Cyanogen Stories March 21, 2017
The Nintendo Switch debuted earlier this month to incredible success. Looking back a year or so, there were rumors floating around that Nintendo was planning to build the device on top of Android, but obviously, those never came to fruition. Now, though, a Cyanogen chairman has revealed that Nintendo was indeed looking to build with Android, and apparently wanted Cyanogen to help out…
Cyanogen Stories December 24, 2016
We’ve been hearing about the failures of Cyanogen for a few months now, but today that has all culminated with the company announcing that it will be shutting down all of its services in just a few days.
Cyanogen Stories October 10, 2016
A few months ago, following layoffs at the company, we heard that Cyanogen would be pivoting to apps, but CEO Kirk McMaster quickly shot those rumors down, at least for the time being. Today the company has just made a major new announcement, replacing its CEO and moving away from “full-stack” development…
Cyanogen Stories July 26, 2016
After reports came out last week suggesting major layoffs had happened at Cyanogen Inc, the company’s CEO has come out to clear up a bit of the confusion as to what the future holds for the company. In those original reports it was revealed that the company was laying off a large portions of its staff and allegedly pivoting the company’s focus towards applications. As it turns out, that’s not true…
Cyanogen Stories July 22, 2016
Cyanogen Inc has been hard at work over the past couple of years working an its alternative version of Android for OEMs, but it seems that can only take the company so far. We’ve seen a few devices here and there that offer the software, most notably the OnePlus One, however even with help from Microsoft, Cyanogen has never been very successful in its endeavors and today it’s clear that the company is suffering the consequences…
Cyanogen Stories March 30, 2016
According to a report this morning out of The Information, AT&T is in talks with Cyanogen to launch a phone running a version of Android made by the company, purportedly on ZTE hardware. This is notably the first time that a US carrier has considered selling a phone running the less-Google-controlled version of Android that powers phones like the Yu Yutopia and the WileyFox Swift…
Cyanogen Stories February 22, 2016
Cyanogen has today announced a new platform called “MOD,” giving developers deeper access to the Android operating system and allowing them to take advantage of platform APIs that are otherwise out of reach. Microsoft, for example, has built a Skype mod that allows users to add VoIP calling functionality directly to the Android dialer, as well as a Cortana mod that replaces Google Now on an OS level…
Cyanogen Stories January 20, 2016
CyanogenMod officially ends WhisperPush support, recommends downloading Signal app instead
The CyanogenMod team has announced via an official blog post that it is ending support for WhisperPush, and that its services will be officially end of life from February 1st. WhisperPush, for those unaware, is an encryption service which keeps messages secure and private.
We’ve ultimately made the decision that we will no longer be supporting WhisperPush functionality directly within CyanogenMod. Further, WhisperPush services will be end-of-lifed beginning Feb 1st 2016. As this is a server side implementation, all branches of CM from CM10.2 and forward will be affected.
There are seemingly several reasons for CyanogenMod’s decision to end integrated WhisperPush support. The team says it saw many ‘hiccups’, and had a number of longstanding registration problems as well as issues in various countries with WhisperPush. Also, with the arrival of Snowden-endorsed Signal — an app which offers practically the same services — the necessity to continue the difficult development and upkeep of WhisperPush was significantly reduced.
We transitioned the work to CM13, instead opting to implement directly within our Messaging application. However, with the rapid adoption of the official Signal application, our implementation into Messaging would have been a seemingly unnecessary fork. Analyzing the costs of SMS verification (many thanks to Twilio for their support on this), usage traffic, server costs and registration numbers, forking would serve no larger long-term user benefit.
If you have a number registered with WhisperPush you should unregister by heading to Settings>Privacy>WhisperPush on your device running any version of CyanogenMod from CM10.2 to CM12.1. Once February 1st rolls around, all numbers will be unregistered by CyanogenMod.
Those who have used, or use the service regularly are urged by the CM team to download the aforementioned Signal app. It comes from Open Whisper Systems (who helped create WhisperPush) and offers encrypted text messages and voice calls. What’s more, it’s cross platform and there’s a desktop beta version.
Cyanogen Stories January 15, 2016
When tablets became the next big thing in 2010, every tech company jumped into the fray hoping to monopolize on the trend. There are definitely lessons to be learned from the dirt cheap Android tablets, Fusion Garage’s JooJoo, and the like—notably, how companies quickly stopped supporting them. However, some tablets, like the Nook Tablet, get reprieve thanks to CyanogenMod.
