YiShow vs ZLauncher

[xlr8]

Ok, this forum needed a controversial topic and i didnt see a yishow vs zlauncher here. I am looking for a new launcher and am considering yishow and zlauncher. What would be good if people could say in dot points what they do and dont like about each one. (Please no "my launcher is better than yours", just comparisons)

Yishow:

Cant minimise bottombar
restricted to 6 shortcuts
pressing jog brings up category select
Bg support direct from jpgs


Zlauncher:

Can minimise everything
can only cycle though tabs in one direction
double click back to change categories
quicklist/fav one extra tap but still very useful
minimising bottom bar interferes with okey (but not really zlaunchers fault)


Anyone else have any opinions?
(btw, using Yishow 5.3 for nx and latest zlauncher)

[LaStigmata]

Dude! Come-on! Your kidding right? Just look at the post's here.

ZLauncher, there is no other choice.

[Anita]

Rhetoric aside and regardless of what launcher other people use, most other people will say that since there's a 30-day trial on both, just use them both and choose the one YOU like best.

It's not necessarily a question of what a launcher DOESN'T have, it's what it DOES have that YOU want to use -- not what I or anyone else wants to use.

If your needs change or a launcher comes out with new features you like, then you can always switch.

Anita

[cbulock]

The only things that I liked better about YiShow was its file management. But now ZLauncher has a great new file manager.

YiShow also does a better job of arranging the icons to make your backgrounds look nicer. ZLauncher doesn't have that abilty yet.

But ZLauncher has better tabs than YiShow if thats important to you, though I don't use them. I like the Compact mode which is more like YiShow is.

ZLauncher is also very customizable You can set the color of just about anything you want (not sure if you can do this in YiShow) and they keep adding more and more features to customize. Some of the latest additions for example, now you can have the scroll bar on the left side for leftys, and you can set how the scrolling works (immediatly refresh icons during scroll or fast scroll where icons aren't refreshed until you are done). And those are just the features they added this week (yeah, another nice thing is there are new features added every week).

As you can see I'm a big ZLauncher fan, but you should try the trials of both app sso you can decide for yourself (or just buy ZLaucher since you will end up choosing that anyways:D ;) )

[wellsjs]

As I've said before:

Point :D ZLauncher if you're a 757 cockpit, love to fiddle kind of a person

Point :D YiShow if you're a Mercedes dashboard, simple elegance kind of a person

I use YiShow because I want my launcher to be an enabler, not an app in and of itself! ;)

[Gianni]

I say Zlauncher. You can just customize about everything. And if you dont like a skin that doesnt work with your background, you can always improvise to fix it. But Im biased towards the "ooh, ahh" effect.

[xlr8]

Originally posted by LaStigmata
Dude! Come-on! Your kidding right? Just look at the post's here.

ZLauncher, there is no other choice.

I said i wanted limitations or things better than with a certain launcher. I thought it would be useful having a list of the great things and the bad things about launchers to help people decide (i am trying both trials atm)

[LaStigmata]

Like I said, If you can't read the post's in this and other forums here at ClieSource and be able to come to some kind of conclusion on your own. Then a list here in this forum is not going to help. It seems to me that ZLauncher has become the standard. Shure, it may not suit everyones needs and tast's but thats ok. "Try the demo's and make your mind up yourself". This is not the first time this has been said, but a list of good and bad points? Why? I, nor should anyone else buy software based on someone elses thoughts without trying it out first.

but hay if you want a list here ya go.

