Sony came up with incredible designs in its NXT line up Xperia smartphones. The Xperia S, U and P have an incredible design and look unique compared to other Android smartphones. One of the major talking points regarding to the design has been the transparent illumination bar on these devices. Basically, this is the part where the antenna of the phone lies and the transparent strip surprises a lot of people because looks unbelievable. This transparent strip features illuminating lights so that the touch sensitive buttons are visible. Besides that, the lighting strip is not used for anything. However, a developer has recently released an app which adds much more to this illuminating strip.
The app changes the notification light from the LED on top to the illumination bar. This means that the transparent strip will light up whenever you get a notification. This definitely makes a greater use of the strip which Sony could have done.
The Illumination Bar Notification app supports notifications for calender entries, SMS, missed calls and Emails. Also, you can set notifications for 3rd party apps including Whatsapp, Facebook and Google+.
The app is extremely customizable and you can change how you want the strip to light up when getting notifications. There are different pattern options available which you can set for different types of notifications. You can also set the speed of the strip blinking. Also, the app can be used to control the basic function of the strip, which is to make the on screen buttons visible. The lights usually go off when you are not using the phone even if the screen is On. You can change this to “always on” and the strip will light up as long as the screen is ON. The light will stop blinking once you read to message or check the call. You can also set a time for it to stop blinking after the notification. There are also options to stop the light when you unlock the screen and directly from the status bar.
The app also supports multi-color lights for different types of notifications on the Xperia U, however, only the default white light is available for Xperia P and S because of the hardware. Illumination Bar Notification app is available here.
