The new Material Design of Android L definitely struck a
chord with some designers and themers. We are likely to be
inundated with such things in the next few months, but in
the meantime, Android L features and styles are slowly
making their way to ROMs and homescreen replacements,
the latter of which is being headed by Nova Launcher.
Nova Launcher 3.0 actually just got out of beta last June
and yet a 3.0.2 update is already in the works. While
normally such maintenance releases are limited to bugfixes
and whatnot, this upcoming one is a bit notable because it
tries to integrate bits and pieces of the Android L developer
preview into the popular launcher. If you're not a fan of the
new Material push, don't worry, as all the new "features", if
you could call them that, are optional and not enabled by
default. In fact, they are so subtle they might not be easily
evident. On the other hand, if you're actually a fan of
Material Design, you might be a bit disappointed.
The Android L additions are actually confined to the App
Drawer icon, the Folder Preview, and the App Animation.
Each of these have to be configured separately and mixed
to your heart's content. A long press on the App Drawer
icon will bring up option to edit it, where you can swap out
the default one for a more L-like All White icon under the
Built-in section. For the Folder Preview and the App
Animation, you will have to dig into the Nova Settings app
to tweak those. Again, the differences might be too subtle
that you might even fail to notice the change.
Of course, there are some bug fixes and optimizations in
this upcoming release. Developer Kevin Barry has even
started fine tuning the launcher for Android L. If you're
eager to get your hands on this beta version of Nova
Launcher 3.0.2, you can either join the Google+ community
to sign up to be a tester, or you can download the APK
directly from the developer.
Source: Android Community