Zlauncher

Color Support: Full color support from monochrome to 16-bit color depth (65,536 colors). You can set any color depth supported by handheld in application freely.
High-Resolution / High-Density Support: Support Sony High-Resolution(320 X 320) and High-Resolution+ (320 X 480), and ability to display High-Density icon on Pre-PalmOS5 Sony High-Resolution handhelds.Full support for PalmOS 5. Support High-Density(320 X 320).
Customizing User Interface:
Support THEME & Icon Set.
ZLauncher can convert a BMP/PGP/JPG(with the Sony Jpeg Decode Library, which is available for Clie NR70/NR70V/T650C/T665C) file into the background image database directly. You can change the background image according to your favor.
You can change various color of the interface, such as icon text color, tab title text color, tab background color, and etc..
You can change various font of the icon text.
You can change the tab icon.
You can hide tab caption manually or automatically.
Support 3 item view modes(Icon view, List view, Detail view).
Flexible Management: You can organize applications, databases or files in tabs. You can rearrange or hide the tabs according to your favor.
Each tab matches a system category. You can manage the category quickly and easily. And you also can overwrite the category information of system with ZLauncher's.
Each expansion card on handheld is corresponding to a single tab.
Support specified category. You can choose one of the multiple presets or specify the database creator and type to create a specific tab.
Support Trash Bin which is similar to the one in Windows. You can put useless applications or databases into trash bin, or recover the applications/databases from trash bin if necessary. You also can delete the items directly if you are sure they are useless.
Support of creating Short-Cut database for the application which is stored on expansion card. You can categorize the Short-Cut database to any Application Category.
Convenient Manipulation:
Drag & Done. You can perform most manipulations of applications, databases and files (such as categorizing, viewing information, beaming, deleting, and etc.) by dragging.
Pop-up operating menu. Tapping on an item for a while will pop up an operating menu. Highlight an item, and press the JogDial for a while also can pop up the operating menu.
You can customize Beaming and Deleting operations. If the operated item is an application, you can only operate on the application or operate on it and its related databases together.
You also can beam all applications/databases/files in a tab at one time.
Support jog wheels such as Sony JogDial and Treo RockerSwitch, and Palm 5-Way Navigator. You can perform most common operations with single hand.
Full Expansion Card Support:
You can directly perform operations on expansion card files such as moving, copying, viewing information, beaming, deleting, and etc.. You even can operate the whole directory tree. This operation is as simple as operating in Windows.
You can export applications and databases from memory(ROM or RAM) to expansion card, or import the files from expansion card to RAM. The exported files must be in the form of standard PalmOS database(PRC, PDB or PQA).
You can launch a application from anywhere of expansion card directly.
Support multiple expansion cards. You can copy or move files/directories between different expansion cards of a handheld.
Path-Tree enables you to go to anywhere of the expansion card quickly and easily.
Easy Launching:
Quick Launch list records the latest launched applications. With the help of Quick Launch list, you can launch the common application quickly and easily.
Fast Find enables you to find out a certain application/database/file quickly. Type character within the preset interval can highlight the item which matches the inputted string best. During the period of highlight, inputting a linefeed character will launch/open the highlighted item.
You can launch a application by tapping its related database.
Advanced Information Management:
View the system information in detail. You can know the status of your handheld clearly at anytime.
You also can view the information of application/database/file or modify its attributes.
Easy Function Extension: Support file association. By associating databases/files with a specified application, you can directly open a specified database/file which isn't an application ( E.g., after installation of ZReader Lite for ZLauncher which is bundled with ZLauncher, you can tap to read the PalmOS format document directly.)Note, this feature only available with ZReader Lite at the moment.

YiShow

YiShow Explorer is a powerful application Launcher for Palm handheld PDAs. It integrates the functions of viewing pictures, reading e-books, and managing files in one program. Its features include:

Easy operation and high speed picture viewing.
BMP/PCX/JPEG/Picture Gear Pocket format support.
Smooth scrolling for images larger than the screen resolution.
SlideShow image viewing.
DOC/MeDOC file format support and the ability to show and bookmark such files stored in RAM/Memory Stick.
Text file support: able to view and bookmark text file stored in MS.
Launcher functionality that is able to directly launch programs stored in Memory Stick.
Creation of short-cuts for programs, images, DOC/MeDoc documents that are stored in Memory Stick for easy access.
Automatic import/export for programs stored in the memory stick's palm/Launcher directory.
Creation of short-cuts for programs, images, and DOC/MeDoc documents that are stored in Memory Stick for easy access.
User self-customizable skin: you can change the look of for YiShow's buttons, CLIE built-in icons, and file type bitmaps with high resolution support.
Provides Pop-up and Tab type Category management with drag-and-drop support.
Hidden programs, directories, and files based on system security settings.
Flawless file management support: You can copy files between RAM <-> MS and MS <-> MS. You can easy copy files between different Memory Sticks.
Viewing modes for low resolution icon, high resolution icon, and detail listing.
Support for CLIE PEG High resolution and color
Support for CLIE PEG Memory Stick and Jog Dial
Support for CLIE PEG Hardware JPG decoding function
Support for CLIE PEG 320x480 display

Hope this helps.
But really, try them both then give your $12 bucks to the guys at ZZTECH. If for nothing else, the continued "Super Support". Cause face it, when that new software comes out tomarrow that glitches with YiShow, what kind of support will you get?

This has been My 2 cents.
Thank you for your time.

[zipslack]

Couple of factors why I use YiShow 5.2 on my T415:

1. My unit is grayscale - YiShow doesn't care....take a high-color graphic or theme and it displays it -- no problem. ZL requires seperate grayscale and color themes -- just try to find a hires grayscale theme for ZL other than the crappy and hard-to-see them that it comes with.

