Mildly Infuriating

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[–] CatLikeLemming@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 7 months ago (11 children)

I just checked out the website and I'm having a hard time understanding what the point of it is. I've never installed any sort of custom launcher, so maybe I'm missing out, but the application advertises itself on being very similar to the regular pixel launcher, not needing root access, and nothing else. Even in the FAQ I only see that it supports some plugin that upgrades some widget, unless you have root where it supports whatever you can do with the "recents api". Neither of those seem remotely worth it. So what does it actually do?

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[–] cley_faye@lemmy.world 19 points 7 months ago (1 child)

I haven't used the pixel launcher in ages, but last time I did, you could not remove the "search bar". That alone justifies a different launcher to me.

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[–] Zeth@lemmy.world 1 point 7 months ago

You can certainly do that now. Main reason I went with it.

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[–] ThirdConsul@lemmy.zip 11 points 7 months ago

So what does it actually do?

It replaces the launcher ("desktop") of your phone with something else. Maybe something faster, or using less resources, or something you can customize to your taste.

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[–] CouncilOfFriends@slrpnk.net 4 points 7 months ago (3 children)

By default it does look similar. However it has customization options comparable to Nova, or at least I was able to easily replicate how I'd configured it.

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[–] CatLikeLemming@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 7 months ago* (2 children)

Sure, but what are those? Maybe I'm the issue, but the website seems to be made for people who are already intimately familiar with the possibilities of a custom launcher, because they're hardly listed anywhere, there's no list of features or anything.

Well, there is one list, but it's

"Pixel design, but more customizable somehow" How? Dunno, isn't explained
"The latest android features" which is cool but also something I have on my stock launcher
"QuickSwitch support" which is not explained (some research makes me believe it's API access to the default launcher that's needed to show recent applications, which is also a feature my native launcher has) and needs root according to the FAQ. So can I not access my recent applications if my phone isn't rooted?

And the wiki is just from the dev side, which is interesting, but doesn't provide the proper info. I'm sure it's cool if so many people here like it, but the website's doing a poor job at showing that off.

Edit: Basically it seems to me like the selling points of most Android forks, which are generally "We're slightly worse in some areas, but generally have feature-parity, possibly slightly better customization/settings, and you're free of Google spyware" which is admittedly a selling point, but here you don't even get rid of spyware if you're on regular Android, and if you are already on a fork, then why bother?

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[–] FG_3479@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago

You can change the icon pack, font, grid size, colours, etc all to your preference.

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[–] CouncilOfFriends@slrpnk.net 3 points 7 months ago*

I would suggest simply installing it to see if you like it, or remove it if you don't. Customization is not something easy to describe without listing menu items

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[–] helpImTrappedOnline@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago

The main thing for me, it gets google out of the picture. No AI, no google search bar, etc.

It also allows me to manage apps in the app drawer. I can hide any stock apps, and put less commonly uses apps in to folders (I miss tabs on Nova). Instead of scrolling through pages of home screen, I swipe up and can see all my common apps at once, no scrolling. The home screen now has free space for widgets.

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[–] Dozzi92@lemmy.world 3 points 7 months ago

I switched to Lawnchair when Google starting messing with the search bar. They added features right where my thumb would press to use the search bar, so I was constantly opening an AI search that I did not want. Lawnchair let me stick with a launcher I liked and was used to, but gave me the customizability to get rid of bullshit like that.

And I generally don't like change, and I certainly don't want to have to do any work to facilitate a change that I don't like in the first place, but Lawnchair was incredibly easy to set up and go. Runs basically like an app, you change your default launcher to Lawnchair (and I assume this step is similar for any launcher you'd use), and bam, runs on top of everything and that's that. Simplicity is key for a simple guy like me.

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[–] Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 1 point 7 months ago (1 child)

how did you end up in this thread if you don't already know what a launcher is?

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[–] CatLikeLemming@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 7 months ago

Let's try a metaphor. Say I have a bike. Someone's trying to sell me another bike, based on it having two wheels, both compatible with standard tubes, and optionally having a luggage rack, if I bring my own and attach it. Then I would also be asking them what their bike actually does and why I should bother swapping mine out for theirs, because it just looks like an extremely standard bike. It doesn't mean I do not know what a bike is.

The question about lawnchair specifically has mostly been answered by comments now, but the website still does a very poor job explaining what it does over any other launcher, especially compared to the stock one.