App Details
Custom, open-source replacement/reimplementation for Nintendo Switch's HOME menu (qlaunch), extending it with amazing, homebrew-oriented functionality!
uLaunch is a very ambitious project, consisting on two custom library applets, a custom system application and a custom system applet, in order to replace the console's HOME menu with a custom, homebrew-oriented one.
This isn't any kind of HOME menu extension, injection, patch, etc. uLaunch is a complete reimplementation, 100% open-source, which also takes over eShop and Parental control applets and flog system title (all of them are pretty much useless with this reimpl) for its extended functionality.
The project is licensed as GPLv2.
For those who are interested in how the UI was done, this project is, like Goldleaf, a good example of how powerful Plutonium libraries can be in order to make beautiful UIs.
Features
List of HOME menu features uLaunch has:
Proper launching and foreground management: launch, suspend and close titles and applets
Proper general channel handling (some of it might be not implemented): sleep, shutdown, reboot, HOME menu press detection...
Settings:
Show connected WiFi network's name
Open connection applet in case user wants to change network settings
Change console's language and show active one
Change console's nickname and show current one
User features:
Allow creating user on the startup menu
Show user's page (in order to edit nickname, icon, friends...)
Homebrew support
Launching as applets (no need of Album!)
Launching as applications (no need of any titles to do so!)
Custom basic homebrew menu
Option to add custom NRO accessors to main menu (homebrew or custom items easily accessible, no more need of forwarders!)
UI
Themes (different to official HOME menu themes/NXThemes)
Custom icons, menu assets and graphics (custom images, colors, sizes, positions...), background...
Custom background music and sound effects!
Folders in order to keep your main menu organized!
Users
PC-like login on startup (select user and use it for everything, log off, register/change/remove password...)
User password support! (up to 15 characters)
Miscellaneous extras
Web browsing (via web-applet) directly from the main menu!
Console screen capturing from PC itself (Windows-only) via USB-C cable and uViewer tool!
Disclaimer
Homebrew-as-application 'flog' takeover
uLaunch allows you to launch homebrew as an application, taking advantage of the system's 'flog' built-in application title, which was stubbed but not removed, thus it's content can be overriden via LayeredFS and launched.
Since launching this title should be impossible, it might involve ban risk. uLaunch has this option disabled by default, so enable and use it use it at your own risk. Always make youre you're safe from bans (by using tools like 90DNS) before using uLaunch to avoid any possible risks.
Changelog
Atmosphère v1.8.0 (up to firmware 19.0.1) support
Disclaimer: known issue
This release ships with a known (minor) issue: the newly introduced game detection (gamecard, corrupted and more, see below) also misclasifies some games as 'needing an update', and while it doesn't prevent from launching them, the corresponding icon is incorrectly displayed. I still need to figure out the way regular HOME menu detects updated titles :P
Menu
Games which are installed within uLaunch now launch fine for the first time, no longer requiring to revert to regular HOME menu for that initial launch
Italian, French and German translations
Lockscreen support! It can be enabled/disabled in settings
A new special entry for amiibo settings was added
Folder names are displayed now over the folder icons (like old uLaunch did)
Games are now detected in a much better way:
Corrupted games are detected like the regular HOME menu, allowing for the same data check process... but in the background, while the regular HOME menu forces it to be active
Gamecard titles are recognized and properly shown
(Most) games which cannot be launched are recognized and properly shown (see known issue above)
Added special checks to ensure all special entries (user page, controller options and so on) are present in the menu
The delay time after adding a homebrew / after a crash was made shorter
Minor bugs where fixed when adding a new homebrew entry to the menu
Fixed some issues with custom menu entries, where some JSON fields were not working if other fields were not set
Settings
Settings were reorganized and extended with a few previously unimplemented options (and there are more to come), these are the changed/added entries:
Console language (reorganized in a nicer way)
System update status
Console region
Primary album storage
Lockscreen enabled (uLaunch-specific)
Handheld / console sleep time
Sleeps while playing media
Wakes at power state change
Battery serial / lot
All these were organized in various menus (uLaunch, system, screen and so on)... not a lot of new ones, but slowly extending the supported settings
Themeing
Introduced a new special entry for amiibo options, with a new icon at ui/Main/EntryIcon/Amiibo, ui/Main/QuickIcon/Amiibo and a dedicated sound effect at sound/Main/OpenAmiibo.wav.
Settings got reorganized, now having menu_text and submenu_text fields (info_text is unused now) and its own input_bar, with background at ui/Settings/InputBarBackground
Due to better game detection, the following over-icons are introduced in this release:
Main/OverIcon/Corrupted
Main/OverIcon/Gamecard
Main/OverIcon/NeedsUpdate
Main/OverIcon/NotLaunchable
Of course, uDesigner and the wiki will quickly get updated with these theme changes.
