Kustom-izing Android

I look back and realize that I've been dedicated to the Android environment for quite awhile.  One of the things I love about Android is how open and customizable it is.  I was tired of looking at the same screens of nothing but icons, and seeing various screenshots of widgets in those early days allowed me to dream of having a truly personalized phone with a minimalist view.  I'd wanted something akin to an interactive wallpaper... something where the widgets would just seem to blend in to complement whatever background I was using for my device.

One of the first things I did was find a proper launcher.  To this day, I'm still using Nova Launcher.

To complement Nova Launcher, my searches led me to Zooper Widget.  It's a no-nonsense app that, if you did your research and stuck to it, you could set up any type of widget to your heart's desire.  Used in conjuction with other apps (Media Utilities which was also under Zooper, and Popup Widget, both come to mind), I was able to set up an icon-free launcher which also dynamically changed which widget I wanted to access based on what I tapped on screen.  Zooper has been my go-to widget for years.  And then that stopped.

As ambitious as my setup went, a few years had passed and there was a lack of updates.  Outside of learning how to program the date in binary, there really wasn't too much else that I could do, and it just became nothing more than a custom clock for me.  I'm sure there could have been more to discover, but I was resigned to spend any more extra effort, and I was content with leaving things basic and minimalist anyway.

Then my always trusty "twin" Flow recently introduced me to KLWP (Kustom Live Wallpaper).  Now, Kustom Industries has other apps, like KWGT (Kustom Widget Maker), but the potential for using a live wallpaper instead of a wideget was brought to my attention quite quickly.  Checking the odd tutorials online, and seeing examples, I instantly fell in love, and realized that those ideas I had implemented years ago could easily be brought back to the forefront.  I dare say that compared to Zooper, certain presets (especially when it comes to the clock) makes things easier, and the programming is similar enough where I was able to jump in without much effort.  Even the integration of programming within the various objects you're working with, along with specifying Global Variables and object grouping, makes this app feel a lot more robust that I've completely dropped Zooper from my phone.

Currently, I'm now using 2 Android devices:  My trusty Pixel 2XL, and for work a Samsung Galaxy S8.  Rather than mess around with my personal phone, I've used the S8 as my little digial playground to test ideas that I have, and see if can apply what I've learned (and continue to learn) for KLWP.  I've since uploaded a couple of sample videos on YouTube of what I've played around with.

The setup is not quite ready on my 2XL, but I've at least included a screenshot as a teaser :)

Living (Room) in Harmony

A few years ago, I remember asking to get a Logitech Harmony remote to keep things in my living room a little more tidy, and ended up with the Logitech Harmony 900.  It was a pretty cool device for it's time, with it's little touch screen and programmable buttons and all.  With a press of a button, I could have my TV, receiver, and set top box all start up at once.  I even tried to expand on its capabilities by purchasing the PS3 Bluetooth adapter so it could also boot that up with another command.  Now that those few years have past, the remote itself is still in a decent working order, though it can act up from time to time, like not quite responding to key inputs right away.  I still wanted to keep things nice and tidy, but didn't want to drop so much coin for another Harmony remote (because the really nice ones are a few hundred dollars).

I think within the last year or so, when IoT (Internet of Things) was really making headway into the consumer market, Harmony did the "smart" decision (pun intended) to create the Harmony Hub.  Not only is this a device for your entertainment unit, but it could also integrate into your IoT devices too.  How it integrated wth IoT wasn't really much of my concern.  I was happy to find out that I could just purchase the hub on its own (without any versions of the other Harmony remotes packaged with it), and it came in at a reasonable price.  Even better, all you need is an Android or iOS device, and download the companion app, and essentially just turn your phone/tablet/etc into a universal remote too.

I've had the Hub for a few months now, and it's been pretty cool so far.  I think one of the things that made me decide on purchasing it was the fact it also included Bluetooth.  Considering the PS3 adapter for my previous remote hasn't worked in awhile, I was able to get rid of that and just soley rely on the Hub to also control the PS3 instead.  Perhaps even cooler is the fact that there's Google Assistant compatibility.  Seeing as I've also got a Google Home Mini, I feel like I've given real purpose for it by pairing the speaker with Harmony.  Creating shortcuts with the Google Home app has allowed me to give shortened voice commands to, say, turn my TV on or off.

