Multi-touch technlogy is nice, but Apple’s design has one serious drawback — it’s useless unless you can see where you are touching! You know what I mean if you ever tried to change the Music’s volume blindly. It’s impossible! That’s why I use my 1st generation iPod shuffle when I go for my morning walk; it’s so clickable.
Thank goodness SkylarEC, a Super Moderator of iPod Touch Fan forum, made a unique app called “Pocket Touch” (ver 0.3b). It’s still in beta but boy it’s fantastic. You can change tracks and volume level simply by swiping your finger across the screen, blind-folded! Swiping left or right tells the music player to skip to track. A single tap pauses or un-pause the music player.
A quick swipe upwards brings the volume level up a notch. Swipe up again to increase it further.
Now… it all sounds easy… but it actually takes some getting used to. We normally adjust the volume level by dragging the volume knob forth and back to the desired level. Dragging, however, does not work in Pocket Touch! If you start dragging upwards, the volume level continues to adjust upwards even after you changed your mind and drag downwards!
However, like I said, it’s only a matter changing habit. It’s actually more fun to swipe up to incremently change the volume level!
Pocket Touch is still under development but you can try it out now. Download and installation instructions.
Ah, the iPod touch is one giant step towards perfection now. Thanks, SkylarEC!
Oh, the Popup Music Menu is still accessible should you need it… such as to take a quick peek at the title of the song, or perhaps quick access to the Music Player.
Mar 11 Update: To install via the Installer, you’ll need to add this new source: http://touchrepo.com/betarepo.xml
30 Comments
Excellent app yes. This one will be one of the first i’ll install when i’ll be jailbroken… still waiting for the new Official Dev Team methods.
On a sidenote; iPlus 2.0 just got released!
http://ipluspwns.blogspot.com/2008/03/released-iplus-20.html
iPlus 2.1, with ipod support, is imminent now! EPIC
I’ve tried that but I really think there should be some sort of customization option if you don’t want to have to swipe in the required direction.
wow just love it
tried it today and the music swap is simply perfect. im not a big fan of the volume controls but boy am i glad skylar brought up this app !!
in the same category Touchpad has updated ! its now touchpad PRO ! its even more magic ! two fingers scroll is now possible !!(with a mac only i guess)
the ipod touch is getting cooler everyday …
SDK POWER !!
I’ve downloaded this and love it, although swiping left to go to next song is kinda oxymoronic. Skylar has edited it, cause I remember that at first, swiping right was next song…ah well. Still beats taking out of my pocket!
Thank you. I’m gonna use it! It solves one of the most silly things about the interface!
Greets from Chile.
jp.
Definitely will try out when my re-jailbreak finishes. I was just thinking today, “You know, I used to be able to roll the click wheel in my pocket, once I oriented my iPod… I can’t do that now…” but now I can!
@Vanya
Yah, apparently Skylar decided to swipe …” in line with Photos, etc.”
Totally weird logic.
Shouldn’t the swipe direction follow the music player?
But of course, the best solution is, like momott said, make it a user option and let us decide.
This is a great app. I misted that from my iPod video days. I agree that we should be able to custumize the ‘next song’ swipe direction. One thing though, if the Touch screen goes to sleep (completely black after a few minutes of not touching) the app doesn’t work anymore. You have to push the ’sleep’ button and ’slide to unlock’. Would it be possible or a good idea to have this app keep the iPod from sleeping?
Hey RupertGee, got a quick question for you. I recently found your blog and I love your tutorials and info!
Anyways, I used to have my touch jailbroken to 1.1.3 when it came out a while ago but I quickly downgraded to 1.1.2 after finding out pretty much NONE of my previous 3rd party apps/games/iphone apps worked anymore. I want to jailbreak to 1.1.3 again, but is there a point? Why would I need it? Are all the repos out there hosting apps that work on 1.1.3 now or what? I also want to use youre 1.1.3 theme, I want wiggle…but I don’t want the hassle of worrying if something will or will not work again
Thanks for the help!
Bartek
@bartek:
Hey man. I totally understand what you mean. At this point, most apps are compatable with 1.1.3. Even summerboard and customize are fully funcional. However, because 1.1.4 recently came out there aren’t a whole lot of reasons to jailbreak 1.1.3. Just use ziPhone (www.ziphone.org) and you’ll be good to go!
