Update on screen dimming

[pruss]

Originally Posted by salsaguy

I noticed the hard buttons for home , left, right, and menu are full bright when its enabled even if you have the rest of the screen down to 10 percent e.g.

There is a separate menu option for turning off the hard button lights. It's kind of experimental--I am not sure it works for everyone.

Also the low point on the bar graph swipe area starts to the left of center which is sometimes confusing when i want to adjust it.

The bars are non-linear in order to allow more precision at the low end. The low-end of the scale is stretched since the low end is presumably where most users will be adjusting. This is more important on small screens than on large ones.

If you want an exact 50%, just tap on the 50% button.

[hoosiermama]

I have a question on the app...sometimes when I'm reading, the brightness goes randomly back to full brightness (I have programmed each of the nighttime settings and daytime settings). Once I open the app back up, it becomes dimmed again before I ever do anything. The active button is checked. Like I said, it's just random times when it can happen.

I don't want to put it in a review, but thought I'd post it here at the app's "home" to see if that can be looked at.

I LOVE this app!

[pruss]

Originally Posted by hoosiermama

I have a question on the app...sometimes when I'm reading, the brightness goes randomly back to full brightness (I have programmed each of the nighttime settings and daytime settings). Once I open the app back up, it becomes dimmed again before I ever do anything. The active button is checked. Like I said, it's just random times when it can happen.

Here's one possibility. The OS is set to dim the screen seven seconds before the screen timeout turns off the screen. Unfortunately, the dim setting is actually brighter than ScreenDim's dim settings, so if ScreenDim is running, that dimming looks like a brightening. If that's the issue, setting your screen timeout to a longer time might help. There is nothing that I can do about this. On Android 2.2, there is a way to turn off the dim-seven-seconds-before-off feature, but on Android 2.3 the setting can't be changed.

[hoosiermama]

Here's one possibility. The OS is set to dim the screen seven seconds before the screen timeout turns off the screen. Unfortunately, the dim setting is actually brighter than ScreenDim's dim settings, so if ScreenDim is running, that dimming looks like a brightening. If that's the issue, setting your screen timeout to a longer time might help. There is nothing that I can do about this. On Android 2.2, there is a way to turn off the dim-seven-seconds-before-off feature, but on Android 2.3 the setting can't be changed.

Thanks for that. I think I have mine set for 5 minutes of inactivity. I'll play with it tonight. I think it was sooner than five minutes that it had done that (because I was reading at the time).

[pruss]

Originally Posted by hoosiermama

Thanks for that. I think I have mine set for 5 minutes of inactivity. I'll play with it tonight. I think it was sooner than five minutes that it had done that (because I was reading at the time).

See if you, or anyone else, can figure out when it happens. The hardest bugs to catch are ones that are intermittent and can't be duplicated at will.

In this case, I don't actually think it's a bug per se, but just something incompatible in the system. There may be a way around it. I could always cheat by double-checking the screen brightness every half second, so if it does it, it'll come back to the old light level very soon. But that will waste battery time.

When testing, I have occasionally seen a brief flash of brighter light, maybe about 1/5 of a second long.

[hoosiermama]

Pruss, last night when I was reading I turned on ScreenDim. I read probably three or four pages (less than my 5 minute setting in the Fire's settings, anyway), and the screen became noticeably brighter. I decided to wait to see what happened. The screen remained bright for about 10-15 seconds, then dimmed again to the ScreenDim settings.

So I don't think it has anything to do with the Fire's sleep settings, because it's happening sooner than that, and brightens the screen, which then dims back to ScreenDim's setting.

Weird....

[pruss]

Originally Posted by hoosiermama

Pruss, last night when I was reading I turned on ScreenDim. I read probably three or four pages (less than my 5 minute setting in the Fire's settings, anyway), and the screen became noticeably brighter. I decided to wait to see what happened. The screen remained bright for about 10-15 seconds, then dimmed again to the ScreenDim settings.

I think something ran in the background. Can you install the Android Log Collector ( http://code.google.com/p/android-log-collector/ ) and use it to email me ( arpruss@gmail.com ) a log as soon as this happens next time?

[pruss]

Also, did you see if anything showed up on the notification bar around the time?

This is a longshot, but I wonder if turning off WiFi might help.

[pruss]

hoosiermama:

If you are willing to spend more time testing, I'd appreciate it if you also tried my special SO and SE versions. There is a moderate chance that one of these will avoid the problem.

[hoosiermama]

I think something ran in the background. Can you install the Android Log Collector ( http://code.google.com/p/android-log-collector/ ) and use it to email me ( arpruss@gmail.com ) a log as soon as this happens next time?

Sure...but you know that as soon as I do that, it will never happen again. Like when you take your car in for a rattle...the mechanic NEVER hears it.

[pruss]

Originally Posted by hoosiermama

Sure...but you know that as soon as I do that, it will never happen again. Like when you take your car in for a rattle...the mechanic NEVER hears it.

Well, if it's so rare it never comes up again, I'm pretty happy with that. But if it does come up, maybe you can install the SE or SO version for a couple of days. If you email me, I can send you non-expiring SE or SO versions (the links in my post were to three day trials).

[pruss]

My testing indicates that the SO version should be more reliable than either the SE version or the official release. But since I haven't been able to reproduce that bright flash thing (though I've seen it myself once--but it was much shorter), I can't check if the SO version helps. Could I get you to install the SO version for the three days of its trial, and then see if you ever see the brightening problem?

Just to clarify: The SO version doesn't help with the 7-seconds of brightening before screen timeout, but only with the problem where it brightens up and then goes back.

[hoosiermama]

My testing indicates that the SO version should be more reliable than either the SE version or the official release. But since I haven't been able to reproduce that bright flash thing (though I've seen it myself once--but it was much shorter), I can't check if the SO version helps. Could I get you to install the SO version for the three days of its trial, and then see if you ever see the brightening problem?

Ok, it brightened again last night while I was surfing the net. So I know it's not the reading app. Unfortunately, I didn't have the log file app on there. I have downloaded and installed the SO version of the app, and it hasn't done it yet. I've even let it go to sleep by itself, and it doesn't brighten prior to going to sleep.

I think this may be a keeper! Will there be a full version of this?

[pruss]

Originally Posted by hoosiermama

Ok, it brightened again last night while I was surfing the net. So I know it's not the reading app. Unfortunately, I didn't have the log file app on there. I have downloaded and installed the SO version of the app, and it hasn't done it yet. I've even let it go to sleep by itself, and it doesn't brighten prior to going to sleep.

It did brighten for me before going to sleep. :-(

I think this may be a keeper! Will there be a full version of this?

Sure, there will be a full version (and you can email me for a copy), but I'd like to make sure the naming of presets feature works well before releasing it officially. Don't want to break what works.

[hoosiermama]

Pruss, it just did it again with the SO version. I'm emailing you the log file.