I love multitasking. Or, maybe I don't love it so much, but I'm always multitasking(even while typing this). This habit also extends to my mobile phone usage. I'm rarely ever on one app, always jumping from one app to another. The only time I take a break from multitasking on my mobile phone is when I'm watching a movie.
Multi-tasking on my mobile phone is pretty fluid, so I wasn't moved to find any kind of multi-tasking app. But, I found one. Or should I say it found me? I was exploring Github, and the app's repository just came out of nowhere. I'm conversant with the project owner in a way. So I was moved to check out the repository, and consequently the app. Being conversant with the project owner wasn't the factor that made me install the app though. I read through the 'readme' file and it had tons of attractive information. I wanted to experience the app for myself. The app is amazing(I can't overemphasize). I've used it for a couple of days now and it has become quite indispensable.
In this article, I will review the app. I'll talk about all its cool stuff whilst sharing my opinions alongside. If you've been having multi-tasking issues on your device, sit down, grab a bag of popcorn and enjoy this article.

TaskBar; PC-style productivity for Android.

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The name of the app I'll be talking about in this article is; Taskbar. The title of the app rings a bell, right? Yes, if you are a PC owner, you should be conversant with the word taskbar. And consequently, you know the purpose of the taskbar on a PC right? Great! Wouldn't it be amazing to have that same experience on your mobile phone? For me, it'd be amazing. TaskBar, as the name already suggests, works like a typical taskbar on our PCs.
Here's the description of the app by the project owner;

Taskbar puts a start menu and recent apps tray on top of your screen that's accessible at any time, increasing your productivity and turning your Android tablet (or phone) into a real multitasking machine!
On devices running Android 7.0+, Taskbar can also launch apps in freeform windows for a PC-like experience! No root required!
Taskbar is also fully supported on Chrome OS - use Taskbar as a secondary Android app launcher on your Chromebook!

That's it for the app's description. The project owner also went ahead to list out the features of the app in the 'Readme' document. The features are;

• Start menu
• Recent apps tray
• Collapsible and hideable tray.
• Many different configuration options
• Freeform mode
• 100% free, open source, and no ads

For my review, I'll confine myself to the premise of the features in the list above. I'll also follow the listing order.

Without further ado, let's delve into my review of TaskBar.

Review of TaskBar. (PC-style productivity for Android)

So I said I was going to do my review based on the features I listed earlier on. This review is quite different because I won't exactly be talking about the app's UI. Reviewing an app's UI is something I like doing. Especially if the app's UI is great. The reason why a UI review won't take prevalence in this article is that; the app taskbar can also be called a 'tool'. So when you launch and enable the app, the services the app renders can be likened to a tool. However, there are certain configurations/customizations you can do on the app that sort of falls into the UI category. Those(configurations/customizations) will be discussed under this header; 'Many different configuration options'

Start Menu.

The typical start menu on a PC contains links to several locations on the PC. Another thing you have access to via the start menu is your 'apps' list. But that's on a PC. The Start menu that TaskBar provides is quite limited. The start menu only shows you all the applications installed in your device. And you can launch any app from there. Aside from launching an app from the start menu, there are other things that could be done. When you tap and hold on any app icon, you'll see more options. The options are;

• Pin to recents
• Block from recents
• App info
• Uninstall

Basically, the start menu could be your app drawer. Everything you'd normally be able to do on your app drawer can be done on the start menu.
I had no issues with the Start menu. Maybe I wanted a little more stuff on it. Something a little bit unusual. But then, this an Android app. Probably working on a device with very limited screen space. So I guess everything is alright the way they are.
There are more things to come later on in this article that'll link back to the start menu.

Recent apps tray.

The taskbar on a PC has a tray. On the tray are apps that are open, or apps you pinned to the taskbar. But, if you didn't pin an app to the taskbar(on PC) and closed the app's window, the app's icon would leave the taskbar. A similar mechanism is applied to the 'TaskBar' app. But this time, you can see apps that you recently used(even if you've exited the app, and didn't pin it.), on the tray. I'm okay with the fact that I could see apps that I had recently used. But sometimes, I wished I only saw the apps that were running in the background. Well, there's an indirect way to make that happen though (That part is saved for later on in this article).

Collapsible and hideable.

There's nothing much to talk about here. The taskbar is collapsible and hideable. Inasmuch as this feature might look basic and trivial, it is quite very important. The absence of this feature would mean that; as soon as you enable the taskbar, it'll be on your screen all the time. And it could be distracting. So it means a great deal for me(and others too) that the taskbar to be collapsible. When the taskbar is collapsed, it leaves this directional arrow with which you can use to open the taskbar. This button(the directional arrow) is aligned in a way that it wouldn't disturb your activities. However, you might not want to see it when you are on some apps. Maybe a game, or when you are watching a movie. That's when the ability to hide the taskbar becomes important.

