Cyanogenmod Compiler lets you build a custom Android firmware file in minutes
If you have an Android device, chances are you are familiar with Cyanogenmod. If you aren't then you should be, as it is one of the best and most popular custom firmware distributions available for Android devices. Usually though, users have to wait for developers on various forums or websites to post compiled builds of the Cyanogenmod source for them to download and flash, but thanks to a new tool, Ubuntu users can do all this themselves.
The Cyanogenmd Compiler is a tool that attempts to take most of the difficulty out of building a flashable .zip file with a nice GUI. This article's title may be a bit misleading because the time it takes to build and compile Cyanogenmod will vary based on your network connection and computer processor, but the point still stands that the CM Compiler program will make things vastly easier and faster for less experienced users.
As long as you are running Ubuntu, all that you have to do to use the program is choose a supported device to compile for (presumably whichever device you own), the branch of Cyanogenmod that you want (Gingerbread or Ice Cream Sandwich), the repository path, and then you're off. The program will spit out a .zip file that you can flash through your recovery of choice, and should work normally.
This may not seem like a very big deal to many users, but what this tool does is make some of the benefits of having the Cyanogenmod/Android source openly available accessible to more average users. Primarily, it does so by allowing less command line savvy users to apply source level tweaks and changes to their OS without having to wait for a developer to do it and post a .zip download. Apart from that, it's also pretty cool to be able to take advantage of Android's openness and compile your own ROM from source, and for that reason alone I may end up downloading this tool and compiling some nightly builds for my Kindle Fire.
