In a message posted last night on the official Android Building mailing list, Google developer Jean-Baptiste Queru announced the availability of the Android 4.1 source code. The code has landed in the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and is now available to independent developers.

Android 4.1, which is codenamed Jelly Bean, introduces a number of noteworthy technical improvements under the hood. It includes significant performance optimizations that boost the responsiveness of Android’s user interface. It was launched at Google I/O last month and debuted on Google’s impressive new Nexus 7 tablet device.

New versions of Android are typically developed by Google and its hardware partners behind closed doors. After a new version launches on a hardware product, Google publishes the source code and makes it available through the AOSP code repository.

Android enthusiasts eagerly anticipate each code drop because the availability of source code opens the door for third-party developers to build custom Android ROM images based on the new version of the platform. Such ROM images make it possible for users to manually install new versions of Android on their handsets and tablets.

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Now that Jelly Bean is in the wild, CyanogenMod and other popular community-driven Android variants that are developed downstream can begin incorporating the code.