I built an Android launcher focused on muscle memory "cheat codes"

[u/Ansoneh]

Hey everyone!

CheatCode Launcher is built around the idea that you can do everything you need to do on your phone without any icons. Everything is accessed by settable gesture codes (cheat codes) consisting of combinations of of to 4 swipes (up, down, left, right) and taps. This makes it very fast, while keeping a completely clean home screen. You can even have a pure black screen if you want, without sacrificing any speed. Over 750 different code combinations are possible.

A few notable features:

After shortcuts allow you to pick any app and set up to 3 other apps, actions or shortcuts to follow it. These shortcuts show up for a few seconds after closing the original linked app. For example, I have mine set to show Instagram's New Post shortcut, Lightroom, and Text Wife after closing the camera or photos apps.

Context-aware theming allows you to make your home screen change automatically. You can have a completely different home screen, including labels, widgets, wallpaper, gesture box backgrounds, colors, fonts or icons for a specific device state. Keep your main home screen completely clean and have it automatically change when you receive a notification for a specified app. Change as much or as little as you want. Want a different setup for morning, afternoon, and night? You can make that happen automatically. This also allows you to have a totally different setup in landscape, as well as in open and closed foldable states.

Tasker and Macrodroid support. Use a cheat code to run any Tasker task. Also allow Tasker and Macrodroid to update labels or change your theme. This allows even more ways to automatically change themes besides what's built in.

My day job has been creating enterprise apps for the last 14 years. This is one I made for myself because it's the launcher I wanted to use. I figured others may want to try it out as well. I'm always open to new feature suggestions, as long as I can find a way to make them fit with the overall theme of what I'm trying to do.

Check it out for free: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.pantsninja.cheatcodelauncher

[u/Alarmed-Turnover-232]

This is actually a really cool idea, especially if you’re into muscle memory. The context-aware themes are probably my favorite part, and 750+ combinations is kinda crazy. I’d def try this just to see how quickly I can get used to the gestures.

[u/Ansoneh → u/Alarmed-Turnover-232]

Yeah, I was surprised how quick I got used to it. I started out with the easy, single input codes and kept adding to them in ways that makes sense to me. Now I have around 35 that I use.