Cyanogen Stories November 24, 2015
The CyanogenMod team announced in a blog post this morning that it has started pushing its Android Marshmallow-based CM13 nightlies to a handful of older Android phones. It does note, however, that if you’re currently using YOG4P orYOG7D builds of CM12.1 and are happy with its stability, you may want to give the CM13 nightly a miss. A nightly — for those who are unaware — is essentially a beta custom ROM build that CyanogenMod pushes out to its users.
Cyanogen Stories November 12, 2015
At the Big Android BBQ in Amsterdam this morning, Cyanogen revealed its plans for next year. It’s pretty ambitious for 2016, and aims to have a much bigger global presence than it has currently…
Cyanogen Stories October 9, 2015
CyanogenMod is arguably the most popular custom build of Android, and now Cyanogen has begun work on CyanogenMod 13. If you’ve been running any of the nightlies on your phone, you’re probably using version 12.1 (based on Lollipop). Version 13, which will probably take some time before it becomes a build you can actually run on your device, is based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow and is now in the earliest stages of development… expand full story
Cyanogen Stories September 21, 2015
The smartphone market is getting crowded by low cost phones offering great performance. It’s been something of a rising trend, especially with brands like OnePlus and Alcatel OneTouch leading the way. The next devices wanting a piece of the action are the Wileyfox Swift and Wileyfox Storm. Both released in what looks like a direct response to last year’s “flagship killer”, the OnePlus One.
I unboxed the more budget-friendly model of the two, the Wileyfox Swift, to see if it could deliver as much bang for your buck as other, similar devices…
Cyanogen Stories August 27, 2015
Cyanogen OS 12.1 update for OnePlus One rolling out OTA
Cyanogen has announced that its most recent update, Cyanogen OS 12.1, is rolling out now to OnePlus One owners as an over-the-air update. The initial launch has been slightly delayed, but it’s finally here and you should see it available to download over the coming days. Cyanogen OS 12.1 is based on Android 5.1 Lollipop and comes with a promising list of updates. From looking at the update, it seems Cyanogen is really going for productivity and performance over anything else. Those updates include:
Cyanogen Stories June 30, 2015
Update: Check out a new video showing off Gello below.
There’s not much to know about this yet, but CyanogenMod staff member Joey Rizzoli has come out on Google+ today to announce a new browser project the team has been working on. It’s called “Gello,” and while we don’t know many real details at this point, it seems apparent that it’s built at least in some capacity on Google’s open source Chromium project (which the Mountain View company’s flagship Chrome browser is based on as well). expand full story
Cyanogen Stories June 25, 2015
Final snapshot releases of CyanogenMod 11.0 and 12.0 going live tonight
CyanogenMod today announced that it is pushing the final snapshot releases of both CM11.0 and 12.0 live. In a blog post, the company notes that both the CM11.0 and CM12.0 have seen improvements in stability and security, but not much else as focus has shifted to CM12.1.
The company defended its release of another CM11.0 build, which is based on Android 4.4 KitKat, by saying that many users have been slow to update to CM12.0 for whatever reason. Nightly builds for CM11 and CM12 will be slowly phased out as development further shifts to CM12.1, which is based on Android 5.1.
Why another CM11 build? Rather surprisingly, many users have been slow to upgrade to L – whether due to the lack of a snapshot release or adverse reaction to the Material design, we don’t know. The meager stats that we have show that there is a rather large contingency of users who are sticking to CM11 as their release channel of choice, so we felt compelled to give a release showcasing all the work that went into that branch to make it ship ready.
More details can be found in the blog post on the CyanogenMod website.
Cyanogen Stories June 17, 2015
The OnePlus One, despite its well-deserved praise and renown, has some shortcoming. Besides the fact that OnePlus has some of the most ridiculous — although effective — marketing of any tech company today, the flagship phone itself has been plagued with some pretty nagging problems . Most notably, OnePlus has some pretty sketchy Bluetooth connectivity with in-car systems, problems sending MMS on some carriers, and — most notoriously — problems with touch screen sensitivity. Now, though, it looks like these problems are finally fixed… expand full story
Cyanogen Stories June 11, 2015
Playphone, which develops a third-party social game store for Android, has a new partner in Cyanogen. The company’s app will soon be included on Cyanogen OS phones in developing markets where mobile games may not have as high penetration as they do in Western countries.
