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Anyone Use Pressy?

Their site, Pressy - the Almighty Android Button! explains it pretty well and also confesses to their infancy. In it, they address my memory concern:

Once you launch the Pressy app, you activate a background service. The service monitors the headset-jack into which the Pressy Button is plugged. The application is then activated only when the Pressy Button is clicked, therefore, it does not drain your battery.
 
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If I understood it correctly, this is how it works (or at least how I would make it to work).

When you insert Pressy, it doesn't disable speaker of the phone like it does when you plug in headphones. So you can still listen to your phone audio. Plus if you pair up with bluetooth headphones, you can listen through those headphones . If you unplug Pressy, you can plug headphones back in and listen that way.
 
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But I can’t simultaneously have a headphone cable going from the droid to my dashboard and Pressy installed in the same jack. Two things can’t be in the same place at the same time. My car has a cable input but no bluetooth. Time for me to give up on this.
 
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There is at least a dozen of $2 Pressy Chinese clones with a perfectly working app that has been available for awhile now. I never mentioned that before since everybody were still waiting to get their original KS Pressy. Since they are finally starting to deliver their $15 product after all these months of waiting, you can check out an alternative: 360 Universal 3.5mm Plug One-click Shortcut Key Dustproof plug for Android Phone - Silver - Free Shipping - DealExtreme

I'm not going to review that alternative "pressy" (out of respect for the original one), but it works 100%, both hardware and app.
 
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Anybody receive their Pressy button yet?
I've been half interested since their fund raiser but I wanted to see the final product first and hear some feedback about it.

I received my Pressy yesterday, and I'm quite pleased with it. I can't compare it to the knock-offs, but I don't have any regrets about backing the project. The app works very well, and makes it easy to configure a variety of different actions - plus it has built-in support for Tasker:

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Now I just need to figure out some nice Tasks to associate with Pressy... all of my current ones are triggered automatically.

Anyone have some good ideas?
 
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I received my Pressy yesterday, and I'm quite pleased with it...



Now I just need to figure out some nice Tasks to associate with Pressy...[/QUOTE]


How is the physical function of the button? Solid feeling? Does the button have a nice tactile click or is it more like a plastic-y moosh feeling? (this is a hard thing to describe since it relies on the sense of touch and is hard to put into words)
It has only been a week or so, but is it holding up alright? Use it much? How far away from the device does the installed Pressy stick out? Is it low profile?
The HTC M8 has the headphone jack mounted on the bottom of the device rather than the more typical top. Imagine with me if you would, if the Pressy button was on the bottom of your current device do you suppose it would be equally as useful or less useful, than if it were on the top?
 
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How is the physical function of the button?

I'm using mine on a Samsung S4 running standard Samsung UI based on Android 4.4.2. I like it, but it's hobbled by some first-generation problems that hopefully the company will iron out with future updates.

Here's my experience:

Hardware: The button itself is decent build quality, and feels like it should last for at least as many actuations (presses) as the phones own power and volume buttons. Nice physical stop to the button when pressed that you can feel but can't hear.

Button extends about 2mm (tiny bit more than 1/16") from the top edge of the phone. I'm using a Spigen NeoHybrid case, and the button fits through the hole for the headphone jack easily. Button does not stick up out of the case far enough, though; I need to either press the pad of my finger in there firmly to click it, or else use the tip of my fingernail. On the plus side, this means I can toss the phone in a pocket and not worry about the button accidentally getting pressed.

Software: Three categories of problems with the official app: setup, customizations, responsiveness.

Setup problems: Lots of complaints online about the setup (see commenters on Kickstarter page). As someone else previously noted, it's hard to put the button into the phone without triggering a button press, but that's really minor. Setting up the Pressy App itself is more problematic.

The app's first-time setup screen asks the user to set the Pressy App as the default process using the headphone button. You tell the app that the Pressy is inserted, select Pressy to be the app that default "always" responds to the headphone button. OK so far. But then the phone has another pop-up asking you to choose a default, except now the only options are Google (Google Now) and Samsung S Voice.

