You've seen the pictures. You've heard the details. Now it's time to actually see the upcoming Stage UI in action on the Dell Streak.
Anyone who's successfully flashed the newest build (version 1.2) of DJ_Steve's Froyo build, released yesterday, has already spent some hands-on time with Dell Stage. But for everyone else, watch the HD video I took of the new official launcher and widgets running on my unofficial Froyo'd Streak so you can see what words and still images are unable to convey.
DJ_Steve's build is more optimized and tweaked than Dell's build will be, so what you see below may not be the kind of performance you'll get from the official update.
Looks better than I thought tbh. I think you’d need to go 100% Stage or no Stage widgets at all, as a 4×4 screen is a major waste.
I think the purpose of seeing the adjacent pages is that you don’t get lost on your homescreens, possibly also that might be the way it works across wider screens, meaning they could just drop it onto the upcoming look glass or something.
Glad it goes portrait too. The really interesting thing in the next few weeks will be to see if Steves ROM can evolve faster than Dells.
Nice video and thanks for showing it! I just wish it was easier to flash to DJ_steves firmware release, seems like its going to be even better then the dell release.
Well Im on DJ_Steves 1.1.1 release and having trouble getting to 1.2 myself. I dont think its really that hard but when these how to tutorials are written it is for people with a better understanding with the steps not a newby like me anyways.
youre too nice jen, but the disappointment in your voice is obvious…stage stuff is crap waste of space.
Nice video Jen. Its made me stick with 1.1.1 for now as Ive got it working as I want it.
p.s. Nice accent
Thanks for the video
I must say I am disappointed with Stage, I can’t see the point in the overlapping, a complete waste of space.
Dell, you’ve got to stop letting the summer interns do the visual design work. Hire a non-engineer graphical/industrial design specialist.
Stage seems like fail. Aggregating widgets, something that shows your most recent apps, or favorite web sites,are a good idea. But this implementation needs a serious dose of focus. I think they could make it not seem ridiculous if they:
1. Lose the faux 3D “stage” part of the stage UI. It’s just useless pixels and doesn’t even add style. In fact, it looks dumb. It makes me think of those people who take the desktop metaphor too far and actually show a desk on your computer screen, or a file cabinet for your files. Or of the little Microsoft Office animated paper clip assistant. Don’t get carried away with the metaphor guys…
2. Get rid of the overlap between screens. Bad idea. Looks bad (really) and adds lots of confusion and buys you…what? Nothing. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.
So if they class up these stage widgets design wise, so that they were slick and classy looking widgets, something that wouldn’t make Jony Ive claw his eyes out to ensure he never sees it again, widgets like these could really be useful.
Thank you for the excellent preview video, Jenn.
I think the Stage widgets are geared toward casual users (ie – 85% of the market) versus power users. Also, for that type of user, the overlap probably makes it easier to remember which way to scroll for additional functions and makes the transitions smoother on the brain.
Can you delete a Stage widget from a homescreen and use the homescreen normally? Any idea if Dell’s release will allow disabling the Stage UI?
Look to me that this Stage thing is one big compromise to accommodate a profile home screen, as well as the normal landscape.
Looks ok on profile, but looks awful on landscape
glad you can turn this off. IF I use it, it’ll be on an outer homescreen, right out of the way of normal viewing
Holding home to bring up recent apps!
Amazing!
(I didn’t upgrade, but 1.1 had it too. Thanks Jenn!)
This is why I was waiting for my next upgrade. Now I’ll definately go for samsung galaxy tab. Dell streak is waste to me now unless they remove the overlap crap and get me back the 1.6 taskbar. What an immature UI.
Yes, you can use as little or as many widgets as you want. The home screen will still be 4×4, though, so if you want to make full use of each screen, then it is better to use a different launcher altogether like the ones shown in the photo at the top of this post.
In watching your video I was beginning to agree with you about not liking the widgets too much either because they seem to waste too much space. But then it got me thinking about how I could organize this in a more efficient way and came up with this idea.
