[Android Apps and Games] doberman16:
Greetings...

Until today, I’ve been just a reader of the forums and have gotten great information that way. I've finally found something that I really want to contribute on because I want to see it go to the moon and back. That said I apologize for the wall of text. If you're looking for a TL;DR, scroll to the bullets.

We all (or most of us anyway) know that TSF Shell 3D was released a couple days ago and the buzz is slowly growing. Anyone who has read the Market description of this launcher pretty much knows that it's straight from Google Translate. By no means am I bashing the developers for this. Hell, I purchased it the day after purchasing SPB Shell. So I more than support their work.

However, as I stated, the Market description is pretty terrible. As far as I can tell, the TSFUI website is down, and there really isn't a one-stop-shop to find out what features you just spent $16.80 on (more on price later).

So, hopefully the wonderful users of XDA can come up with an unofficial guide which can be added to as we stumble across features. Everything I've found has been in random article comments, very few forum posts, and personal experience. At any rate, I'll list what I've been able to confirm and hopefully we can go from there?

TSF Shell - Unofficial User Guide [WIP]

Disclaimer: This guide is based on personal experience. I have no connection to the developer of TSF Shell. All claims regarding working/broken, supported/unsupported features are strictly based upon my experience using a rooted, stock rom Motorola Milestone X. If you see something incorrect, please let me know and I will correct it immediately.

The Switch Button

The switch button is used to switch between your 4 personalized pages as well as the App Drawer or App Page.

You can tap the Switch Button to show a preview of your screens. Simply tap any screen to switch to it.

A slightly quicker way to use the switch button is to tap and hold it, and then drag your finger to the desired screen.

Tapping and holding an icon from any Personalized Page and dragging it to the Switch Button will also show the screen preview, allowing you to quickly move the icon to a different screen.

The App Drawer

The App Drawer or App Page can be accessed by tapping the Switch Button and then tapping the far left page.

The App Drawer uses a horizontal paginated scroll effect. As of yet, there is no way to switch to a vertical scroll.

There are 6 different scroll animations to choose from. You can switch the animation style on the fly by tapping the small tab in the upper left (just below the first row of apps).

Double tapping an app in the App Drawer will put a green check mark on it. This can be done to several apps at a time. Click and hold any of the apps you've pre-selected and the screen preview will appear, allowing you to move several apps to the same screen at once. When you drop them on the preferred screen, they will automatically arrange nicely into a grid. You can resize and move this grid to your liking. Tap anywhere off the grid or tap the circular arrow (refresh-looking symbol?) in the upper right.

When a new app is installed, it will have a fire animation on it until it is launched for the first time. On my phone (Milestone X), the fire is only animated while scrolling and is static while not scrolling. I'm unclear whether this is intended or a bug.

Personalized Pages

Personalized pages are fairly similar to the standard screens we are used to with Android. One major difference, however, is swiping them does not switch screens. It draws a lasso instead.

This lasso can be used to select multiple icons. When you complete a full circle with the lasso, a menu will pop up. This menu allows you to Arrange, Multi-Choice (like double-tapping in the App Drawer), Create a Folder, or Delete. There is a fifth option called "Gather", this feature is unavailable thus far. There is also a '?' in the center of the option menu which appears to do nothing. The lasso tool cannot select widgets.

All normal widgets can be placed on the Personalized pages as usual. Long press, or Menu > Add. Both of these methods allow you to change wallpaper as well. **Note** Live Wallpaper is apparently not supported currently.

Personalized pages do not have a defined grid, so the only way to align your asia neatly is to lasso them and use the arrangement option.

Personalized pages also allow you to place apps at any angle using multi-touch. Press and hold the app and turn it with the other finger.

The Side Bar

By default, the tab that activates the Side Bar is located on the middle left of the screen.

The Side Bar has 3 available tabs, they are as follows:

Smilie Face - I assume the Smilie Face implies favorites? Basically you can drag and drop apps in and out of this tab for fast access.

Settings Cog - This tab contains all TSF Shell specific widgets. You will NOT find these widgets (yet, anyway) through Menu > Add > Widgets or through Long Press > Widgets.

Thumb Tack - I'll call this the "Decorations Tab" because, as far as I can tell, there are three items listed here. A cloud, a ghost, and a pumpkin. Each of these can be places on any Personalized page. You can not tap through them, so placing them completely over an app or widget will require you to move them before being able to use the app or widget from that location. These "Decorations" don't appear to be animated and don't appear to serve any purpose other than "Hey guys, check this out!” I would imagine these will be elaborated on in the future?

Finally, if you tap and hold any of the above listed tabs, you can change their order around, as well as drag the whole side bar tab. You can move the side bar tab vertically anywhere between the bottom of the notification bar and the top of the Switch Button.

The Price:

One tiny rant on that... please stop complaining about the cost of this launcher, people. I don't see anyone crying over the $200 "Diamond Widget" app that does literally nothing but prove you have $200 to blow. Or, worse yet, that you have only $200 to your name and you've now blown it all accidentally :D The developers put a lot into this and it shows. Appreciate it or use the plethora of free launchers available.