[doomsey]

I've written three new, free utilities for the Treo 650 (they may also work on the Treo 600 and other Palm OS5 based devices).

The first, keyshades, is a free alternative to KBLightsOff for allowing user control of the keyboard backlight.

The second, Kill Touchscreen, allows the touchscreen to be disabled under user control. Good for fumble-fingered people who are constantly tapping the screen accidently.

The third, Reset Netlib, allows the Palm's network library to be reset without resetting the entire device. This is often useful for clearing up problems applications have opening up TCP connections. For example, in many cases it can resolve the "Too Many Online Mailboxes" error in Chatter Email.

All three are BSD licensed with the source code included.

last revisions:
Keyshades: v1.1, 26 May 2005, better handling of side button
Reset Netlib: 11 May 2005, fixes a bug where network stack doesn't reset when all connections are closed but network stack is still open.
kill-touchscreen: v1.1, 22 June 2005, better handling of side button (from keyshades), side+opt mode, autostart on reset

[SciPug]

Thanks, Doomsey! I just tried out keyshades right now. Works great. Getting the timing right to get the keyboard lights to go out without setting off the program that's triggered by the side button is going to take a little bit of getting used to (maybe two quick clicks would be better). But I like it. And you can't beat that price. Thanks!

[gt5l]

they are hack, you need hack manager to use them is that right

[doomsey]

All three applications are self-contained. No external hack manager is required.

[Lorea]

Thanks doomsey!

I installed the keyboard one, and already my keyboard lights aren't on. But I'm confused....how do I change any settings, or switch them on and off? It's not showing up as a program or in my preferences at all.

Thanks!

It's getting late, and I can't type on my Treo anymore....

[doomsey]

hold the side button down for ~1 sec. If you release it when the lights change state, it won't trigger the application bound to the button.

(it's in the readme )

[stylez23]

nice work.. would be nice if it had a launcher item.. other than that its a nice alternative to kb lightsoff.. any plans for an update?

[doomsey]

For keyshades? Probably not, unless I find a problem with it. If you want the extra control it offers, KBLightsOff may be a better choice.

I probably will do some work on Kill Touchscreen to make it remember its settings and automatically start up on reset at some point.

[scrungew00t]

The second, Kill Touchscreen, allows the touchscreen to be disabled under user control. Good for fumble-fingered people who are constantly tapping the screen accidently.

... or who just flatly despise touchscreens

[tonylmiller]

Keyshades seems perfect to me. Thanks! They should have included this with the device. . .

[Lorea]

hold the side button down for ~1 sec. If you release it when the lights change state, it won't trigger the application bound to the button.

(it's in the readme )

Oops! Sorry....I guess I was looking for a *.txt file instead of something called "readme"...silly me!

Anyways, I tried holding it down for 1 sec, a quick tap, a long hold.....and the lights never change for me. It'll just jump to my pTunes app..and even if I continue holding it past my app launch, the lights never turn back on.

[ziphem]

What's the difference in resetnetlib and the reset-netlib prc files?

[doomsey]

Anyways, I tried holding it down for 1 sec, a quick tap, a long hold.....and the lights never change for me. It'll just jump to my pTunes app..and even if I continue holding it past my app launch, the lights never turn back on.

I can think of two possibilities:

• Something (Pockettunes, maybe? I've never used it) is hooking the side button and not letting keyshades see it.
• Something else (brightcam, kblightsoff) is interfering with its operation. I know that kblightsoff just being on the same Treo can cause the lights to go off and not come back on. Anything that can control keyboard lights or dim the display may interefere with keyshades.

If you can give me instructions to reproduce the problem without any software like kblightsoff or brightcam installed, I will look into fixing it.

[doomsey]

What's the difference in resetnetlib and the reset-netlib prc files?

oops! resetnetlib.prc is an old version. use reset-netlib.prc instead.
I fixed the archive.

[hofo_mofo]

hey doomsey...i just uninstalled kblightsoff and installed the keyshade app...very very very nice!..great work...

small thing if possible...im used to the keyboard timing out with kblightsoff, is there some wayt o add that or something.

What i really love about the app actually is that when you turn the keyboard lights off they stay off until you hit the side button. Great work, great app, great everything

much appreciated man

[ziphem]

Should the "Reset Netlib" program be turning off the GPRS connection that is on? I have the T600 and the Netlib program just makes the screen flash, but I'm not sure if it's doing anything!

Thanks.

[Lorea]

I can think of two possibilities:

• Something (Pockettunes, maybe? I've never used it) is hooking the side button and not letting keyshades see it.
• Something else (brightcam, kblightsoff) is interfering with its operation. I know that kblightsoff just being on the same Treo can cause the lights to go off and not come back on. Anything that can control keyboard lights or dim the display may interefere with keyshades.

If you can give me instructions to reproduce the problem without any software like kblightsoff or brightcam installed, I will look into fixing it.

Maybe it's 2 things:

• I had VoiceLauncher installed and it "stole" my side button away from PTunes (it wouldn't let me go to PTunes, no matter how long I held the button for)...in order to try out your app (which I think is great, btw), I unmapped VoiceLauncher and went back to simple PTunes.
  
• I do have Profiles installed, and that dims the screen at night.....might that have anything to do with it? Also, I had mLights installed at one point, but it was uninstalled. I've never tried kblightsoff.

Thanks doomsey!

[longbeard]

I liked the keyshades!.. Cool.. On the Reset Netlib can you give more info on what it does..

[doomsey]

It makes repeated calls to the network library requesting its immediate shutdown.

If the screen blinks and nothing else happens, it means that the network library did not respond to 16 of these requests. (It's reference counted, and it's possible that the library has been opened more than 16 times - but probably is unlikely.) If it worked, it will pop up a dialog saying "Should be done" and the data connection will be dropped.

On my Treo this will solve certain specific problems with running out of available sockets (which manifests as the Too Many Online Mailboxes error in Chatter, and other errors along the lines of Can't Open TCP socket in other applications.)

Although I expect it to work on any Palm OS based device with a network stack, I have no way of testing it on a Treo 600.

[shneor]

Finally, a utility that just gives you manual control over the keyboard lighting and does nothing else!
Thanks a bunch!!