Themed SMS [APP]

[eris72]

Consolidating my previous post, here are two simple, modified blur sms apks. we have:

a) Messagingwhite.apk: same as stock, except grey text in conversation list is white rather than transparent/grey. easier to read i think

b) Messagingicsblack.apk: the background of both read and unread texts is black, with unread text being displayed in ICS blue while read texts are in white. black background looks better with the ICS text

For both, the incoming sms box in actual conversations has been darkened. just my fancy.

Next step; blackout the background of conversation list entirely. pretty sure that'll entail diving into the framework. I know its done routinely, but im learning by experimentation as i go (more fun that way!).

Instructions:

1) Must be rooted

2) Download desired Messaging______.apk

3) Rename to Messaging.apk

4) With a file explorer or via adb, navigate to /system/app/ and copy your current Messaging.apk and corresponding odex file (if you're rom is odexed) to somewhere safe (just for a backup) and then delete them from /system/app/

5) Move the renamed Messaging.apk to /system/app/, change permissions to rw-r--r--, and reboot.

And thats it! The changes aren't big, but unlike my attempts yesterday, I think they're much more aesthetically pleasing. Particularly the one with ICS color incorporated.

Hope you enjoy! If you like hit the thanks!


*USUAL DISCLAIMER; tinkering with your phone is YOUR choice; should anything happen to your phone I am in no way responsible. Not like this is serious stuff here, but just in case i guess

 

[eris72]

screenies

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[eris72]

btw is there any interest whatsoever in this? im just having fun learning and hoping to eventually get full themes going

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[illb1u2]

Anyway to do the people (contacts) the same

 

[eris72]

Anyway to do the people (contacts) the same

im about to go watch the dark knight rises, but afterwards i'll start messing with it! it will depend on if the app draws from a specific line of code that gives a hex value, or from a .png inside the framework-res.apk. if its the latter, the rom needs to be deodexed and to be universal id have to learn how to make it a flashable zip blah blah blah. BUT if its the former, shouldn't really be that hard.


edit: yes first attempt was a big giant fail. pretty sure contacts.apk and phone.apk are intertwined in some way, I can't even decompile and recompile contacts.apk without errors when i haven't changed a single thing. and theres some images in contacts.apk that only appear in the phone app. so yea. but ill take a stab at it! just might be beyond my grasp atm

 

[DizzyFox]

im about to go watch the dark knight rises, but afterwards i'll start messing with it! it will depend on if the app draws from a specific line of code that gives a hex value, or from a .png inside the framework-res.apk. if its the latter, the rom needs to be deodexed and to be universal id have to learn how to make it a flashable zip blah blah blah. BUT if its the former, shouldn't really be that hard.


edit: yes first attempt was a big giant fail. pretty sure contacts.apk and phone.apk are intertwined in some way, I can't even decompile and recompile contacts.apk without errors when i haven't changed a single thing. and theres some images in contacts.apk that only appear in the phone app. so yea. but ill take a stab at it! just might be beyond my grasp atm

That suxs I was really hoping the people app could be blacked out to match the phone good try though. Thanks

 

[eris72]

That suxs I was really hoping the people app could be blacked out to match the phone good try though. Thanks

I'm sure it can be, I just need to figure out how

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[DizzyFox]

I'm sure it can be, I just need to figure out how

Sent from my DROID RAZR HD using Tapatalk 2

Have you ever thought about trying the calendar app change the white background to black?

 

[eris72]

Have you ever thought about trying the calendar app change the white background to black?

I'm actually a fan of the white, but I'll look into it. Ideally I want to figure out how to make a flashable zip that will black out framework/some selected apps, but I'm not anywhere near that yet. Got my rom of choice (batakang) deodexed, but i can't even change the gradient background to black without problems. Should be a simple edit. Still much to learn obviously!

I have to get a lot of research done in the next week, hoping to get a paper published in the next 6 months, but as soon as Christmas break rolls around, this will be my pet project until grad school starts up again

Right now doing the contacts app is my priority, just figured out a key step that I was missing. still getting mad errors but making progress!

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[Notrega]

I am interested in all black themes in apps... willing to donate for such...

 

[eris72]

I am interested in all black themes in apps... willing to donate for such...

No donations necessary. I've gotten a lot from the android community and am just trying to give back since there isn't much dev support for the razr hd.

So far, contacts and phone are not looking good. I've tried all possible routes; most of the time the modded apk won't even compile and when it does, it isn't recognized upon boot. Best I've gotten is the phone to recognize it, but when the phone app is opened it's just all FC all the time. System apps are a tricky *****.

That being said, the messaging app I have pretty solid control over and can alter most of those colors, baring the background. That's tied into framework, which I was able to get blacked out! I can explain the process (moderately difficult) or more likely I'll look into making a flashable zip. So with that in mind, if anyone would like some basic color altering to their sms, I can prolly do so with the limitation that the background is the JB gradient or black. Texts, contact names, text box backgrounds (not the main background!) and such can be changed.

I'm giving up on contacts for now, unless I can find/think of a new way to get it working. phone is tied directly into it to, so that sucks. I can look at the calendar, but since its third party now (on g play where it'll get updates vs the built in one, which I deleted), I have to imagine someone's done that already. If anyone has any requests ill look into it, I'm not sure what other apps there are that someone else hasn't put a theme to that can't be put on our phones.

What I think I'm gonna do is look into how to get aosp apps working, contacts was on some rom on rzr forums but I couldn't get it on my rom (batakang). Maybe if I decompile it and recompile it with my framework...

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[eris72]

working on making this a flashable zip: blacked out framework and black outgoing sms box. looks quite sexy i think

if you can't tell we're animal lovers. thats my cat sleeping on my quantum book

 

[msassounian]

hey eris just wanted to say i'm very interested in this and am about to give it a try! screen shots look great! thanks so much

EDIT: got it working. looks nice! any word on updating the incoming/outgoing to black?