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The original was posted on /r/androidthemes by /u/OfWaywardWill on 2023-11-11 02:06:31+00:00.
Hello and thanks for reading. I know most of us are here for the beautiful themes, but if you have a little time, I'd love to hear what you're running! This post will hopefully serve to create a sort of community snapshot of what themes, launchers, and other components like fonts, apps, or widgets everyone is using at the moment. It would be really nice of you to share what your setup is as well as why you like it.
That's all for the main point, but I have some personal thoughts and stuff to share too if you'll read on. guess they could be controversial but the point isn't to start an argument. Just my observations of what's going on lately in the world of launchers and theming.
Okay so, for a long while now I've been using a mix between the Smart Launcher 6, Total Launcher, Nova, and default OneUi with heavy customization using the samsung theming apps. Really, really love DrumDestroyer's icons (Especially Dominion even though it's falling behind in support) and I like to customize them for personal use with Icon Pack Studio. I've used countless themes but one I adore recently is Nasapunk for KLWP. For Total, I can't get enough of the customization but there's a pretty serious lack of templates or community for that launcher. Still, the power over my setup is unmatched and it runs well. I bought this new Star Trek one recently. Been fiddling around with it a ton and it continues to surprise me with how well made it is considering the tools. Another is Exentria, which I use as a template for a lot of my stuff considering how minimal it is, but functional. Also, fonts! I use fonts like Consolas and Roboto Mono because of the slashed 0 but I tend to switch themes up a lot so I use whatever fits. I wish I had screenshots of my previous layouts but I'm currently in the process of learning KLWP and my phone is a mess!
Besides that though, something I want to note is that while I was searching for info on KLWP and doing a checkup on the current trends, I notice that Nova still accounts for a huuuuge portion of users. That's not really surprising since it's been a gold standard for years and I've personally used it as an optimal environment for apps, themes, icons, and widgets. Especially for testing my own app functionality and performance because of how many users have Nova. I just figured that things would balance out with new competition, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Kinda makes it simple for me from a dev perspective, but also a little disappointed there isn't more variety. It's a complicated feeling.
However, as I'm sure a lot of you know, Nova was recently purchased by an analytics company and stated that it is now a project for data analysis. Personal opinions aside, that's a significant change for the future. It's not exactly unique since other launchers have abundant permissions, trackers, data collection, and probably do their fair share of deals with data companies. Not to mention that all programs, apps, and services collect data to some extent. Damn near impossible to avoid but it's also not very impactful in reality. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It is what it is. So now I'm wondering if/when people will start trying other launchers. I kinda doubt there will be a huge change, but it does make me wonder what kind of new themes and layouts will pop up. Personally, I'll admit I wish there was more of a community in Total, but ultimately I just think it would be cool to see people experimenting with other launchers and theming apps. I think a lot of devs are afraid of being experimental because most of the community has settled of a few launchers and therefore theme and widget apps need to support those or integrate well into them. Just my 2 cents, don't overthink anything I said x)
I hope to see some cool designs!