2. YiShow's file manager. Still seems to be more capable and intuitive than ZL.

3. YiShow has built-in doc-reader (slow, but usable) and graphics viewer (also slow, but usable). Once again, the graphic viewer does not care about color-depth.

4. Most of the ZL themes (including the default one) seem somewhat "cartoonish". Some of the newer ones looks pretty good, but YiShow seems to have a more "professional" (i.e. - clean) look that I prefer.

One thing I don't like about YiShow - 5.3 stinks. It would crash on me when doing MS operations and I absolutely hate the new quickbar. I much prefer 5.2 over 5.3.

All this is based on my previous encounters with ZL 2.20 and may not be indicative of the current state of affairs.

5. Ooops, forgot something....SPEED!!!! ZL is MUCH slower than YiShow on re-display and refreshing (even with the cycle-sucking stuff turned off) on my 33 MHz machine.

[bcringo]

I have an NR70V and I absolutely love YIshow. I like the following:

1. The interface is clean and user-friendly.

2. Very customizable. I can use my pics for background if I like.

3. It displays apps on MS with main mem apps.

4. File manager works pretty good. *see below*

5. Seems to be as fast as no launcher at all.

6. Ease of customization on the fly


Things I don't like:

1. MS issues with Yishow 5.3 (I didn't notice probs with prev versions)

2. Would like to have pop-up menus of app catergories, ex.. Medical apps, Utilities, Games etc... or even recent apps.

3. Get rid of the new quick launch bar that is new with Yishow 5.3


Overall, I will stick with Yishow. I have tried other launchers but I still come back to old faithful Yishow.

[xlr8]

I've started using yishow and am content with it. Btw, if you press the jog dial it brings up the category select bit.

Also what is wrong with the 5.3 quick launch bar (was it better on previous versions?)

[zipslack]

The quickbar is a new feature of 5.3 -- take a look at the demo. When you use the bottom bar to switch to tab view, the next rotation brings up the quickbar. You have to tap again to get back to the normal operations bar and there is no way to turn the quickbar off, so you're stuck with cycling through 3 bars now. Also, the bar is not very customizable...it has a YiShow card icon and a hotsync icon by default along with the 4 basic palm apps. YOu can drag other apps to it to add icons, but you can't remove them or re-order them. Also, any Palm icons that you add to it are not transparent and make the bar look completely terrible. The only way I found to remove an icon was to delete the app!

[aaronrkelly]

I am using YiShow and not having any difficulties with the bar - jus drag another app to the place of one you want rid of and it replaces it.....you can also reorder them this way aswell. Its isnt as easy but its only a few extra steps.

Some icons arent transparent, thats why I use AppIcon and change the ones that arent - although on my palm that was only a couple not all of them. Anywho my background image is just fine around my icons with the appbar.

[jettie1767]

Have a dumb question....how do you drag and drop with these launchers?

[rob_squared]

Pretend your stylus is a mouse, and you'll get a transparent-looking copy of the icon you're dragging. Kind of like windows actually.

[Mr Sheen]

Besides all the other positives, ZL has the best support one can dream.

Sheen

[arinvolvo]

Ok, I am a Yishow user from way back...I also have ZL on my NR...I love ZL...but it is starting to get so complicated I cant even find my way around it anymore...Sometimes i get frustrated and revert back to Yishow, which I know like the back of my hand, and has never given me any problems...

ZL has never given me problems either (like bugs) but it is just starting to confuse me...too many options!!

Both are excellent launchers, and I really couldnt pick just one, that i why they are both on there.

[wid4008]

Must I say anything more, just go for Zlauncher.
You will not regret it.

[wellsjs]

Being a very recent convert from YiShow to ZL, I like being pretty much able to put stuff where you want them with ZL, i.e. battery/mem/clock at top or bottom. Quick launch icons at top or bottom, and tabs on any of four sides of screen. Also, ZL seems to be more stable than YiShow.

[Unregistered]

I use YiShow!

[xlr8]

I tried both and think i'll stick to yishow. Zlauncher is a really great program with heaps of options (which you can hide so it doesnt clutter up) but i find yishow more efficient

[LaStigmata]

Originally posted by xlr8
I tried both and think i'll stick to yishow. Zlauncher is a really great program with heaps of options (which you can hide so it doesnt clutter up) but i find yishow more efficient

I would like to know how YiShow can be more efficient than ZLauncher? I may have missed something. I mean with "heaps of options" and the ability to customize it just about any way you would like. How could anything be more efficient?

[archangel]

I've heard complaints that Zlauncher is too complicated, but you control all of that. If you don't need all the buttons simply don't use them. I have everything I need on the top bar and I don't even use the bottom bar.

You can make Zlauncher as simply or as complicated as you want. Thats the great thing about it.