Since there are 7 home screens how about only using the Stage widgets on every other home screen. I would start with a Stage widget on home screen 1 starting at the left most home screen and alternate so you end up with 4 home screens with Stage widgets and 3 without. The main home screen in the middle would not have a Stage widget.
In this arrangement you would have a stage widget with the space on each side being able to be used by the regular 1 x 1 icons of the next screen. What do you think? I think it should work fine since the areas on each side of the Stage widgets is interactive.
I can not believe Dell held up Froyo for this god awful looking crap. Thank goodness it can be disabled. Very disappointing.
hey jenn,
how did you get it to say Honolulu, HI on the Home Screen for the weather??, mine says Tamc, HI, I have no idea why :/
isnt that just a weather widget? normally you set it to either find your location (via network masts of gps) OR you can set a default
No thanks Dell… I have no interest in Stage.
I don’t even understand who would want this UI on their streak, it’s just wasting 1/3 of the available space with adjacent screens. Why not just use the lower corners for a user defined text label of what lies to either side?
Glad this can be disabled.
The location was found automatically.
Arghh I cant seem to fix it, I tried tapping on it then switching location or deleting the widget but it will go back to tamc, HI
Well, it seems like its working fine, my location is marked as TAMC, HI which means Tripler Army Medical Center, i had to google it lol
so dj steve ripped the dell stage ui out of the leaked dell froyo rom. isn’t that considered copyright violation? jus sayin.. who cares right?? lol
None of Dj Steve’s builds work on my Streak, i have the AWS Streak that works with t-mobile 3g usa…..All of Steve’s builds mess up my Streak, Every time I flashed one it made my Streak Crash within 5-10 minutes….and after it Crashes It Never turns back On n gets stuck on Dell logo and the Only Rom that works on my Streak is 6941-2.1 leaked 2.1
Hey Jen, just a correction to your video. You can move a shortcut from one screen to any other screen.
Instead of quickly dragging and dropping, drag the icon over to the side of the screen as far as you can and hold it there. It will scroll to the next page while holding on to the icon. Then you can drop it wherever you want.
I’m surprised with the responsiveness you’re having with your Stage Launcher. I think I just might give this launcher another try. Thanks for the Vid.
It should be mentioned though that the StaGe Launcher does not have it’s own ‘Settings’ or ‘Preferences’ that you can adjust, unlike the other 2 browsers included in 1.2
For those who are using the older versions, 1.2 is definitely a much improved ROM. I cant wait to see the overclocked version.
Oh, yes, I know that. I knew the Astro shortcut was on the other screen, though, so I wanted to add a new one to that column.
thanks jenn, this was really interesting and I can’t wait for the official Froyo now.
you put so much effort into the site and it is really appreciated!
still loving my Dell…
can’t wait for the official froyo. nuff of this dj stevo beta stuff.
Where can we find the evo build?
At the link in the EVO post. Read the last sentence in that post.
well it sure looked to me like you were having problems in the video.
I quite agree with oduck.
Google did such a wonderful innovative job with the android user interface. Coming from winmo, to me, every little touch in android seemed just right and was such a pleasure to discover the thoughtful details even after the millionth time using it.
I’m really glad Dell is trying to add to the Streak-android experience but I can only wish they had taken it up with as much passion as google.
Watching this video I’m beginning to regret having bought a Dell Streak. Stage UI is complete fail. At least it gives one the opportunity to hold the home screen in portrait mode, but in every other way it is crap.
I guess I’ll have to continue using ADW Launcher.
Why can’t Dell at least give us the option of turning Stage off and having a real Android experience?? FAIL.
That is one lovely voice!!
I sincerely hope that, when i post this, the time is not too late. tks.
is the Stage UI optional? Or is it a requirement to the update. I actually prefer the “rooms” on the stock ui.
I am also disappointed with new update. Once updated i cannot go back to old version. And in home screen, i cannot add the widget i want. It updates what i used last. I want to keep some widgets permenently in the home screen
I disappointed with new update. Once updated i cannot go back to old version. And in home screen, i cannot add the widget i want. It updates what i used last. I want to keep some widgets permenently in the home screen
how do you update?