I’m addicted to customizing my home screen with KWGT

One of many long-standing causes followers persist with Android over iOS is due to the customization the platform permits. Particularly with Google actually constructing on this idea with its Materials You design efforts, Android can look, really feel, and performance virtually any approach a consumer needs. Though Apple is lastly beginning to give iOS customers a way of management with the power to maneuver round icons and alter their colours (kind of), there’s simply no denying that Android is the way more versatile working system .

Ever since I purchased my first Android telephone — a Samsung Galaxy S2, as a result of I am a Very Previous Man™ — I have been taking part in round with customization. It is fairly simple to put in icon packs, change system colours and set up stay wallpapers, and I had enjoyable with it for a very long time. Nevertheless, it wasn’t till I found KWGT that issues bought actually difficult.

In truth, I’ve turn into so obsessive about KWGT that I continually change the look of my house display screen. When you get the cling of KWGT, there are limitless potentialities for what you are able to do. A lot in order that by the point I’ve lastly settled on a single design, I say to myself, “However what if I did this as an alternative…” after which change it once more.

KWGT has a big group of established designers, and plenty of glorious troubleshooting sources exist for brand new builders. Nonetheless, I discover that the majority Android customers – even the actually “technical” ones – do not know what KWGT is. Even when they do, most have by no means bothered to attempt it. So let me clarify what KWGT is and what sort of issues I’ve performed with it. Come trip time, you may most likely dig deep into it and turn into as obsessed as I’m.

KWGT is brief for Kustom Widget Creator. Kustom is an organization that makes numerous customization apps, together with KLWP (Kustom Dwell Wallpaper Creator), KWCH (Customized Clock Face Creator) and KLCK (Customized Lock Display Creator). Though all of them do various things, they work in an identical approach, permitting you to create customized components for the Android working system.

You can begin with a clean slate in KWGT and use the default code snippets to construct a widget from scratch. Nevertheless, designers all over the world additionally create widget packs for KWGT that they promote (or generally give away) on the Google Play Retailer. These packs include any variety of pre-made widgets that you should use as you want. Moreover, with a bit trial and error, you’ll be able to take one thing another person has created and tweak it to make it higher suit your aesthetic or perform in a barely totally different approach.

If you mix one thing like KWGT with different Android customization apps and run them on high of a third-party launcher like Nova, you are able to do just about something together with your telephone’s structure.

My colleague Andy Walker (who can be actually into KWGT) has a submit explaining how he made his dream Google widget utilizing KWGT. If you wish to know extra in regards to the steps of ranging from scratch and constructing a customized widget, I extremely recommend you learn his article within the connection.

Though I’ve constructed widgets from the bottom up in KWGT, I am often not notably eager to go that route. As a substitute, I search by way of widget packs made by others and use their creations as a place to begin. There have been a number of layouts I’ve put collectively utilizing this methodology that concerned no enhancing in any respect – I simply positioned the widgets the place I needed them and known as it a day.

Nevertheless, more often than not, I pull equipment from totally different locations and alter them to make them extra uniform. A great instance of that is beneath. The town and climate widget (which varies relying on the placement of the telephone) is from one bundle, however the battery and music participant widgets are from one other. The music widget was additionally rather more vibrant, however I modified it to suit the minimalistic purple/white theme:

Currently, I have been making an attempt so as to add a splash of colour to my look. The structure I made beneath included some widgets from a number of neon packs and an icon pack known as Define. What’s cool about that is that every widget pulls its colour scheme from the music participant’s album art work. In order I transfer from one music to a different in my playlist, my house display screen design strikes with it:

As you would possibly anticipate, the varied widget tiles all hyperlink to the apps related to the knowledge displayed there (location when Maps opens, date when Calendar opens, climate when Pixel Climate opens, and so on.). The exception right here is the one with the cruise ship emoji: it is a countdown timer till my cruise trip in March. 82 days, child!

The sharp line beneath the music widget is an energetic progress bar, so you’ll be able to see how a lot time is left on the monitor. The icons are the usual Pixel variations, although I exploit Nova to drive all of them to be circles for a pleasant, uniform look. Additionally, though I needed the colours to all match the Hazel theme, all of the widgets use Materials You, so I could make them look totally different simply by altering the background:

If you wish to recreate this for your self, I used Nova Launcher for the general structure and icon placement, the Hazel wallpaper from this Reddit submit, and the widgets discovered within the Pixdots pack (you may have to tweak them a bit to ‘taken to appear like me right here). In the event you’re simply getting began with KWGT, see the subsequent part for tips about the place to start out.

I absolutely perceive that KWGT will appear intimidating to anybody who has by no means used it earlier than. It’s not a straightforward factor to grasp. Fortunately, there are a ton of useful sources on-line that will help you dive in.

First, I like to recommend as soon as once more studying Andy Walker’s article, because it covers lots of floor. I additionally advocate that you just obtain KWGT and simply begin taking part in with the pre-installed widgets. They’re fairly easy and have not modified in years, so that they’re a great way to see how code and layouts work.

When you begin desirous to go deeper, the most effective place for assistance is the Kustom subreddit. 1000’s of passionate designers on the market are pleased to supply newcomers suggestions and methods on the best way to make the house display screen of their desires.

In the event you follow loads and perceive how every thing works, however lack inspiration on what to do, head over to r/AndroidThemes. Though not everybody on the market makes use of KWGT for his or her creations, the overwhelming majority do, and most will present you all of the packages they used to make the structure. Even in case you do not replicate a design you discover on the market, I am typically impressed by what different persons are doing, and it will get me down the highway of redoing my house display screen… once more.

In the event you’re a seasoned professional on the earth of Kustom, head to the feedback and submit some other useful suggestions or sources you’ve got discovered in your journey!