Cyanogen Stories May 12, 2015
Cyanogen receives more ‘strategic investment,’ this time from Foxconn
The details are very scarce at this point, but a fresh press release this morning reveals that Cyanogen has received a “strategic investment” from Foxconn, closing out its series C round of funding. While an exact number isn’t mentioned (in fact no details are really mentioned), the release does say that Cyanogen has raised a total of $110 million in funding to date, assumably including the amount that Foxconn has invested.
Cyanogen received $70 million in an investment round in January, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. Some amount of that was from Microsoft, another company that Cyanogen calls its partner. Kirt McMaster, Cyanogen’s CEO, was quoted as saying that the company plans to “take Android away from Google,” and apparently Foxconn—like Microsoft—will happily support this venture.
Yu—a subsidiary of Micromax—announced their first device (the Yureka) late last year, but today the company has announced their second entry: the Yuphoria. At first glance you’ll probably notice that the device has a smaller overall build and a metal frame—and that’s exactly the realm of devices that Yu seems to be after with this launch (think the Galaxy A series)… expand full story
Cyanogen Stories April 24, 2015
Cyanogen wants to take Android from Google, so it would make sense that the company might want to show off the best of what it has to offer. The company has launched a new series of videos today, showcasing the best features of Cyanogen OS. And while many of these features may not be anything new for Cyanogen veterans, those who haven’t given the custom fork of Android a try might be intrigued… expand full story
Cyanogen Stories April 16, 2015
In what may be taken as some dreadful news to long-time fans of Cyanogen’s work in the custom Android-based ROM space, the group has today announced a partnership with Microsoft to pre-install many of the Redmond company’s consumer-facing apps on its mobile OS… expand full story
Cyanogen Stories April 13, 2015
After teasing the update last week, OnePlus today has announced that Lollipop-based Cyanogen OS 12 is now rolling out to the OnePlus One. The update has been a long time coming and while users have been waiting, OnePlus also released Oxygen OS, which is also based on Android 5.0 Lollipop.
Cyanogen Stories March 16, 2015
Cyanogen recently gave itself a rebrand, and now the company has come out to share the new boot animation shipping with its upcoming Cyanogen OS 12. It’s definitely sporting the company’s slick new logo which, according to Cyanogen, “celebrates space, with minimal letterforms that don’t quite connect, giving the logo a sense of motion and a feeling of inherent energy.”
Cyanogen Stories March 2, 2015
Cyanogen rebrands itself, partners w/ Qualcomm to load its OS on reference devices
Software maker Cyanogen announced today that it has made a deal with Qualcomm to pre-load its partially-proprietary, Android-based Cyanogen OS (not to be confused with CyanogenMod) onto some of Qualcomm’s reference hardware. Reference devices for the Snapdragon 200, 400, and 600 series chips will now be powered by the Android-based operating system.
These reference devices previously ran customized versions of Android compiled by Qualcomm, with some tweaks for their own purposes. The move to Cyanogen OS could potentially put the software onto a large number of devices very quickly. It could also mean that many more reference devices will be able to receive software updates and run the latest version of Android.
Cyanogen also announced new branding (seen above) to help fit with its focus on open software:
As our values have evolved and advanced, we’ve realized that our identity as a team and a company should reflect that change.
Today we’re announcing a new look that we hope captures our commitment to openness. This new approach celebrates space, with minimal letterforms that don’t quite connect, giving the logo a sense of motion and a feeling of inherent energy.
The new Cyanogen feels open: fresh, expansive, and free.
Cyanogen Stories February 6, 2015
You can now install CyanogenMod 12 on the Nexus 9
If you’ve been waiting for CyanogenMod 12 to hit the Nexus 9, you’re in luck. A nightlies release from earlier today packs support for “flounder” (the code name for the Nexus 9), and you can download it right now. This news comes following the announcement in early January that Cyanogen had enabled nightly releases for the latest version of its ROM.
As you know, CyanogenMod 12 (unlike CyanogenMod 11) is based on Android 5.0 Lollipop, so you’ll still get Material Design and the other benefits of Google’s latest official release with this build. That said, it’s worth remembering that this is a very early version of the software, so if you go ahead and flash it, don’t expect it to run perfectly (this can be said about basically any build of CM 12 currently).
Direct download below:
(via Android Police)
Cyanogen Stories January 29, 2015
The tensions between CyanogenMod and OnePlus have been well documented over the recent months, with OnePlus even going as far as removing Cyanogen branding from its most recent shipments of phones. This morning, OnePlus teased an upcoming announcement with the tagline “Back to Basics” and now the company has revealed its own custom ROM. In a post on the OnePlus forums, the company has revealed that it is developing its own ROM that it will call Oxygen OS.
