A decent portion of our readerbase is likely familar with Xposed Framework, a root utility that absolutely tears Android’s security to shreds and allows developers to create “modules”, or mods and programs, with deep level system access that rooting alone could never provide. Things like modifying the device’s framework, playing around with the bootloader and messing with the theme and function of non-custom roms become child’s play in the face of Xposed Framework’s might. Many of you may also remember that Xposed took forever to hit Lollipop, longer than any update before, mainly because of the runtime, or core programming to hardware interface, changing from the aging Dalvik Virtual Machine to Android’s very own ART, short for Android Run Time.. This has not been the case with Marshmallow.
Developer rovo89 announced in a thread on XDA Developers that his Nexus 9 running Marshmallow has been making an excellent guinea pig for Xposed and the general public can expect a taste at some point “later this week”, after some bug squashing with one incident in particular only needing three lines of code to right itself. rovo89 has stated that the build will be a little less stable and compatible than existing builds due to a fairly normal gamut of changes in Google’s AOSP code at the core of Android, but that it should be plenty stable enough for day to day use. In a somewhat regular move for bigger developers, rovo89 has finally caved to the clamor of would-be donors and added a bitcoin option to the official donation page.
Many users have been waiting for this, reluctant to take an official Marshmallow upgrade or go to a CM13 or other Marshmallow-based ROM without being able to take Xposed functionality with them. With the wait almost over, the bigger questions that begin to arise are whether there will be ports of existing modules to Marshmallow from Lollipop and Kitkat, as well as what new and exciting kinds of modules may become possible once Marshmallow’s depths have been fully plumbed by module developers. It’s hard to say for now how this development will affect the root community at large with Marshmallow still basically in its infancy, but it’s safe to say great things are set to happen.