Skies, colours & my sky

The look of the calendar lives on settings › "the sky", the first row of the settings book. To open the book, hold the gear ⚙ in the bottom-right corner of the sky — the sky being the whole calendar, one canvas that becomes each view.

Two related things live elsewhere. An almanac's own colour is chosen on the almanac itself (see Edit an almanac). "colour strength" is on settings › "ease" (see Ease — motion, colour & touch).

#Ten skies

A sky, on this page, is a colour filter laid over the colours you already chose. It is not a repaint. Colour carries meaning here: it tells you which almanac — which named, coloured layer — a commitment belongs to. So every sky keeps colours apart.

There are ten, shown as two rows of five chips. It starts on "clean". "clean", "mono" and "pastel" come with the app; the other seven are (Gold). A locked chip still shows, wearing the gold star ✦. Tapping it opens the Gold offer instead of changing the sky. The lock is on choosing, never on drawing, so a sky you already picked keeps being drawn.

"ember" and "abyss" keep the order of colours when they fold the wheel. Two colours far apart stay the furthest apart inside the arc, so the sky becomes one family and colour still means something.

A white almanac stays white. White and near-white have no hue to work on, so all ten skies leave them alone.

#How colour strength and the sky work together

"colour strength" runs first, then the sky. Your stored colour is lifted by colour strength, and only then handed to the sky — so the sky always has the last word. That keeps "mono" truly black and white however high you turn the dial. Under the two greyscale skies, "mono" and "ink", turning colour strength up raises the contrast instead.

The sun, the earth and the moon follow the sky. So does the highlight under a scrubbing finger, which is painted in the sun's colour. "mono" never leaves a gold sun in a black-and-white world. Colour strength does not touch them, because it exists to tell almanacs apart and the sun is not an almanac.

Over the two pale skies, "daytime" and "ink", the phone's own clock, signal and battery icons turn dark. Menus and list rows keep the app's near-black surface whatever the sky does.

#The colours

You choose colours on an almanac and in a commitment's editor. Two sets are offered:

• A soft set of twenty-four, which comes with the app, led by the six starlight tones.
• A vivid set of eighteen (Gold), each at full strength, so any two can be told apart at the size of a meteor — a commitment that happens once.

A swatch is drawn in its own hue at the colour strength you have set. It is never drawn through the sky, because under "mono" every swatch would be the same grey.

#My sky (Gold)

"my sky — the real stars overhead" is a switch on this page, off to start. My sky draws the real stars over you right now in place of the invented starfield. They sit faint behind the orrery — the year drawn as an orbit round the sun — in the chosen sky's own dust colour.

The stars line up with the solar system. The real sky is turned so the Sun's true direction lands where the orrery draws the sun. Stars and sun always show the same moment.

• Turning it on asks for your location, because the real stars overhead are the stars over you.
• Without Gold the switch wears ✦, and a tap opens the offer. If it was already on, it is never switched off underneath you.
• It replaces the invented stars on the calendar only. The page says so: "my sky is on, so the calendar shows the real stars over you instead of these — they still draw in the binder and on an almanac".

#The my sky page

While the switch is on, "my sky settings ›" stands under it. It is not there while the switch is off. Tap it and a page opens inside settings, headed "‹ my sky". Back, or tapping that row, steps out to "the sky". The page has no preview of its own.

One sky for the whole phone. Every Zenith app with my sky opens this same page. A choice made here holds in each of them. Each app keeps only its own on/off switch.

The page opens with "my sky — the real stars above you", then three chips, one for each version. The one you are on is filled in. Its line is under the chips:

• "classic", where everyone starts: "classic — the first my sky: the brightest stars, with the big dipper, orion, cassiopeia, the southern cross and the summer triangle".
• "collection": "collection — all 1,322 real stars, with as many constellations as the slider asks for, best known first".
• "carousel": "carousel — all 1,322 real stars; one constellation at a time fades in and out, picked from those wholly on your screen".

Then the sliders. Each shows its value at the right.

The line at the foot: "how often the sky turns to match the real sky, and how long each turn takes. constantly uses the most battery; reduce motion makes it jump instead".

Without Gold the page is drawn dim, and a tap anywhere on it opens the Gold offer instead of changing anything.

#Three fingers move the stars

While my sky is on, three fingers belong to the stars, in every view:

• Pinch or spread to zoom the stars.
• Drag to pan them.
• Twist to tilt them.
• Double-tap with three fingers to bring them back to where they started.

One and two fingers stay the calendar's. Two fingers still pinch and pan the solar system. A touch that becomes three fingers presses nothing and moves no day.

#Chosen per almanac, not here

An almanac's mark — a letter, a symbol, a number, an emoji, an icon from an installed pack, or a picture from your phone (Gold) — is set on the almanac (see Edit an almanac). So is how its commitments' pages look (see A commitment's page).

#The rest of the page

A tapped day opens its fan at once, whatever the rest setting says. The rest only applies while you drag.

#See also.

Ease — presets & sizes · Ease — motion, colour & touch · Edit an almanac · Zenith Gold in the calendar