Light Flow LED Control for Android lets you customize LED notifications and much more
While Andreas has been busy trying to create a working substitute for a notification light on his Samsung Galaxy SII, I am lucky enough to own a Galaxy Nexus, which already has a built in notification light on the front of the device. However, although the light should support blinking in various different colors, I have only ever seen it display two, and have never found a way to specify what color is used for notifications. Luckily, there is a third party app that can do just that quite well, as well as change quite a few more detailed and granular settings regarding Android notifications.
The app is called Light Flow LED Control. It comes in both a “lite” and paid version, but both serve the same basic function of managing your device’s notifications. Currently, I am using the light version, which – despite having fewer features than the full version – still has more features than I know how to use. Even with so many options, the app manages to remain fairly clean and simple to navigate, with intelligently titled menus and easy to access settings.
Beginning with the general settings, there are options to use contact-based notifications for Gmail, manage how notifications work when charging, enable sleep settings to turn off the notification light and sounds, and even use the camera flash instead of a notification light for notifications. In the more specific notifications screen you see above, you get a list of all the notifications that the app can handle, and from here can change all kinds of settings specific to that notification, such as the monitoring method, how the notification should be cleared, what color the notification light should be, how long the notification should flash, and even the rate at which the notification should flash. There are also settings for notification sounds, vibrations, and repeat vibrations that I haven’t even begun to get into. Color options, at least on the Galaxy Nexus, include 18 default colors as well as a custom option to ensure that there no two notifications look alike.
Clearly, there is a lot going on with this application, and quite a number of features that could be utilized. I originally downloaded it just to change the color of the notification light, but have found that you can do quite a lot more than that even with the free versions. As I said, I haven’t had the time to really take advantage of all the features, but even just for the extensive control of the notification light, this app seems well worth the money. Some features may work on many devices, but the only ones that the app actually claims support for are the HTC Nexus One, Galaxy Nexus, and Galaxy SIII, so be sure to try the free version before you buy.
Download: Play Store
