications icons, like when you get emails, SMS messages or Google+ notifications. Sadly these don’t show up, so you would have to use alternative pop up solutions, perhaps something like Pops which does that job instead.

Usefulness:

Add loads of customizability to a part of the screen that has previously been relatively untouchable. While it doesn’t ‘add’ much content, it lets you completely change the look of the status panel, allowing it to compliment whatever skin, theme, wallpaper or launcher you might be using.

Ease of Use:

The app menu is clean and simple to use. You do have to keep toggling the custom status bar on and off to enable the colors and settings you have just changed, but this is incredibly easy. It’s also easy to navigate the menus and alter what you need to. Basic, but very straightforward- you’re not going to get lost!

Frequently Used:

Enabling this app will place it on your screen and viewable whenever you use your phone. The cool drop-down effects make the status bar both interactive and more usable, and look great!

Interface:

You essentially have the background menus- which are simplistic but functional and responsive. You also have the status bar which you have essentially designed yourself. This is rewardingly fun to play with- not only creating all kinds of looks, but kicking in the bouncy drop-down icons. It just works so well, and looks very cool in deed!

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