[Android 3.0+, ROOT] TabletBar Hider - fullscreen in Honeycomb without system bar!

---

TabletBar Hider

Want to use your honeycomb tablet in *true* fullscreen, without that pesky system bar in the way? Now you can! (REQUIRES ROOT!)

This app allows you to hide the system bar in landscape mode, where it gets in the way the most. Then, if you need to access it to leave the app, just rotate your tablet to portrait and the bar appears. When you're done, rotate it back to landscape and the bar disappears again. You can go back to the app and end that behavior at any time.

There is currently an issue with apps that prevent rotation - you may get stuck in them! But worst case, you can always reboot and everything goes back to normal. I will work on a fix for that if people like the app!

I am new to Android app development so please let me know if there are any issues! I have created a free demo version that you can run to verify that the app will properly hide and restore the system bar on your tablet. I have tested this on a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 but not others yet! So please make sure to try the demo first.

Note that the demo is only for verifying that the app can kill and restore the system bar. It does not feature the automatic rotation service that the full version contains.

Screenshots of full version attached to post

Demo
https://market.android.com/details?i...etbarhiderdemo



Full Version
https://market.android.com/details?i...tabletbarhider

Well thought! tested the demo and working well on arabic rom p7510jpkg5. Though expected demo to be a little more useful beyond just hiding and restoring the bottom bar. Couldn't revert to home screen after applying the tweak. The full version could have been free.
well done.

It's useful...thanks

Works great on my Xoom but some time in future development it would be nice to have the option of a transparent status bar too.

Bought it in hopes that you'll be further developing it. Further development on this that could really turn heads would be access to the full apps list with the ability to check mark which ones you want the taskbar hider to work with (and more importantly, which ones you don't).
Great idea. Looking forward to where this might go.

Please consider making it work with multitouch gestures.

I have my tablet set to always stay in Landscape mode (unless an app forces me into portrait mode). So the current way of hiding and restoring the status bar is a PITA.

What you could (should) do is this.

Two finger swipe down off of the screen = Hide status bar.
Two finger swipe up onto the screen = Restore status bar.

Does that make sense?

It's a great start!

Originally Posted by arrtoodeetoo

Two finger swipe down off of the screen = Hide status bar.
Two finger swipe up onto the screen = Restore status bar.

+1
this would be really nice!

It would be great if it would work with wizz or have like a wiz type bar where i can click bottom middle during any app and bring up home and back and multi task and then even better like wizz i can add my own!

edit:
on adw ex I have swipe down as notifications. with this thing enabled. I swipe down and my notifications dont pop up really wished that I could swipe down for my notifications with the bar off

O well, guess its good for specific apps although I would really like to see it as a more accessible thing like wizzbar

Originally Posted by mughalgxt

Well thought! tested the demo and working well on arabic rom p7510jpkg5. Though expected demo to be a little more useful beyond just hiding and restoring the bottom bar. Couldn't revert to home screen after applying the tweak. The full version could have been free.
well done.

Yes, I know its a simple app and it could be free, but this is kind of an experiment for me to see if I can make money writing apps. It also will provide the encouragement I need to keep developing it. And yeah, the demo is just to make sure people don't get stuck buying the paid app and have it not work. Its not really intended to be useful.

Originally Posted by Psychokitty

Bought it in hopes that you'll be further developing it. Further development on this that could really turn heads would be access to the full apps list with the ability to check mark which ones you want the taskbar hider to work with (and more importantly, which ones you don't).
Great idea. Looking forward to where this might go.

Hey that's a great idea! I'll look into that.

Originally Posted by arrtoodeetoo

Please consider making it work with multitouch gestures.

I have my tablet set to always stay in Landscape mode (unless an app forces me into portrait mode). So the current way of hiding and restoring the status bar is a PITA.

What you could (should) do is this.

Two finger swipe down off of the screen = Hide status bar.
Two finger swipe up onto the screen = Restore status bar.

Does that make sense?

It's a great start!

Actually I was originally going to hook into the volume buttons, and have one hide it and one restore it, but I found that background services don't have access to the volume buttons. Orientation was less ideal, but It was something I could hook into from the background. I'm not sure if background services can see the gestures, but I will look into it! One thing I know I can do is look at the accelerometer instead of the orientation. That way even if you're locked, you can still rotate to show the bar. Of course.. then its sideways, and that's weird. But thanks for the words of encouragement as well!

Originally Posted by turtlegss

It would be great if it would work with wizz or have like a wiz type bar where i can click bottom middle during any app and bring up home and back and multi task and then even better like wizz i can add my own!

edit:
on adw ex I have swipe down as notifications. with this thing enabled. I swipe down and my notifications dont pop up really wished that I could swipe down for my notifications with the bar off

O well, guess its good for specific apps although I would really like to see it as a more accessible thing like wizzbar

Ooh, yeah the app kills the process that contains the notifications, so that is one area where it won't work. Also, I said this above but I'm not sure if I can see gestures from a background process. But I will look into it for sure! That would definitely be better.

I also realized that if I implement the suggestion above about selecting which apps to disable my app on, I could have it also disabled on the home screen. That would be nice.

-Taylor

So, I just realized that the Market app doesn't allow rotation, and it can appear that you're stuck. I will definitely have to add a way to filter which apps this is enabled for.

For the meantime, you're not actually stuck in Market. Just use the menu on the top right and go to "Contact us" and it will open the browser.

Silly, for sure. I'll try to add the fix soon. Probably not till the weekend though.

-Taylor