Related
If I missed a thread where this was solved then sorry, but I can't believe the only way to CID unlock the Dash is to pay some website 38 bucks for the "service". If they have the software to do it, then why don't we? The whole thing seems ridiculous...
dmtomlinson said:
If I missed a thread where this was solved then sorry, but I can't believe the only way to CID unlock the Dash is to pay some website 38 bucks for the "service". If they have the software to do it, then why don't we? The whole thing seems ridiculous...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
or, you could just pay the 41 bucks US and quit worrying about it. Like you, I waited and waited. Easier just to pay the cash and get on with your life instead of wasting a lot of time constantly checking for the free solution.
Since there is at least a solution, I'm sure nobody is working on it nearly as hard as if there were no solution available. IMEI-CHECK (as much as I don't particularly care for them personally) have permanently bricked a few devices to find out the HTC solution and are now in a position to charge whatever they feel they can get. Not a single other unlocking service can do it so it can't be all that easy.
My .02
Huh IMEI-CHECK now require you to email them a scanned photo id, either your passport or driving license after you have paid, and don't mention this before hand. So its no-longer an instant CID unlock. So if you have an S620 it might be worth skipping the current WM6 beta and waiting a bit longer for a free solution.
Dear IMEI-CHECK customer,
Due to the increase in paypal frauds we have to increase our verifications.
Because you are a new user we need to verify you.
How to become verified user:
1. Please email us a copy from a photographic id (passport or driving licence) which will match the same name and address used on the paypal account.
2. You are a previous customer who ordered at least 2 months ago without having any reversed payments from paypal
Regards,
IMEI-CHECK Team
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
They did verify me within an hour of me sending a photo of a gas bill so I guess thats pretty good. But even after CID unlocking the WM6 upgrade still says INVALID MODEL ID. So you need to follow the instructions here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=295845
What? Are the legally allowed to collect such information?
what is rediculous is you expecting someone to spend their time to break the lock so that you can flash your phone to a rom that wasnt originally designed for your phone when you bought it, and to make this solution easily available for you to access, and for them to do it for free. move out of home and join the real world. you should thank them for finding a solution and only charging a modest amount.
if you cant afford to put gas in your car, dont buy one
hondaguy said:
what is rediculous is you expecting someone to spend their time to break the lock so that you can flash your phone to a rom that wasnt originally designed for your phone when you bought it, and to make this solution easily available for you to access, and for them to do it for free. move out of home and join the real world. you should thank them for finding a solution and only charging a modest amount.
if you cant afford to put gas in your car, dont buy one
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I dont think it's rediculous since we got the Hermes free unlocker in this forum months ago already. Guess you would change your thinking when you know more in the forum, at least you will not be so confident as above.
athena1973 said:
I dont think it's rediculous since we got the Hermes free unlocker in this forum months ago already. Guess you would change your thinking when you know more in the forum, at least you will not be so confident as above.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you want a free unlocker, then make one yourself. If you don't know how, then don't complain that there isn't a free unlocker
merwin said:
If you want a free unlocker, then make one yourself. If you don't know how, then don't complain that there isn't a free unlocker
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats dumb and a waste of effort. The person who figured out the hermes CID unlock could easily apply the same technique to the excalibur -they just don't own one. I'm sure he would have worked with us if we all offered to donate the £20 we gave to imei-check or might have even done it for free had he known the situation with WM6 and CID. I think someone else profitting from our hobby of playing with different ROMs is totally wrong.
merwin said:
If you want a free unlocker, then make one yourself. If you don't know how, then don't complain that there isn't a free unlocker
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1, It is not me who 'complain' here.
2, I can image all the free applications you are using are purely made by you
3, Pls go through as much information as you can in this great forum before you try to challenge, I am tired to such kind of style.
IMEI-CHECK
I would be careful sending photo ID and other persoan information to a company that cannot protect their company from fraud. How can you ensure that your information will not compromised and used elsewhere.Just my 02. of caution.
indiekiduk said:
They did verify me within an hour of me sending a photo of a gas bill so I guess thats pretty good. But even after CID unlocking the WM6 upgrade still says INVALID MODEL ID. So you need to follow the instructions here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=295845
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
athena1973 said:
1, It is not me who 'complain' here.
2, I can image all the free applications you are using are purely made by you
3, Pls go through as much information as you can in this great forum before you try to challenge, I am tired to such kind of style.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah. I'm a hypocrite!
Problem: HTC Tornado... I wanted to have the screen dim all the time
Solution: I wrote the completely free application, Tornado PowerControl
Problem: HTC Tornado/HTC Excalibur... I wanted to be able to overclock the CPU based on CPU usage
Solution: I added that feature to Tornado PowerControl
Problem: I wanted to convert the old nokia RTTTL ringtones into MIDI format., as well as to other monophonic phones
Solution: I wrote the completely free application Tones4All
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4a
Problem: I wanted to be able to convert said RTTTL ringtones into said formats without downloading any applications
Solution: I wrote the completely free web-application, Tones4All PHP
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4aphp
In conclusion:
Yeah... I do nothing to help the community, or to create solutions myself.
merwin said:
Yeah. I'm a hypocrite!