@momott:
The 1.1.4 problem is not hard to get around. iSpazio (link on Rupert’s Blogroll) has a patch that fixes it, or your could SSH into your iPod’s system info file and change the number “1.1.4″ to “1.1.3″… Usually that number is all the apps look for.
I changed mine to 1.1.5 for a while, just for fun.
Installed fine over here
Thanks for sharing this Rupert, saves me a couple of seconds, at least ’til my iPod Radio Remote likes the iPod Touch
I installed it last night, and I used it ALL DAY in school. It’s so much more convenient than having to pull it out of my pocket, unlock, put in the passcode, go to Music, press Pause. Now, I can leave it unlocked and it hardly uses up any power, and I can pause, fast-forward, etc. I can’t wait until he releases it with Diagonal commands (his next update)…
im sure that the swiping from left to right to play the previous song and the right to left to play the next song hast a reason. i think this app is actually more for the iphone cuas iphone user will have their phone not upside down (not liek the iPod Touch) in their pocket cause of the plugin for the headphones. so with the iPhone upside down the swiping left-to-right would actually be right-to-left when the iphone is upside down in the pocket….
just thinking…actually iPod Touch users have it upside down xD…haha i hope i didnt confuse u guys HaHa
Yo people! Check ziphone.org for iPoT no matter how big woooooooooooooooooo
Btw, this app hasbeen updated to v 1.0b, which has the option to enable volume and/or track swipes, and reverse the function of each.
v1.1 video preview of this amazing app:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TouchPodium/~3/252592496/
[offtopic]
btw, i’m finally jailbroken!
i used the safe jailbreak-only method from Ziphone 2.6b as it’s harmless and doesn’t tamper with the BL in any way.
I did the jailbreaking proces on firmware 1.1.4 (upgraded from 1.1.3 OOTB) (not even restored) on an iMac in 40 seconds I think. Awesome! It kept all my settings, music and videos intact! So I didn’t need to sync again… woohooo because syncing 32GB takes 3.5 hours to complete.
Jailbreaking is so much fun!
[/offtopic]
@thegpc: you do know that when you reach the slide to unlock screen you can just double click the home button and the music controls appear?
New version has been released with “Shake” feature to go to a random song
Yea, I found Shake to be really annoying. I got off the bus today, and the jumping motion made the song go to a random one. It’s very sensitive. I just turn it off.
I do like the “Exchange Swipes” though, because my belt clip makes it go into Landscape, so it helps.
1.2 out today… Can’t see much of a difference past aesthetic things, but it looks better now, I guess…
Skylar’s also planning a blue progress bar, which i presume is for the track, and how far through the song you are
For 1.3 forgot to add
And where’s Rupert gone? Haven’t seen him on for a while…
@Vanya:
You know, that’s a good point. Where’s the dude? Without him, I’m lost in the sea of the INternet, trying to find good stuff to install… T_T
Lol, yeah, I miss his handy tips and tricks. Maybe on holiday??
Have you heard of Caterpillar? It allows you to have a 5 icon dock, reflective dock, as well as a Calendar on the unlock screen. Costs 45US for unlimited usage, but there is a way around that *wink wink*
@Vanya:
Yea, I was taking a look at that. How do you get around paying for it? Isn’t that the whole point of jailbreak apps?
Lolz. I know that there’s a crack for 1.1.1, but there’s a new version (1.2), which allows you to delete apps just like you would web clips, but for now, no hack (YET)
Wait a mo. 1.1.1 has been hacked. add
sephone.nm.ru/ripdev.xml
as well as repo.fireonfive.com for the old caterpillar
first, download caterpillar, launch, then exit WITHOUT tapping anything. next, download the hack. ENJOY
p.s don’t open caterpillar again, or the hack will be voided. to change the settings, go to the settings app
Hi there,
I was googling and found your site.
I’ve been having problem logging in to wireless@sg using my jailbroken ipod touch…and called singtel and was told that wireless@sg can only be used via wifi enabled system –> laptop or mobile. Is that true ? if not, how should i make it work ?
Thanks.
@Miera
Try using your ipod
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