Many different configuration options.

This section has a lot of talking points. In fact, the talking points in this section is enough for another article. I had wanted to do that(write a sequel to this article). But I finally decided to compile everything about this app in one article. To do that, there's going to be loads of sacrifices with the content. But don't fret. I'll ensure you are getting all the vital information that you'd be interested in.

At the beginning of this review I said;

The reason why a UI review won’t take prevalence in this article is that; the app taskbar can also be called a ‘tool’. So when you launch and enable the app, the services the app renders can be likened to a tool.

When you launch the app(TaskBar), what you'll see are settings and customizations and stuff. Whatever setting you tweak or customize consequently affects the taskbar(as a tool).
The configuration options are split into several categories. They are;

• General settings
• Appearance (this is the part that relates to UI)
• Recent apps
• Freeform mode
• Advanced features.

In this section, I'll talk about each 'settings' category. I'll also share my opinions about certain configurations. But all these will be summarized, so that this article doesn't become so long.

General settings.

There's quite a lot of things to talk about here. But like I said, I'll sacrifice a lot of stuff, so I won't talk about all the things you can configure here. (Just the noteworthy ones).

The first thing you can configure in this section(General settings) is;

Start menu layout.

You have two options. Either the start menu is displayed in list or grid format. For me, I prefer the grid display option. With the grid option, you'd do less scrolling to find an app at the bottom.

The next thing on the list is;

Position on screen.

This is one of the most important things you can set in this section(general settings). Whatever option you choose decides where the taskbar is going to be located. Choosing an option depends(maybe) on these factors;

1. Your device's display size.
2. Your preferred hand (Either you are left-handed or right-handed).
3. Whatever you want.

For me, it was the first two factors that were considered before I made a decision.
The taskbar can be placed in eight (8) different positions on your screen. By default, its position on screen is; bottom left (horizontal). In this position, you'd have a similar experience with the taskbar on a PC, when the taskbar(the app) is not collapsed. This is how it looks;

From the image above, you see that it doesn't look bad. But I really didn't like it in that position. That way, the number of apps showing at once on the recent tray is limited. That means I have to scroll. Maybe if I was using a tablet with a large display, I'll use the default option. The position I finally chose was; top left (vertical). The recent apps tray can contain more apps at one glance without the need to scroll. And I chose it to be at left because I'm left-handed(now you know).

The last thing(or maybe not) I'll talk about in this page is;

Search bar visibility.

So I said the start menu displays all the app installed on your device. It could be 10 apps. It could be over a hundred apps. For me, it is over a hundred apps. Sometimes, scrolling to find a particular app can be tiring. That's when a search-bar becomes handy.
There are three options as regards the search-bar visibility. They are;

• Hardware or software keyboard.
• Hardware keyboard only
• Never show search-bar.

The option to choose here(which is the one I chose) is the first option. That is; Hardware or software keyboard. If you choose the 'hardware keyboard only' option, you won't see the search bar. I think the hardware keyboard refers to if your device has a physical keyboard you could actually press.
Aside from the search-bar, choosing that option gives you access to more functions on the start menu. Just beside the search icon on the Start menu, there's the 3 dot icon which signifies more options. These options are the 'something more' I wanted to see when I reviewed the start menu earlier on. You have access to, or can do the following from the start menu;

• Volume control
• Lock device
• File manager
• System settings
• Power menu

So you can see that the abilities of the Start menu on TaskBar(the app), is as robust as the one on your PC.
I'll stop here now. All the configurations I did under general settings can be found in the first picture I posted just below the header General settings.

Appearance settings.

In this section, you can tweak settings that affect how the taskbar would look like. The first setting on the list is Theme. The theme isn't talking about the taskbar itself but the settings page. There's the dark or light theme. Dark was my preferred option.
The next setting is; Icon pack. If you have icon packs installed on your device, this would make more sense to you. If you do have icon packs, you can select the one that you like more. The icon pack that you select would be the icon pack that your app icons would be displayed in.
Then there's; Background tint and, Accent colour. I made the background tint black in my case. It makes the icons on the recent tray 'pop' me. The accent colour could be anything. It wasn't particularly important to me.

I'll stop here now. All the configurations I did under appearance settings can be found in the image I posted just below the header Appearance settings.

Recent apps.

The things you configure in this section affects recent apps and the recent apps tray.
The first thing you need to do is; Enable usage access. Without enabling usage access, you'd be unable to do/control some functions.
After you've enabled usage access, the important things you'd ideally want to set are;

• Refresh rate
• Recent apps to display
• Max number of recent/pinned apps
• Faster app switching.

But the most important ones out of the four are;

Refresh rate.

