HONEYCOMB may be Google's signature tablet operating system, but its home screen user interface looks bland unless you work to improve it.
Motorola’s new Xoom tablet computer, which uses Honeycomb, comes with stock Android and Motorola widgets, and some useful wallpapers, but there are five expansive home screens to fill.
And the quality of available widgets is below the potential that widgets generally offer, especially with calendar, email, and messaging.
Fortunately there are third-party apps offering alternatives, and even full replacement user interfaces.
Beautiful Widgets ($US2.70 from the Android market) includes a range of clocks, date and weather widgets, and live wallpapers to lift the appearance of Honeycomb's home screens. Its day-night live wallpaper in particular is exquisite.
And the quality of available widgets is below the potential that widgets generally offer, especially with calendar, email, and messaging.
Fortunately there are third-party apps offering alternatives, and even full replacement user interfaces.
Beautiful Widgets ($US2.70 from the Android market) includes a range of clocks, date and weather widgets, and live wallpapers to lift the appearance of Honeycomb's home screens. Its day-night live wallpaper in particular is exquisite.
If you don't have access to HTC’s Sense interface, Beautiful Widgets is a must.
The Xoom has its own email and calendar widgets, but there are alternatives if you want to change skins or configure which mail boxes are displayed. Pure Calendar ($A2.06) and Pure Messenger ($A2.06) are more flexible alternatives.
Touchdown for Tablets is a free app that displays all aspects of a Microsoft Exchange email account: mail, contacts, calendars and tasks, and there are widgets available for each of these functions too.
Alternatively you can ditch the standard Honeycomb UI altogether.
LauncherPro Plus ($US2.99) is a totally fresh UI and it loads quickly; it really spruces up Honeycomb's appearance.
Originally for smartphones, it currently has to be sideloaded onto the Xoom to work. You’ll need to go to the Launcher Pro site to pay for the Plus version.
Once installed, you can reconfigure your entire Honeycomb UI. Select the home screen links and choose the number of screens to display, from one to seven, and you can install specific Launcher Pro widgets, along with anyone else’s.
The other benefit of LauncherPro is that it lets you resize your widgets on the screen. You don’t need to tolerate the higgledy-piggledy appearance that poorly aligned widgets tend to leave.
The Android market currently enjoys one significant advantage over Apple’s iTunes store, and that is its ability to sync apps to a device remotely. You log into the Android market on your desktop, buy apps, and select the devices you want them on.
Android does the rest. It installs the apps on those devices without you lifting a finger.
Android also offers Wifi syncing of music and podcasts through third party apps. For $US4.99, you can unlock the AirSync feature of doubleTwist to achieve this. Your desktop multimedia is synced to your devices without using a cable connection.
Of course, you’ll need to use a Wifi connection for syncing operations and not 3G!
The Xoom has its own email and calendar widgets, but there are alternatives if you want to change skins or configure which mail boxes are displayed. Pure Calendar ($A2.06) and Pure Messenger ($A2.06) are more flexible alternatives.
Touchdown for Tablets is a free app that displays all aspects of a Microsoft Exchange email account: mail, contacts, calendars and tasks, and there are widgets available for each of these functions too.
Alternatively you can ditch the standard Honeycomb UI altogether.
LauncherPro Plus ($US2.99) is a totally fresh UI and it loads quickly; it really spruces up Honeycomb's appearance.
Originally for smartphones, it currently has to be sideloaded onto the Xoom to work. You’ll need to go to the Launcher Pro site to pay for the Plus version.
Once installed, you can reconfigure your entire Honeycomb UI. Select the home screen links and choose the number of screens to display, from one to seven, and you can install specific Launcher Pro widgets, along with anyone else’s.
The other benefit of LauncherPro is that it lets you resize your widgets on the screen. You don’t need to tolerate the higgledy-piggledy appearance that poorly aligned widgets tend to leave.
The Android market currently enjoys one significant advantage over Apple’s iTunes store, and that is its ability to sync apps to a device remotely. You log into the Android market on your desktop, buy apps, and select the devices you want them on.
Android does the rest. It installs the apps on those devices without you lifting a finger.
Android also offers Wifi syncing of music and podcasts through third party apps. For $US4.99, you can unlock the AirSync feature of doubleTwist to achieve this. Your desktop multimedia is synced to your devices without using a cable connection.
Of course, you’ll need to use a Wifi connection for syncing operations and not 3G!
