Windows Phone Thoughts: Spb Software House Mobile Shell

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Tuesday, February 6, 2007

Spb Software House Mobile Shell

Posted by Judie Lipsett Hughes in "SOFTWARE" @ 11:45 AM


Controlling Spb Mobile Shell Options
This is the center hub of Spb Mobile Shell's options, and it is definitely a place with which the user will want to become familiar. It can be reached from the Settings menu of the main launcher screen, or by tapping an holding one of the tabs on the Today screen. The Today Tab offers the choice of allowing the selected tabs on the Today screen to stay expanded or to auto-hide when tapped. If auto-hide is not selected, and the tabs are expanding on the main screen to the user's annoyance, the option to auto-hide can be immediately chosen, also by tapping and holding the offending tab on the Today screen.


Figure 17: Options involving the Today screen.

The Now Screen Tab is the screen that appears when the screen is first turned on. I'll show it in all its glory shortly, but in the meantime, choices may be made as to whether or not it will show first thing, and whether a digital or analog clock will be shown with the other information it displays.


Figure 18: The Now Screen Tab's options.

The aptly named Tabs Tab is where the Today screen's Tabs may be rearranged or new ones can be created. One thing that I wish was possible, and I could not find a way to do it, was to create a quick and dirty specialized list of programs which I wanted to be able to launch from within their own tab without losing the option to display the recently chosen application icons. I did find a way around this, however. Clicking the Add button allows the option to add a tab for just about any program with a Today screen plug-in. I have Resco Explorer installed on my Treo, which has a simple icon program launcher, so I was able to create a Resco Tab. From within that tab I can very quickly access the programs I want to launch, even though they may not actually be my more recently chosen applications.


Figure 19: The Tabs section allows the ability to add custom tabs to the Today screen.

The Theme Tab is a second way to access the setting which controls the overall coloring of the Spb launcher and Today Screen.


Figure 20: Another way to choose on of 16 available colored themes.

The Weather Tab offers the option of whether or not to update weather forecasts automatically or manually with a simple check mark. Remember that cities and temperature grades are changed by tapping and holding the forecast from the Today screen.


Figure 21: The one and only Weather Tab option.

This last capture is of what's known as the Now Screen. It can be set to display when the device's screen is turned on, or it can be accessed by tapping Now from within the launcher. This is a very handy screen which displays the device's battery level, any new email, new text messages, any waiting voicemail messages, wireless signal strength, the time, the day, date and the weather. Tapping the email, text message or voicemail icons will take you directly to their respective program screens. Tapping the weather icon will take you to the Weather Tab on the Today screen, and tapping the time will also take you to its respective Today tab.
Not too shabby, huh?!


Figure 22: The Now Screen in all its glory.

Conclusions
I am actually pretty amazed that Spb House released this program, because it takes several of their popular Today Plug-ins and offers "lite" versions of each rolled into one very nicely rounded application. I recognize bits borrowed from Spb Weather, Spb Time, Spb Pocket Plus, and perhaps snatches from a few of their other titles. This is a really great program for someone that doesn't need all of the extra features in the other full Spb applications, but it will also integrate and play nicely with the Spb titles I just mentioned and others. I like that it allows such a high degree of personalization while making the entire one-handed mobile phone experience even better with my Treo. Spb Mobile Shell has earned a permanent spot on my Treo.

Judie Hughes, who spent six years earning a reputation as a respected reviewer at The Gadgeteer, has now added "member of the Pocket PC Thoughts review team" to her list of credits. Her site, Gear Diary, continues her exploration of the gadget world with blog entries and reviews of all things geeky.

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