uLaunch - custom, open source Nintendo Switch HOME menu reimplementation

uLaunch - custom, open source Nintendo Switch HOME menu reimplementation

November 10th, 2019, 22:38 Posted By: wraggster

Hey all!

It's been a while since I started working and playing around with homebrew replacing HOME menu in February. After several months of RE, new approaches and a lot of work, I'm glad to present the result of all my work related to HOME menu + homebrew:

uLaunch is a custom, open-source replacement/reimplementation for Nintendo Switch's HOME menu (qlaunch), extending it with amazing, homebrew-orienteed 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-orienteed one.

Are you looking for help with themes? Check this documentation for everything you need!

Having trouble with uLaunch? Check the FAQ section for support!

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...)

List of not (yet) implemented HOME menu features:

Controller managing
Album
Periodical play report sending (so long, telemetry!)

This is the amount of features uLaunch contains, compared to the original HOME menu:

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!
- Foreground capturing from PC itself (Windows-only) via USB-C cable and QForegroundViewer!

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.

For more detailed information (too much to be put here), check GitHub's README: https://github.com/XorTroll/uLaunch

IMPORTANT! Note that this is the first release of the project, and while it was made to be as stable and complete as possible, it is far from being fully ready, so expect some unimplemented functionality or sudden bugs or small issues.

Themes

You can check my Discord (https://discord.gg/3KpFyaH) for an active theme submissions channel.

Download it from here: https://github.com/XorTroll/uLaunch/releases

This project has taken me a lot of work, hope you enjoy a custom, brand-new HOME menu!

For more information and downloads, click here!