[Captivate Android Development] littlewierdo:
No offense to any of the devs, just going to pull say the top 5 GB based roms off the XDA forums list that are not based on CM. Completely unbiased, these are the first 5 that meets the requirements mentioned above.

Obsession

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1098145

One small blurb in red that quotes "This is JV9 GINGERBREAD ROM make sure you have bootloaders updated".

No information on how to return to stock.

Apex

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=952588

One small blurb in standard black that quotes "If you are already on other GB ROM (NOT MIUI or CM7 since they dont have GB bootloaders) then you may want to try flashing this ROM directly from recovery else you can follow these instructions."

A short list of instructions for how to install the rom follows.

No information on how to restore to stock.

Continuuum

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1045160

Wow, Kudos to this developer, Im going to read his OP... Alot of information on this. Going to have to PM the developer for actually taking responsibility to explain this stuff.

Talon Dev

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1050206

One small blurb, "As always, flash at your own risk, im not responsible for any damages!"

No information on how to return to stock.

Darky

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1071931

No information on bootloaders is given.

Now, to be fair, I grabbed what appeared to be roms that change the bootloaders. Maybe none of these do but there is no information one way or the other as to whether they do or not. Again, I sort of skimmed the OPs instructions (of course I would read much more closely if I planned to flash these and now that I know what to look for, Id download and look inside the zip files to confirm whether they are flashing bootloaders).

Continuum was the only one that had details on this.

Four roms out of five, I think my point is made here.

There is also ONE sticky thread that talks about permabricking and how it works (and it isnt even under rom development, its under Captivate General).

http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1049294

There is hardly any information on this in the xda forums. Many sites even outside of XDA are just willy nilly posting GB roms that are farking around with the bootloaders, there are several here that are needlessly changing them.

Yes, the responsibility lies on the person flashing them. But the responsibility also lies on the rom creators and rom uploaders. I mean, what would happen if say Winamp (just to pull a random program out of thin air) discovered that someone was somehow injecting a virus in their download that overwrote the bios in your video card, thus bricking peoples expensive $200 video card (yes, these virus's do exist) and all they stated on their site was "As always, install at your own risk, im not responsible for any damages!"?

Well, yea, the responsibility lies with the person who downloaded winamp but it also lies with the creators of the software to make sure it is safe. Yes yes, I know the analogy isnt exactly the same, I realize that rom devs arent posting roms with the intention of being malicious, but they are in fact posting roms that are not safe and in the long run, are dangerous.

Rom devs have a responsibility as well as the user. Making a generic statement like "Im not responsible for what happens to your phone with the use of my rom" is pure BS if said rom is mucking with bootloaders and creating a potentially brickable device (in an otherwise unbrickable device).

I think if people realized the potential risk here, they would not be flashing these roms. Trust me, once you have had to pay for a second Cappy because of this, you wouldnt either.

The problem is, there are two types of people flashing android. Enthusiasts such as myself who know nothing about how Android works (or just enough to be dangerous) and Developers who usually know more than the enthusiasts and one would hope a much more extensive knowledge about how the specific device they are developing for works.

We enthusiasts TRUST the developers to both give us proper information and give us a rom that isnt going to permabrick our device (or at a minimum tries to reduce this risk as much as possible). There are many situations where we dont have the full knowledge and trust other people to give us the information we are looking for. We TRUST that the reporters are reporting information accurately (not going to go any further than that except to say, the internet has shown us how stupid we were for trusting news reporters). We TRUST our doctors to give us informed information about our health. We TRUST a sales person to give us an informed opinion based on the needs of the type of product.

The enthusiasts are trusting the developers to give both informed information and make it as safe as possible to both use their rom and restore to stock as safely as possible.

It isnt all we have. There are several GB options available that dont muck around with things they should not be (ie bootloaders).

As to the rest of your statement, I resent the statement that people dont read. That is absurd. I had to do alot of digging to find any information. You cant possibly expect people to dig thru 800+ pages of threads to find any information on this. I found ONE thread dealing with this. ONE!! And it was in the Captivate General thread...

*sigh*

Enough of this.

We now return to our regularly scheduled program, Cyanogenmod 7.

The rom that doesnt brick your device because it doesnt muck with things it shouldnt be (and imagine that... its a Gingerbread based rom!!). Simply amazing!!