Cyanogen, which is synonymous to the Android-based Cyanogen OS, is debuting a new developer platform dubbed MOD, which will offer developers complete and direct app integration in the Cyanogen operating system.
On Monday, Cyanogen launched the new MOD platform that will undoubtedly be welcomed by developers. Thanks to the platform, third-party apps will be able to take advantage of Cyanogen APIs so that they can integrate it directly in the OS.
"Thinner bezel, better biometrics, faster processors... changes never cease, yet many people are still bored with their devices. Why is this? We think people are intuitively looking for a more natural way to interact with them. MOD enables this by effectively creating a new runtime, a new way to build services for the Android super platform," says Kirt McMaster, Cyanogen's CEO and co-founder.
The company is collaborating with several partners worldwide who have an understanding of the "new vision of computing that MOD enables for Android." McMaster also says the company was keen on seeing what exciting things are developed as a result of the partnership.
Initially, Microsoft will be offering most of first-generation mods. This includes the ability to integrate Skype directly to the dialer interface, as well as OneNote's integration with the email client, calendar and browser. Truecaller, which entered into partenship with Cyanogen last year, is also now gearing up to launch the mod that will aid in controlling spam messages.
Cyanogen will be offering a Platform Development Kit or PDK to its partners as part of the MOD Ready program. The PDK will consisit of all the necessary important components one needs to launch a device that is MOD-enabled. Moreover, Cyanogen will be working in tandem with chipset providers to upgrade the PDK constantly on a quarterly basis.
Cyanogen OS is CTS-compliant, hence devices that are MOD Ready will allow the partners to benefit from the prevailing Android ecosystem.
The notion behind the MOD platform is to offer developers access to multitude APIs, which in the past were only accessible by the developers of Cyanogen OS. The access will enable the developers to write integrated forms of their applications or use extensions for the prevailing ones.
Since there are several possible security repercussions, Cyanogen has wisely chosen to work with a handful of developers as of now. However, in the long term, the company is eyeing the opening of the platform to all developers.
Select Cyanogen device users will be able to take advantage of the MOD platform, which will roll out when the Cyanogen OS 13.0 is launched in March.
