If you frequently make phone calls, your dialer (aka phone app) is one of the most crucial apps in your app drawer arsenal. There are times, however, when we cannot dial right away because we are busy composing Emails, looking for files, or are simply tied up in other not-so-menial tasks. In such cases, launching the dialer can potentially cause you to lose your progress in whatever it is that you were doing up to that point. There are several options out there, most of them in the form of floating windows like Sony's Small Apps suite, Samsung's multi-window mod, or even some of the open source alternatives. However, they all require something major, normally in the form of a ROM or feature port. But what if you don't have the time or luxury of flashing ROMs and would kill to have said ability to dial a phone number no matter where you are? XDA Senior Member dancer_69 might have just what you need.

Slide Dial is an app that provides you with a floating dialer no matter which application (if any) you happen to be using at the moment. The dialer simply comes forth by means of swipe on the screen. This gesture can be easily configured to be either from left to right or from right to left and the location of the starting point can be changed by the user at will. The app also features a small Contacts area with access to speed dial features and a smart dialer, which basically means that you can either type the number or the name of the person you are trying to call. And of course, it also offers a few other pieces of basic functionality that you'd expect to have in a dialer.

The dev states that this was a small project to get started into Android programming and decided to share the fruits of his labor with the rest of the community. He further states that the app is stable enough for daily usage, and he is looking for some feedback. Please swing by the thread and take it for a spin. You can find more information in the Slide Dial app thread.