At this point the phone enters a loop. If you press the exit softkey, the popup reappears. If you select Google or S Voice, it will take you directly to that app. If you exit and try to return to the Pressy app, it reenters the loop. It's as if the app is continuously sending a trigger signal, but the phone won't give you the option to choose Pressy as default. Feels a lot like a programming glitch.

The system's popup asking you to set a default is floating over the app's regular screen; so you can try to hit one of the app's screen buttons that appear when the looping system popup disappears for a second before reappearing. Can't recall if that eventually worked for me, or if I just hit the home button to exit. Eventually I was able to get into the app and set custom button presses.

Currently, my problem is that a long-press opens Samsung S Voice rather than being interpreted by the Pressy app. Apparently this is a known issue related to having difficulty changing the defaults. You can disable/uninstall both Google Now and Samsung S Voice, but I like both and wouldn't want to.

Customization problems: The level of customization is not quite as good as I think most users would like. I assume this will get improved over time but for now this is feeling like a first-gen app with too-few options.

For example, I'd like a simple button press to set up a text to my wife that I could manage entirely by voice recognition (my preferred way to text). Instead the texting option is to set up a fixed message to a fixed recipient. So you could have it send a message saying permanently "running late" to your gf/spouse but nothing more than that. For my purposes, I'd be better off triggering S Voice or Google Now, both of which can handle voice-activated texting.

Also I'd really like to see more precise app processes, like you can do with some launchers. Not just "open app", but "open app and begin specific app process". For example, I set up a button combo to run SoundHound, but it simply opens the app when I want it to start listening to a song immediately. (Shazam settings can be set to automatically listen, so there's your workaround there.)

The take a picture setting is decent. Just a second or two faster than turning on the screen, swiping on directly to camera, and taking photo. Minor complaint is that it puts Pressy instant photos in a separate folder, not the main Camera folder. The photos are a little worse than when I use the Samsung Camera or Google Camera apps, but that could be due to the choices I made under Pressy's instant photo settings, where you can choose flash and other settings.

Responsiveness: Final comment is about Responsiveness. Sometime's it's snappy and other times it's incredibly laggy. Depending how overstuffed your phone is with apps and processes (I'm running my S4 with factory UI but tons of apps), there's can be an unpredictable lag with the haptic response. This wouldn't seem to be a big deal but you need to haptic feedback to let you know if your short or long press was received as such. So you end up pressing the wrong combinations and getting unintended results. Not sure if a brand new phone, pristine from the retailer without a crap-ton of apps would respond more quickly or not.

It would be great if anyone has both a Pressy and a very uncluttered/new phone could comment on its performance. Is responsiveness a ton better? Similarly if anyone figured out how to either set the app up without the looping default screens; or if anyone figured out how to improve responsiveness of the app to button presses; they should write it up here!
 
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Just as a side note comment about Pressy and their Chinese clone (that $1.66 clone from the link I posted above - solid metal construction and a robust app without any problems, btw) - PITA to remove it when you have a case on your phone, and you are also handicapping audio because you can't use the jack for headphones and you can't pair up with a wireless headphones/speaker. Not 100% sure if Pressy going to have (or maybe has already?) some workaround to be able to send audio wirelessly, but it's not fun to unplug this little guy every time you want to connect headphones or pair up with a wireless speaker.

Sorry guys for being negative, but I think the hype of crowdfunding is over, unless if you are Reading Rainbow and just banked $5.5 million campaign :D
 
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Personally, I think it's a great idea for a phone, because I don't use headphones much at all with my Nexus 4. It simply sucks compared to my Cowon S9, and I'd rather have another button.

For those who use their phones more as tools, they will find a use for pressy... For those who use their phones more as entertainment devices, they probably won't like it.
 
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