This is the rate at which the taskbar refreshes itself. I set mine to infinity. This gave me a continuous refresh rate. So it was faster for the taskbar to refresh and add recently used or opened apps to the tray.

Faster app switching.

To get the best experience out of this app, you need this option to be enabled. In fact, this is one of the major reasons I kept using this app after I tried it.
Now when you open the taskbar, on the recent tray you have opened apps, recent apps, and pinned apps. With this option enabled, switching between two or more opened apps works with the speed of light. I'm exaggerating though. But it is really fast. This feature would be more appreciated on devices with low ram storage.

I'll stop here now. All the configurations I did under 'Recent apps' settings can be found in the image I posted just below the header Recent apps.

Freeform mode.

This is something I'd have really loved to talk about in this review. But I won't be doing that for two reasons. The first reason being the fact that I didn't really try out the feature. If I try to review it, it'd be based on my own logical reasoning and not experience. The second reason is that this article is already as long as it could get. But what I'd do is; share the project owner's explanation of this feature.

Freeform window mode (Android 7.0+)

Taskbar lets you launch apps in freeform floating windows on Android 7.0+ devices. No root access is required, although Android 8.0+ devices require an ADB shell command to be run during initial setup.
Simply follow these steps to configure your device for launching apps in freeform mode:

1. Check the box for "Freeform window support" inside the Taskbar app
2. Follow the directions that appear in the pop-up to enable the proper settings on your device (one-time setup)
3. Go to your device's recent apps page and clear all recent apps
4. Start Taskbar, then select an app to launch it in a freeform window

If you are still confused after reading the project owner's explanation, I'll try to summarize what the freeform mode is all about.

This feature(freeform) gives you the ability to have a Windows-like(PC) experience on your mobile device. You know that every application we open on our PC has its own window. At any point in time, we can decide to resize all these windows and can place them in different areas of the screen. Below is an image of what I'm trying to explain;

In the image above, you can see that I've 3 different apps opened. That is; Esteem surfer, VLC, Brave Browser. Each app has its own Window. You can also see that these windows are not conformed to equal sizes. Esteem surfer had a larger window size. While the others had different sizes respectively.
What I've shown you in the image above is similar to what you'd experience on your mobile device if you use TaskBar and have the freeform mode enabled. I can't say exactly how similar the freeform experience would be when compared with how it is on a PC. But with what I've seen so far on this app(TaskBar), it'll be really close.
I was unable to try this feature out because my device is running on Android 8.1. And making the feature work involves some technicalities I'm not ready to rack my brains for. That being said, it'll be good to point out that the feature is still experimental and are likely to experience certain issues with it. So if you are reading this, and you can try out this feature, go ahead and try. Please share your experience with it in the comment(s) section.

100% free, open source, and no ads.

The best part of everything I've shared in this article is the fact that this app is totally free. I laud the generosity of the project owner. With an app like this, it'd be easy for the developer to make money off it by locking some features. And with the services the app provides, people would be willing to pay. It's a great thing to have the full functions of this app for free. However, you can donate(willingly) something to support the developer and the app's development. I plan to that when I'm well funded.

That's everything you need to know about TaskBar.

Summary.

In this article, I've been able to give a comprehensive review of TaskBar. Virtually everything you need to know about the app is in this article. Inasmuch as I tried to compromise the article by cutting off some parts, it's a concise nonetheless.
Something I failed to mention during the course of my review is that the app can serve as a replacement for your device's homescreen. In other words, you can use TaskBar as your homescreen app. That's what I'm using right now and I'd ideally have loved to do a comparison. But, here's the summary of the comparison;
Since I started using TaskBar(as my homescreen), I've not felt the urge to revert back to my old homescreen(Nova launcher). Nova launcher is great. It has all these cool perks, but using TaskBar has been interesting. It has become indispensable really. But, it has an issue which I think the project owner needs to look into. If you aren't using the software as your homescreen, it is basically an app that can be opened or closed. The implication of this is that, anytime I refresh my phone's memory, the app would close(that's if it isn't set as my homescreen). It'd be great if the project owner implemented a feature that makes it immune to memory refresh. That would be amazing.
Overall, TaskBar is a great app. I've shared my own experience. Check the app out and experience it for yourself.

PS;

With this article, I've unlocked a new level 'beast' in app reviews. This is the longest article I've written since I started writing app reviews. This article is packing over 3,000 words. I hope(for my sake) that the length of this article justifies the content I've delivered. I also hope(for my sake) that it wasn't boring to read.

If you read this article till the end, Thanks for reading.

Links

• Project repository: https://github.com/farmerbb/Taskbar

• App download link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.farmerbb.taskbar

Resources:

• The content of this post was created based on my knowledge of the project, and mostly from my experience. The images used in this article are screenshots from my mobile phone or PC. Other images used, have their source links provided just below them.

Github profile:

• https://github.com/HarryHeights