Unlocking Multitouch For Droid And Nexus One

We’re fans of pinch-zooming and that means multitouch. Although the interface is natively supported by both the hardware and operating systems of the Nexus One and Droid phones, it is locked out of the stock installation. You can make multitouch work on both handsets if you’re willing to do a little firmware alteration.

The coding has already been done for you, it’s a matter of loading a custom kernel. Both the Nexus One and the Droid have been rooted, and that’s what you’ll need to do to unlock multitouch with new firmware. In addition to gaining full access to the device OS, you’ll need to load up some different apps that support pinch zooming, etc. Luckily, these are readily available and you may like them better than the stock browser, maps, and photo applications.

Nexus One Rooted

You know it’s getting a bit ridiculous when hardware that hasn’t hit the streets is being rooted. That’s exactly what has happened, root access can now be achieved on the Nexus One. [Paul] found an exploit and packaged it nicely so that anyone can do it. We do wish he had shared the details of the exploit but we’re not complaining.

If you’re not in the know, the Nexus One is the fabled Google Phone now come to life. It’s slated for release in 2010 and some think that will be officially unveiled at a January 5th press conference. That’s right, unveiled. The device has been cracked yet it doesn’t officially exist. What it does do is join a growing number of rooted android phones.

[via Gizmodo]