Update: A previous version of this article stated that Microsoft was investing $70 million, but it seems more likely that the company is only part of that total number. It’s not known how much Microsoft is investing. Feel free to read WSJ’s ambiguous wording below…
The Wall Street Journal reports today that Microsoft plans to take part in a $70 million investment round in Cyanogen, a company that was once just a group of modders working on a variant of Android. Now, Cyanogen has bigger ambitions. “We’re going to take Android away from Google,” said on the record recently by Kirt McMaster, Cyanogen’s CEO.
OnePlus is today teasing an announcement for tomorrow with the tagline “Back to Basics,” but no one really has any idea what the company plans to tell us about. Interestingly, the teaser image that OnePlus posted across its social media profiles (seen above) definitely makes reference to the Breaking Bad title screen, but it’s not clear yet what it might mean.
Also, updated models of the OnePlus One without Cyanogen branding on their back covers have begun shipping…
Cyanogen Stories December 17, 2014
OnePlus is celebrating it’s first anniversary by making its OnePlus One ‘flagship killer’ smartphone available without the invitation you’ve so far needed to order one. Both the white 16GB and black 64GB models are available.
The company is also offering 11% of all accessories, a prize draw to win a 64GB model and a competition to name its forthcoming custom ROM in which you can win both a phone and a trip to Hong Kong to meet the team.
Yesterday’s ‘Go further’ teaser, however, turned out to be rather unexciting … expand full story
Cyanogen Stories October 7, 2014
OnePlus One software update adds RAW format photo capture and high quality audio support
It’s still hard to get your hands on a OnePlus One, however if you’re among the small group of people using the handset, a new software update is now available for your rare smartphone. Cyanogen’s CM 11S 38R is rolling out as an over-the-air patch and its highlights include an updated lockscreen, improved touchscreen responsiveness, the ability to capture photos in RAW format and high bitrate (24 bit, 96/192khz—flac/alac/wav) audio support.
Cyanogen Stories August 28, 2014
CyanogenMod—which is probably the most well-known fork of Android—lets users customize their phone beyond what Google intends, and touts having as many as 12 million active installs across a variety of devices. But the company behind the famed alternative operating system is reportedly getting a lot of attention, notably from companies that would consider themselves some of Google’s biggest rivals.
Cyanogen Stories February 12, 2014
Koushik Dutta, Cyanogen Inc co-founder and developer of the AllCast app that allows Chromecast streaming of local photos and video from your phone or tablet, has posted the above meme graphic hinting at the ability to mirror the entire Android screen to a TV.
Dutta had previously suggested that the functionality might be coming to Android officially … expand full story
Cyanogen Stories December 20, 2013
A big round of applause to the folks at Oppo and Cyanogen Inc as the Oppo N1 becomes the first Google-approved CyanogenMod phone. The announcement came yesterday via Google Groups as the device was certified to have passed through Google’s CTS and CDD certification programs which is a major milestone for everyone working on this project.
Cyanogen Stories December 19, 2013
Cyanogen Inc, the parent company of the Android-famous CyanogenMod has raised an additional $22 million dollars in Series B funding. The money comes on top of the $7 million the company raised earlier this year as it announced three months ago it had incorporated.
Cyanogen Stories November 12, 2013
There’s no doubting that CyanogenMod is one of the most well-known custom ROMs available, with it being available for a plethora of new and old devices. Last month, the CyanogenMod team announced that it had raised $7 million in funding and was looking into a direct-to-consumer route for installing the ROM. Today, Cyanogen Inc. has announced (via Droid Life) the CyanogenMod Installer. This app, available on Google Play now, allows users to install the custom ROM incredibly easily.
Once the app is downloaded to one of the compatible devices (list here), it will pair to companion computer software in order to perform the ROM flash. All the user must do is plug their device into the computer and simply hit “start.” The process will wipe everything from the device and install the latest CyanogenMod build. Both the app and computer software are free to download.
As far as device compatibility goes, Cyanogen says that it “will continue to work on supporting additional devices beyond the initial set,” but that for the moment, the software supports “the majority of flagship models currently on the market.”
This is an incredible feat for a company that only received funding last month. CyanogenMod Installer will allow for people who are not technologically-inclined to easily install the latest version of Android to their device.
You can download the app from the Play Store now, and the computer software from Cyanogen’s website.
