bedside_iconLike Nyquil’s “nighttime-sniffling-sneezing-coughing…” medicine, the upcoming Bedside 3.0 application is the nighttime, light dimming, sound stopping, music playing, flashlight providing, alarm linking, customizable, amazingly supported must have on your nightstand so you can rest Android application!

I wrote about this application in an earlier article touting its simplicity. Daniel Velazco has done a great job maintaining that simplicity and ease of use while adding functionality. Version 3.0 continues to provide the basics fans of Bedside are accustomed to like a dimmed screen, sound muting and control over color and font while adding several useful features. In the new version the basics are enhanced with greater control over color, text and background, as well as font–five options now compared to only three earlier. This is a new version of Bedside, however, not just a maintenance upgrade with a few modifications; new bells and whistles are plentiful.

Scheduled screen brightness allows you to change the brightness level based on time. If you want your phone to light up bright at 6am as an extra “nudge” to get you out of bed, set it and forget it. For those mornings when you are too tired to open your eyes but you still need to know the time just long press Bedside 3.0 and a voice you configure tells you the time. You can configure speech rate, pitch and language so if you want to be told the current time super fast but in a super slow German pitch, Bedside can do it! Customizable shortcuts now appear on the screen that allow you to configure your favorite music player, alarm, screen brightness and an additional shortcut for whatever else you want one-click access to in the morning. The screen brightness shortcut can be configured to function as a flashlight. I found this feature most helpful! One click and my phone lit up providing more than enough light to help me easily find the power cord to plug in at night or work my way downstairs for a midnight snack without stubbing my toes. I configured the additional shortcut for the Greed application so I was always one-click away from news, flashlight, music and an alarm.

Of course, not receiving notifications throughout the night may insure a restful sleep but it may mean you miss an important SMS message. While Bedside 3.0 continues to allow phone calls, it does, by default, block SMS messages. Unlike earlier versions however 3.0 allows you to disable that default and be notified when you receive a 3am text. The configuration comes complete with a whitelist allowing you to control which contact’s text you want to be notified of overnight and which ones you would just as soon ignore and read in the morning; genius. The list of enhancements and additions doesn’t stop there. Battery status, control over day and weekday formats, 12/24 hour format, auto-start, auto-end and more are all in Bedside 3.0.

Bedside 3.0 will be available for download tomorrow November 6th for $1.49. If you already have the application the download is free. The developer is committed to this application and is very responsive to support issues. You have a cold and want a good night’s sleep, take Nyquil. If all you need is a good nights sleep: download Bedside 3.0, the nighttime, light dimming, sound stopping, music playing, flashlight providing, alarm linking, customizable, amazingly supported must have on your nightstand so you can rest Android application!

  • This App Was Tested Using: G1/Dream on Android 1.6
  • Presentation: Simple to use app with no frills but lots of simple to use and configure features.
  • Value: Price is right.  Nothing else that I have seen compares to it.  The first (and so far only) app I have purchased!
  • Stability/Resources:  No hanging, no sluggishness, no issues of note.
  • Bottom Line or “AG Says” – Bedside 3.0 improves on earlier versions without sacrificing quality or performance.  This is an app worth purchasing.
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20 COMMENTS

  2. I have just one problem with apps like this. It is all good in theory but in practice I never can find any app that will make screen dim enough. And I agree with @dman92 about screenshots

    • No developer will be able to, the lowest setting the SDK allows you to go is 10%, if you go lower than that the phone's screen goes black and lots of problems show up. On the other hand, the current screens, having a backlight, don't help that much. Only OLED/AMOLED screens will help solve this "issue" since they don't have a backlight.

      What I did on this current version of bedside was to allow the user to set the font transparency (alpha), this along with brightness setting allow the user to put the screen very VERY dim.

    • Thanks for supplying these Daniel. Sorry they were not a part of the original review; I agree with everyone who said they should have been. I will make sure to include screenshots in all future reviews!

  5. Since the developer is lurking around here anyway, I'd like to ask a question.
    Did Google (or Motorola) expose the 'trigger' (API call/intent) that is used in the Motorola Droid to know when it's in the Desktop stand to be used by other developers? I mean, would it be possible for you to replace the default 'MediaDock' functionality that is currently implemented in the Motorola Droid? Or would you have to 'reverse engineer', which would be possible since it's open source, that API call/intent to do so?
    Just interested to know, would be quite cool if developers would be able to improve upon the default functionality.

    • I just saw in the screenshots you supplied that there is an option to start Bedside when you plug the phone into a power supply, but isn't there the possibility that this will conflict with the current default functionality on the Droid when you put that in it's Desktop Dock (with power). Or can that default functionality be turned off on the Droid? (only Droid owners know that last answer)

      As you might have noticed, I'm really interested in getting a Motorola Droid (MILESTONE in my case, I'm in Europe) :P and using this app if the default functionality isn't good enough.

      • Well, I thought many people would be talking about this.
        To be honest, I've been working on this version for a very long time, I've been really busy so it really took me a long time, anyways, I was really shocked when I saw those Droid videos/screenshots the first time, now Bedside looks very familiar to that.

        Anyways, to the point, yes, if they developed that app, and implemented the intents the right way, when you connect it on the dock a little dialog will pop up asking which program you want to open when connecting it to the dock, and if you would like to set it as default.

        It uses Intents, though, I have yet to test it on a droid to see if it really works the way it should, that is, if they implemented the software the right way, using intents as well.

        Thanks

        • It works just like you say. When I plugged it into the dock, the droid asked if I wanted to set bedside as the default instead of the regular dock screen. Bedsides fires up as soon as you put into dock.

  7. What I did on this current version of bedside was to allow the user to set the font transparency (alpha), this along with brightness setting allow the user to put the screen very VERY dim.

  9. Are you able to silence all notifications at night other than texts or calls? I want texts or calls or wake me up, but I also keep getting woken up by updates from other apps which I want to silent at night.

  10. Looks awesome – shame it crashes on my Samsung Galaxy Portal (Spica) (Android 1.5 – no 2.x in the UK yet!) :(
    (Force closes every time a minute ticks by).

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