[AT&T Samsung Galaxy Note I717] Frankenbiker:
If it's offered on AT&T, it probably won't pass this hurdle 2 years down the road. :silly:

I offer that semi- tongue-in-cheek, but there's a deeper issue here. Here's my train of thought:

The Infuse (which many of us loved) appeared to be AT&T's first foray into displays larger than 4 inches. It was popular enough, but was the red-headed stepchild of the Galaxy family; it's specs were unlike any OTHER galaxy device, and it was offered only by ONE carrier in ONE market; It had 4 capacitive buttons instead of the single home button. NO ONE else uses the configuration. Six months after introduction, Samsung clearly wanted to wash it's hands of it. It was good at what it did, but it wasn't popular ENOUGH.

The Skyrocket has been "pigeonholed" as an Infuse with LTE. Effectively identical screens. But much more horsepower under the hood, which was ineffectively utilized by it's GB software base. Again, only offered in ONE market, by ONE carrier. Again, four capacitive buttons. It wasn't effectively supported EITHER, but AT&T kept it in stores because it was LTE. Like the Infuse, it has a small but rabidly loyal following.

The I-717 Note has been described as a Skyrocket with a bigger screen. Effectively identical specs under the hood, but JUST different enough to really muck things up when it comes to kernel and coding issues. Yet again, offered in only ONE market, by ONE carrier. Yet again, four capacitive buttons. But this device blew everyone's minds. It was POPULAR. People WANTED it. People wanted it BADLY. Samsung knew they had a hit. AT&T(!) knew(!) they had a hit. Six months after introduction, the used market was still commanding NEW pricing on the bad boy.

Then, somewhere along the line the folks at Samsung and AT&T finally agreed that the international market-spec of the exterior of the phone would be the same across the entire product line. The difference in processor would only be because of the LTE bands in the North American market; otherwise the phones would be identical. The Note-2 sold faster than Samsung could get them off the production lines, and AT&T was laughing all the way to the bank. The "regular" Galaxy series phones were relegated to the back wall in the corner.

I bring up the 4 versus 3 buttons because I suspect that's where the kernel difficulties lie, and where the development falls off the rails. Not because of the buttons themselves, but how they and their functionality hook into the kernel code. Notice how all three devices that have them have been consigned to the trash bin; CM itself no longer supports the functionality (and Steve Kondik himself mentioned how much of a ***** it was to try to code around/for them.) SK is also on record as saying that the big merge of supposedly Samsung kernel code introduced a great deal of collateral damage that took them three months to even categorize, much less fix. Even Samsung dragged their feet on the JB release for our phones, and we see how marginal the end result was. The otherwise identical next generation streamlined a great deal of software development.

Add into this the fact that every device mentioned uses a combined WiFi/Bluetooth chip that uses closed-source drivers. We simply cannot get drivers for them. Thus we're left with reverse-engineering, and you can see what the results are; BT and WiFi that are only marginally (or unpredictably) functional. On all three devices.

(I kept up with Scott Hart's (scott.hart.bti) development of CM for the Infuse in the early stages. The hoops he had (and still has) to jump through to get the Infuse kernel to BOOT, much less function normally, were mind-boggling.)

I submit that there are lots of people who are "making decisons" want our otherwise awesome device GONE. Not because it isn't awesome, but because it creates a LOT of headache to maintain. The software world is moving FAST, and by the time they've gotten our device sorted out, they're already not one but TWO OS versions behind. And they can't just "jump over the hole." They have to fill the hole first, and I'm guessing that they feel that there is sufficient developer support in our small-but-rabid community to fill that hole and keep us happy.

*whew* (If you kept up with all that drivel, congrats! :laugh: )

-blaine