Zune Hackers Create Toolkit to Make Apps, Games

A team of three developers has created a toolkit that can bypass Microsoft?s limitations on developing programs for the Zune. The kit allows independent programmers to create applications for the digital music player.

“This is the first Zune hack that works,” Glenn Anderson, one of the creators of the toolkit told Wired.com. “People can now bypass all of Microsoft’s limitations and develop for the platform.”

The toolkit called OpenZDK will allow developers to make new games, port old ones, create emulators and even have a rogue app store on the device. It will work on the original Zune and Zune HD.

OpenZDK could let people make applications on par with Microsoft-published games such as PGR: Ferrari Edition and Audiosurf Tilt. It could also spark a healthy homebrew community that would offer programs that are much better than what is available on the Zune now.�

Microsoft launched the Zune music player in 2006 and a HD version of the device last year. Zune, though, has barely made a dent in the market that Apple iPod consistently dominates. Zune reportedly has a market share of about 2 percent.

Earlier efforts to make Zune apps relied on a Microsoft kit called XNA development tools. In 2008, Microsoft released XNA Game Studio 3.0, which supports Zune development. But some developers say that XNA’s sluggish performance and lack of 3-D or internet access make it difficult to produce quality apps.

The OpenZDK toolkit could allow programmers to get around the limitations Microsoft has placed. The OpenZDK crew met on ZuneBoards, a popular online Zune development community, where they go by usernames Netrix (aka Anderson), Nurta and itsnotabigtruck. It took them a few months to work around Microsoft?s protections, Anderson said, and they have been testing it for the last two weeks.

But since OpenZDK has just launched, there are no apps or games based on it available yet. Getting started is easy enough, though, by following the steps on the OpenZDK wiki.

Microsoft?s newly announced Kin phones will also be running some of Zune’s software, but the OpenZDK team says it won?t be possible to simply port the hack onto the phones, because Microsoft has “locked the phone down.”

Which isn?t to say Kin is unhackable. “That remains to be seen,” Anderson said, hinting it could be possible in the future.

Photo: Zune