Unified Sensor API now supports the Omnia Light Sensor

Around a month ago I got a tip from an anonymous reader (I think it's a Samsung developer) on how to access the Samsung's light sensor. The tip seems to work correctly [0], so I added support for that sensor in the Sensor API.

I ended up having to refactor the API a little to support the Samsung light sensor transparently: the changes are similar to the ones I made a few months ago for transparently creating the proper IGSensor implementation on a given device.

So, the change log:

• HTCLightSensor is now a private class.
• SamsungLightSensor is a new private class.
• Refactored HTCGSensor and SamsungGSensor to derive from GSensorBase which inherits from PollingSensor. This change was made to consolidate much of the sensor code.
• Instead of creating an HTCLightSensor or SamsungLightSensor explicitly, developers should use the new LightSensorFactory.CreateLightSensor method to get the appropriate ILightSensor object for the phone the application is running on.

Here's the link for the updated API and code samples.

I'll be recompiling Klaxon shortly to accommodate the new changes.

[0] It looks like the way this is done is by reading the backlight intensity value, rather than actually reading the light sensor. The Omnia sets the backlight value based on that reading.

HTC Touch Diamond Stylus Sensor API

I spent a bit of time figuring out how to determine the stylus on the HTC Touch Diamond. It only took like 5 minutes: it was exactly where I suspected, a registry key that toggled depending on the stylus state. So basically it's really easy to access. I rolled access to this registry key up in the Sensor SDK.

(HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel\Keybd\StylusOutStatus for those curious.)

The new HTCStylusSensor has 2 members:

StylusState

This property is has a value that is either StylusIn or StylusOut.

StylusStateChanged

This event fires whenever the StylusState property changes.

Click here if you want to download the APIs and source to access the G-Sensor, Light Sensor, Nav Sensor, or Stylus Sensor.

 

I will be releasing an tool shortly that allows users to launch any application, shortcut, sound file, etc, when the stylus is removed from the device.

Another Klaxon Release

As promised, I implemented more bug fixes and features for this release. Download Klaxon here.

• The light sensor will only turn off your alarm if the phone is face up. This fixes the issue where the alarm gets shut off if the phones if flipped face down to snooze.
• If the phone is snoozing, a sensor can not be used to turn the alarm off. The off button must be manually pressed. This is a precaution to ensure the phone doesn't get erroneously turned off.
• The shake off function is implemented differently now: if at any point, the phone is subject to 20 G's of force, it will turn off. Previously, it was using an orientation change count. The G measurement method is much more reliable.
• As a silent confirmation, the phone will vibrate once if you put it into Snooze mode. It will Vibrate twice if you turned it off.
• All the sensor actions are configurable: you can now manually configure what you want the alarm to do when you shake it, flip it, or turn on the light.
• Implemented some of the UI clean up changes. This includes bigger Vista style check boxes and radio buttons.
• Implemented an About box which gives you information about your Klaxon version and the author.
• Fixed a bug where the registry entries were not being deleted properly when an alarm was deleted.
• Fixed a bug where the device would go to sleep after a Snooze and not wake up to alarm the user.
• Fixed a bug where the Delay setting was not being saved after editing it.

HTC Touch Diamond Nav Sensor API

Scott, from scottandmichelle.net, figured out how to detect which way the nav sensor was being moved. I did some further investigation with the data output and managed to figure the rotation per second readings that were also being returned with it.

The new HTCNavSensor has a single event:

Rotated

This event fires whenever the Nav sensor event is detected. The rotation event will provide the user with an approximate rotation per second value and a radial delta. The radial delta is a double value that describes how much the user has moved along the nav sensor since the last time the event was fired. I.e, a radial delta value of .25 would mean that the user moved his finger around a quarter rotation since the last the last time the nav sensor event fired.

As usual, the updated API can be downloaded here. The other sensor APIs (accelerometer and light sensor) are also available in the same zip file. So that wraps up accessing all the different sensors on the HTC Touch Diamond!

Let me know if you find any bugs!

Edit: I found a bug where the nav sensor was reporting clockwise movement when actually moving clockwise. Fixed that. Also updated the Nav Sensor Test to show a red line that rotates as you rotate around the sensor.

HTC Light Sensor API

Goofed around with the HTCSensorSDK.dll some more and figured out how to access the light sensor. I've updated the HTC Accelerometer API to allow access to the light sensor, and converted the values to make it developer friendly. The API exposes the following:

GetLumens

This returns a double value that describes the environmental lumens. It works decent at best, but it's a starting point. I calibrated this using a lightbulb, monitor, and other random light sources around the house I had the lumens values available for.

Brightness

Retrieves an arbitrary enum that describes the brightness of the environment. Values are Dark, Dim, Normal, and Bright.

BrightnessChanged

This event will notify you whenever the brightness changes.

You can download the API here. Let me know if you find any bugs!

Update:

I've updated the SDK to access the Nav sensor as well!