Here I’d like to open a space to collect your ideas what improvements could be carefully integrated into BLISS launcher in order to make it a sleek standard brwoswer for /e/.
I personally like Bliss a lot - as it is a simple and easy to understand front end for an operation system and I believe it is suitable for /e/'s user target group. But I believe as well the Bliss still needs some fine adjustment. Therefore I opened this threat. Please note:This is not intended to be the place for Bliss bashing. I am a regular reader of /e/'s telegram group. There’s so much derogatory remarks towards Bliss. Please note, this is not the right place to drop all those negative and aggressive emotions (If you do not like Bliss, just install an alternative launcher, there are various alternatives around.
And yes, Bliss does not have an app drawer. If you need it just look out for Lawnchair, Librechair, Trebuchet et al.
First of all, I’d like to share my thoughts with you:
What I like about Bliss
It is true, Bliss doesn’t offer much more than essential functionality - but that’s what I like about it.
it has a distinctive appearance (different from most other Android launcher flavours. Yes, I agree, it has a user experience close to iOS);
it has a dedicated widget page, easy to reach and easy to add/use further widgets;
no way to get lost in additional (unessential) functionality.
What I do not like so much about Bliss
(I’d love to see some improvement)
Language settings. For now, Bliss is only in English language, it would be good if it adapts to the devices’ language settings;
Moving icons around. For the moment I feel it is a bit difficult to move icons from one home page to another. Furthermore, it is impossible to move icons within folders. Would be nice to make that possible.
Additional Bliss settings. Other people already requested a Bliss settings menu.
Feature to lock icon position on home screens. It happened a few times to me that I moved icons by mistake. especially for less experienced users it would be good to have an option to make icons unmovable - not by default but upon request.
Easily hide Weather and App Suggestions widgets.
Search Widget. The search function is a bit unexpected what I would naturally expect here is a tool to search apps on my device as well as files and photos. If this remains a like to the internet it should be renamed at least ‘Internet Search’ instead of ‘Search’ and refer use the browser that is set as the systems’ standard browser.
Widget layout. At least for all standard widget I’d like to see a coherent layout/appearance
Edit Widget page. There are sometimes several widgets with the same name and different functionality. Ideally, I’d like to understand differences before installing
A last thing: Not important at all, but I’d love that swiping from one homepage to another goes a speedier.
In case settings for Bliss are going to be introduced I’d like to see it ideally in the /e/ settings or via the edit button on the widget page (see pics below).
I would like the “open apps” screen (the square button on the right) to behave like the Android pie launcher i.e. horizontal scrolling thumbnails with swipe up to close the application. Trebuchet does this as well on LOS 16
Hi, thanks for your feedback, that would be nice indeed, but as far as I understand this behaviour has nothing to do with the lancher rather with the Android version in the back (guess this feature is coming along with Pie)…
I would like Transparent Navigation bar instead of Black navigation
And Bliss launcher settings in Device setting it looks like more IOS every app settings inside device setting app…
So please make separate option in Bliss launcher like (Edit Button) in widget page
First of all, I would like to Thanks all of you for showing your support to the Bliss Launcher. I am the developer of Bliss Launcher so it’s my responsibility to take all those points into consideration and improve the user experience. I totally agree that it lacks number of features and sometimes shows unexpected behaviour but we are working on constantly to improve it.
There are multiple reasons for the various broken functionality in the launcher. First thing is that most of the existing launcher (lawnchair, NOVA or Trebuchet) are based on AOSP Launcher2/3 source so they have more features. Launchers which are not based on AOSP/Pixel Launcher source have to do some extra work to port those features (For example work profile compatibility issue in Total Launcher and OpenLauncher).
Bliss Launcher is written from the scratch to adapt the simple iOS like design style. The reason for doing so (not choosing Launcher2/3 as base source) is that the UX is completely different in those launchers and the Bliss one. Also some android components are not meant to fit into this iOS kinda style design (for example android widgets are designed to be on multiple screens and resizable in both directions which is not same as iOS form of design).
I take all yours points mentioned above into consideration and there will be continuous improvements into the Bliss Launcher. I have created this empty issue to take this issue further at project level as it’s hard to maintain it here. Kindly keep an eye at this issue and comment your valuable suggestions/feedback over there.
@ralxx, unfortunately Bliss on Android pie does not behave that way (I am running the official /e/ pie release for the Pixel). I have put the request onto gitlab as per @amitkma request.
I agree with @anon84098008 suggestion to be able swipe away apps as in Trebuchet since the “card stack” listing of open apps is not easy to handle if there are quite a few in the list. You end up pulling down the notifications bar if you try to get access to “ClearAll”.
A second wish is better handling of widgets. As far as I can see you have only the left-hand home page to put them on and if you want a widget occupying a large piece of the screen then this severely limits the number you can use. For example I tried to put the widget from Simple Calendar to show the whole month and this seems impossible if the real estate is already occupied. The widget just disappeared.
It would be better to allow adding a widget to en extra home page so that you could have a good view of a whole month or a long list of mail messages to read. Perhaps this is possible in Bliss but I haven’t found a way of doing it.
Last wish: improve the shifting of icons both within one page and especially between different pages. It often seems a juggling trick and it’s not very easy to place the icon exactly where you want it. Having a way of locking its position as another suggested might help in this case.
Hi, just one more observation, there a simple way already implemented into /e/ to swap the bottom keys. Just go to settings>system>buttons>buttons&layout>imvert button layout
Other than that, it felt quite good as a start. I still don’t know were I can find the settings for configuration (if there are any), but if the out of the box experience will be as good as iOS, it might not be necessary to have any.
Thank you, this bliss launcher is really great and fast and handy. But two remarks : Why isn’t it possible to uninstall the weather app ? On the first screen on the left, why isn’t possible to delete those widgets : searching, apps suggestions and weather ?
There is one thing I am missing a lot: A SYSTEM INFO WIDGET, indicating the total and still remaining available space on (1) edrive, (2) the devices’ memory and (3) the SD-card.
I would love to have an easily reachable place to keep just an eye on those information. I believe a widget for Bliss could be the right place for it.
Furthermore, the widget could be be used for providing other system information such as mobile data usage (last month/last 24h) or phones’ battery health or no. of photos/videos taken. If the widget was customizable and - if necessary - uninstallable, it could be a pretty useful little tool for many that would even not bother those who do not need it.
Hi, just to reignite this topic, my thoughts on Bliss:
What i like:
the visual design - it’s beautiful!
the various swipe options (below to get search)
the dedicated widget space look cool
What i miss:
Customisability, mainly in being able to put apps where i want them (they currently all snap to the top, you cannot space them out over the screen)
widgets in other areas - i love having widget also in my main screen, eg my calendar for upcoming appointments
some bugs need to be ironed out, e.g. moving icons around is too difficult + a “hold press” screen with options would be nice, to re-arrange the various screens, add one in between etc
I second @Rik , and I’d like to be able to change the number of icons per line, and change the shape. Also the wetter widget is buggy. If not, Bliss doesn’t seem to bad! If these changes are implemented, I will come back to it!
