Install Google Currents on the Kindle Fire

Yesterday, Google has launched Google Currents (iOS/Android download here), a new publishing platform that lets users read web news like they would with an electronic magazine. Unfortunately, Amazon Kindle Fire owners have quickly realized that Currents was not available on the Amazon App Store. Worse, even sideloading it by copying the .apk (application file) to the Kindle didn’t work.

Fortunately, geeky Kindle Fire owner and XDA developer forums member “rooobbbbb” did not give up and found out what is going on: it turns out that Google Currents relies on a Google code libraries that don’t ship with the Kindle Fire. The good news is that it is possible to copy and activate that those libraries to finally get Currents working on the Kindle Fire. Here are the instructions that you can find from the XDA developers forums (thanks to Tom Benton who tipped me in a Google+ thread):

1. Extract the zip file on your computer
2. Copy the extracted files to your device
3. Copy com.google.android.maps.jar into /system/framework via ADB or Root Explorer
4. Chmod (long hold select file in Root Explorer and select permissions) to 644 (owner read/write, group read, others read)
5. Copy com.google.android.maps.xml to /system/etc/permissions the same way
6. Chmod that file to the same permissions
7. Restart your Fire to allow it to recognize the new framework
8. Install this APK Google_Currents_1.0.apk
9. Open the app and select your Google account to continue

If you manage to install Currents on the Kindle Fire, check our Ubergizmo edition. It’s in Science&Tech, and you will recognize our orange happy smiley face :)

Hubert Nguyen
Categories: Breaking, Tablets
Tags: Google, Kindle Fire