The only downsides that I've seen, or that I can think of at the moment, are as follows:

1. Would be nice if there was a litte more flexibility in arranging the pages for each function in the remote app.  Not so much arranging the buttons on each page, but rather arranging the order of the pages.
2. Should there be any issues with your local network, then you've basically rendered the Hub useless in controlling your entertainment system (which I should have considered prior to purchase).  My old Harmony 900 isn't compatible with the Hub.  Otherwise, I'm falling back on the individual remotes in a worse case scenario
3. It actually would have been interesting to have an app to control the devices through your PC as well.

With that being said, I think purchasing the Harmony Hub on its own would benefit a user with an existing Harmony remote that's compatible with it, and is looking into making their home connected thru IoT devices.  However, if you're only interested in controlling your home entertainment area, and willing to chip in a few extra bones, then grabbing the Hub with the basic companion remote may do you well.  Otherwise, you can always just take the risk like me and just stick with the Hub on its own.

Still Cubin' After All These Years

I'd recently received a Gigaminx puzzle from my brother for Christmas, which I'm still in the process of learning to solve.  Maybe I'm a little geeky, but I do find some entertainment trying to solve puzzles, and my brother knew exactly what to get for me.  It's only now that I realize that I've been solving your standard Rubik's Cube for the last 20 years or so.

You know that hair-tearing puzzle that "everyone" just can't seem to solve.  It was such a craze back in the 80s, and I guess my family wasn't immune to its allure.  Much like everyone else, as a kid I was just happy if I'd be able to complete one side of the cube, and then just stare at it and wonder, how the hell do I fix the rest of the sides?

Fast forward to the late 90s.  One fateful summer day, during my college break, I happened to stumble across a book my family bought from a local department store (that's long since been shut down), that happened to show off a solution on how to solve the cube.  Lucky for me, I'd also remembered where we kept the cube in the house.  I fondly remembered that one afternoon, following the algorithms present in the book, and to my surprise I'd actually solve Rubik's for the very first time.  I'd since called this basic method of solving the cube "The Hamburger Method", because it involved solving for the top and bottom layers of the cube, and then using a basic algorithm to solve for the edge pieces in the middle layer of the cube.

For a few years, I'd kept on solving the cube in this manner, realizing at some point how tedious it was to solve the cube this way.  Too many moves were spent, but I will say one thing:  It gave a better understanding on how to navigate pieces around the cube itself.  It came to a point where I wanted to be quicker, so eventually I did my searches online in the early 00s.  I'd searched for speedcubing methods and stumbled across the Lars Petrus method.  It's a pretty intuitive method of solving a cube, on the foundation of building from a 2x2x2 cube and expanding from there.  In a nutshell:

• You start at one corner of the cube, creating a 2x2x2 cube
• Expand that cube along one edge to then to create a 3x2x2 rectangle
• Using the free-moving layers, solve for the first 2 layers (F2L), leaving just one layer to fix
• Solve the final layer of the cube

I know, it seems a lot easier than it sounds.  I think it took me a good month until I felt completely comfortable in memorizing all the algorithms for solving the last layer.

After my interest in the standard 3x3 waned, I had to expand my horizons.  Now, I'm sure there are some people out there that have quite an expansive collection of cubes.  Compared to those people, I consider my collection modest:

• a couple of 2x2 cubes, one of which uses tiles instead of stickers
• a number of 3x3 cubes: tiled, a Tic-Tac-Toe variant, a 25th and 30th Anniversary to name a few
• a 4x4
• a 5x5
• Mirror Cube: a 3x3 variant that is not equally split
• Square 1: Not an official Rubik's, but another cube puzzle with an odd cuts that also put the cube out of shape when mixed
• Void Cube: another 3x3 variant that's missing all the centers

To this day, I still try to play around with the standard 3x3 just so I'm not out of practice and I don't forget those algorithms.  I should post up an updated video of me demonstrating the solve, but I guess for now, you can settle for an older, low quality video taken from my brother's phone easily a decade ago: