Since CyanogenMod 9 rc1 came out, I’ve been testing it extensively on my phone. I got used to the new look and appreciated the visual speed improvements. I also like the new data usage diagram and predictions. Furthermore, my phone uses a lot less battery power than on CM7. It had power for four and a half days without charging recently.

But there are also some features I’m missing from CyanogenMod 9. In good Free Software fashion I created feature requests for them in CyanogenMod’s issue tracker. Here’s my list:

Power Control Widget Not Configurable

In CM7 multiple Power Control Widgets could be added to the desktop. Each could be configured individually and have a different number and types of buttons. In CM9 only the Power Control in the drawer can be configured. That helps somewhat but is far less powerful than having any number of custom widgets.

No SSH Daemon (Dropbear)

Having a dropbear daemon running on my phone used to be a great feature, because it allowed my to remotely log into my phone, run scp and rsync. Unfortunately, there’s no dropbear binary on the CM9rc2 image anymore.

Option for Black Background Missing for Contacts and Messages

CM7 had the option to set a black background for the free (as in free speech) contacts, messages and calendar apps. (Note that I’m not talking about the non-free Google Apps here.) This option is gone in CM9 and these apps don’t integrate at all in a phone where all other apps have black background. Plus it consumes more energy.

No More Direct In-App Shortcuts on Desktop

The Desktop from CM7 allowed custom shortcuts to screens within applications. This was a useful feature to for example directly link to the alarm clock.

Native OpenVPN Support is Gone

PPTP and IPSec are still there, but OpenVPN is just gone.

In case you are actually using a Google Account, you can vote for those issues by starring them.

Update: Added missing Dropbear support.