By Google has done a great job getting developers to adopt new design guidelines without a mandate (here’s looking at you, Apple), but not every developer has been able to adapt as quickly. It’s not easy for a user to go from a collection of great Holo or Holo-esque apps, and then revert back to the pre-4.0 days for the odd app that decides to stay stuck in that past.
For those apps, Holofication Nation aims to rectify all of that. Holofication Nation is a community consisting of (as of the time of this writing) over 750 members, and their mission is to transform some of the community’s favorite apps with legacy design into something that looks like it was crafted in in the past couple of years.
The project is quite small right now, with the team only having about 4 apps on tap. That said, the team says their most important goal beside upgrading visual flair is to make sure there are no damning bugs sprawling about. That extra care means extra time must be taken on each app, so things are slow going for the time being. Here’s the quick list of early apps:
- Steam
- Snapchat
- Grooveshark
And much of that was thanks to the work of just two people so far (Connor Kirkby and Brandon D’Souza). We imagine the large Google+ community is also to thank, as they make suggestions and provide feedback to help shape the direction of the Holofication Nation. The team is looking to take things a step further by courting a developer to make an official app to highlight these Holo-fied apps, though they stress that the position is unpaid.
Note that you have to uninstall previous versions of apps before installing these new apps, but that’s the only requirement — no root, no mods, no nothing. Head to the XDA thread here for the current downloads, and be sure to request to join the community on Google+ right here.
The funny thing is there are some people in that community that want the team to theme apps that are already holo.
Ugh.
Maybe because it still needs improvements
The team already said they won’t update apps that are already holo.
Like Google Finance.
I don’t get what you mean?
Obligatory #HOLOYOLO
Please redo espn’s fantasy football app for them. It is very painful to look at.
Eh, not worth the hassle.
Instagram looks 100000000x better. Thank you.
I had this same idea a while ago only I called it shitification
Wouldn’t it be better to give the code to the apps’ owners and let them release it properly as a normal update?
What for if they never decided to follow the guidelines themselves? They half ass if change anything at all, but beautify the iOS version. They simply don’t care, and then they just might tweak it to their own liking later. Hopefully this inspires them or change of heart to do it in their own. This helps make Android a whole.
I understand the motivation. Two problems: (1) If there is some non-Holo-related update of the original app, they have to do it again, and meanwhile, their users don’t get the update. (2) There are security concerns regarding getting in the habit of reinstalling apps which have been repackaged by a third party. Not saying anything bad will happen from these people, but virus writers also repackage other people’s apps.
God.. Curiosity killed the cat. I uninstalled Instagram and tried to install the newer one. It won’t let me… Cleared orphan data.. Nope….tried to reinstall the original from the market? Nope.
*sigh*.
It’s a bug with Android, unfortunately. Sometimes apps get broken if you try and install the same app with a different signature as Android only partially uninstalls it (its usually rare though). The partial data resides somewhere in the package.XML file
Isn’t that HOLOYOLO is a Chris Chavez thing??? {°¿°}
Instagram looks way better but how come Lookout says it’s riskware? I’ve never seen that with any other app I’ve sideloaded
Same with Snapchat
Probably because we haven’t signed these with an official developer key, since we don’t have one.
Ah, gotcha. Great work, they look way better than the stock apps.
Exciting!
Hail Duarte.
This is freaking amazing! Now what would we do about updates? Or will they leave their apps as is?
Updates are available on on our XDA thread and on our Google+ community.
The first thing I thought when I read that list of four apps was that I hoped they’d add Steam to it. And look. There it is, all nice and prettified.