[Android Themes] Tweak32:
This is an idea I have from my experience using themes on my Samsung Captivate. My experiences i describe apply particularly to the AOKP builds for that device and a few others. However the concepts are something which would be implemented at a system level and I think it would be applicable for any Android device, so I wanted to share it here in the general forum as well.

I like the color picker in Rom Control for ICS AOKP, but I was surprised that you pick and choose each color separately for clock, signal, etc. There is the hard-coded button to recall the ICS holo blue. I would love to see another button that stores a user selected color instead of copying and pasting the hex codes, although that works. And then the wireless signal is a graphic image that you cant change without flashing a .zip to modify system png and the like. I wondered if it could be coded to use a triangle with a fill color based on something from the color picker, and then lay over top of that grey or black bars for the part that should be 'off'. maybe layers arent possible? tho it appears that they are being used, and i have seen overlap of the data signal on top of the wireless bars. right? I know there is a LOT of stuff these amazing developers are working on which keeps them very busy already. These are just some ideas

I noticed looking through some of the code in AOKP gerrit for the theme chooser updates, that they started using variables instead of a hard coded ICS holo blue color. but it seems as if there is no user interaction for that color, its still a hard coded value set in a single location instead of being hard coded in multiple locations. So it is a huge improvement Im sure for themers who have to try to search out and modify every instance of those values. I would just like to see it progress to something where the end user can modify that variable from Rom Control.

It would be even more awesome if Android used a system wide style sheet setup. background, checkbox style, text color, font, font size, perhaps it could even include specs for headers, paragraphs, tables, titles, etc. but that would be WAY more than I am thinking. It certainly works nicely for web design tho.

This would then be something that other apps could also read and implement into their design as well. Then we wouldn't have to create hacked SMS and google play, and tapatalk, etc, etc, etc. to make them inverted or red, green, orange, blue, yellow, etc.

Of course having an option to over-ride those settings is cool too, maybe you want an all orange theme, but you want white on your keyboard keys. a keyboard app could have a selector built into its settings which allows you to follow the system setting or pick your own base color, or go with the developers default choice. There are a lot of great developers out there who make gorgeous apps that deserve to keep their defaults, ie. 1weather. So I am sure apps would ship with their own defaults turned on, so the user is guaranteed the experience they intended.

I do think these ideas seem inline with what google is trying to accomplish with their unified design standards.

I am imagining a day where I can change my wallpaper and then open settings, use a color picker (maybe even one that can pick a color from the wallpaper :eek: ... Then maybe choose black or white, or gradient or transparent background. Two steps, and just that simply and quickly my whole system is color themed to compliment. Then using Tasker this could even be automated for work, home, weekends, etc. LOL.

Ok iphone, take that!