Problem: HTC Tornado... I wanted to have the screen dim all the time
Solution: I wrote the completely free application, Tornado PowerControl
Problem: HTC Tornado/HTC Excalibur... I wanted to be able to overclock the CPU based on CPU usage
Solution: I added that feature to Tornado PowerControl
Problem: I wanted to convert the old nokia RTTTL ringtones into MIDI format., as well as to other monophonic phones
Solution: I wrote the completely free application Tones4All
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4a
Problem: I wanted to be able to convert said RTTTL ringtones into said formats without downloading any applications
Solution: I wrote the completely free web-application, Tones4All PHP
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4aphp
In conclusion:
Yeah... I do nothing to help the community, or to create solutions myself.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well you owe it to every person that likes to install 3rd party software on their phone to write these programs.....lol
we all come to these forums because we like tinkering with our devices and trying different things. i am gratefull to all of the people with techinical knowledge that spend their time extracting roms and writing free programs that i can use. if i had the know-how i would do it to. what pisses me off is the people that think it is their god given right to be able to access this kind of info for free. i cant believe someone actually said that we should donate the money imei-check charges to the guy that wrote the free unlock program for the hermes instead of paying imei-check. either way you are paying for it. most hobbies cost money, whether it be the cost of materials or products (paints, canvas, models, remote controlled devices, etc) that are used while enjoying your hobby.
i am not saying that i wouldnt take advantage of a free solution, i am just saying it is rude to expect and demand one. i have paid for their services twice and it was well worth it both times as i was able to change roms on my qtek 8500 that was missing calls and now i am able to use the wm6 rom on a different device because someone was nice enough to give us access to it. i believe that some things are worth paying for, especially when it allows me to do something or use something that i enjoy. some of you believe that it is wrong to pay someone for their time and expertise and open threads demanding a free product while the rest of use enjoy our different roms. if you stand behind your beliefs i can respect that too, though
hondaguy said:
well you owe it to every person that likes to install 3rd party software on their phone to write these programs.....lol
we all come to these forums because we like tinkering with our devices and trying different things. i am gratefull to all of the people with techinical knowledge that spend their time extracting roms and writing free programs that i can use. if i had the know-how i would do it to. what pisses me off is the people that think it is their god given right to be able to access this kind of info for free. i cant believe someone actually said that we should donate the money imei-check charges to the guy that wrote the free unlock program for the hermes instead of paying imei-check. either way you are paying for it. most hobbies cost money, whether it be the cost of materials or products (paints, canvas, models, remote controlled devices, etc) that are used while enjoying your hobby.
i am not saying that i wouldnt take advantage of a free solution, i am just saying it is rude to expect and demand one. i have paid for their services twice and it was well worth it both times as i was able to change roms on my qtek 8500 that was missing calls and now i am able to use the wm6 rom on a different device because someone was nice enough to give us access to it. i believe that some things are worth paying for, especially when it allows me to do something or use something that i enjoy. some of you believe that it is wrong to pay someone for their time and expertise and open threads demanding a free product while the rest of use enjoy our different roms. if you stand behind your beliefs i can respect that too, though
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You said it better than I ever could have! I'm sure that imei-check bricked more than a couple phones making their solutions, and they deserve to be compensated for their hard work
hondaguy said:
i cant believe someone actually said that we should donate the money imei-check charges to the guy that wrote the free unlock program for the hermes instead of paying imei-check. either way you are paying for it. most hobbies cost money, whether it be the cost of materials or products (paints, canvas, models, remote controlled devices, etc) that are used while enjoying your hobby.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You misunderstood me. Only the people willing to fund the development pay, once its done the rest get it for free. This is a typical scenario for software development where the creator doesn't directly benefit from the creation of the software (he doesn't own the device in question), but with it comes the recognition of the one who was successful in making it. If the recognition isn't enough then thats when cash gets involved. From the beginning XDA Devs, and SPV Devs for that matter always sought their own implementation of things to further their skills and learn more about our devices and how they work. I don't see anything positive in supporting imei-check.
Heres something for you to read
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/shouldbefree.html
And like I said, he probably didn't even know there is the need for a CID unlocked for the Excalibur. AND, with your opinion that no-one on this forum should ever ask for anything I don't see how he would ever find out.
Eric S. Raymond writes in The Cathedral and the Bazaar: "Every good work of software starts by scratching a developer's personal itch."
So, I will try to cause some itching now:
Excalibur uses Samsung OneNAND chip, itsme developed a tool to access the non-OS sections of the chip, ie: where the CID area is stored.
The simlock data is stored on the first 0x20000 bytes of the gsmsection.
Wouldn't it be easy to dump CID & SimLock area before unlocking, pay for imei-check's unlocker and dump CID & SimLock area after unlocking and then compare?
If everyone unlocking provides this information, someone will come with a solution sooner or later...
Theres more about that here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=285003&highlight=bkondisk
and it being used to unlock the StrTrk:
http://www.spv-developers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6581
But it doesn't mention how they obtained the decryption key for the StrTrk or how to find it for the Excalibur. Unless I missed that.
Despite the stuff about decryption I dumped using bkondisk as you said and found my SuperCID (31 31 31 31 31 31 31) at 0x2a0dc
The command I used was:
prun bkondisk -v0 -b0 -n500 \firstblock.img
But that dumped more bytes than you need. Also since the CID among a bunch of other strings so I doubt this is the right place.
indiekiduk said:
You misunderstood me. Only the people willing to fund the development pay, once its done the rest get it for free. This is a typical scenario for software development where the creator doesn't directly benefit from the creation of the software (he doesn't own the device in question), but with it comes the recognition of the one who was successful in making it. If the recognition isn't enough then thats when cash gets involved. From the beginning XDA Devs, and SPV Devs for that matter always sought their own implementation of things to further their skills and learn more about our devices and how they work. I don't see anything positive in supporting imei-check.
Heres something for you to read
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/shouldbefree.html
And like I said, he probably didn't even know there is the need for a CID unlocked for the Excalibur. AND, with your opinion that no-one on this forum should ever ask for anything I don't see how he would ever find out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is exactly what I was thinking. The reason why we come here is for sharing, applications, information etc. So far I don't see any superman can write whatever he needs by himself thus he could proudly shout to others who expect a freeware.
I am using Firefox, it is free, I never feel guity to expect the next more powerful version --even though I really could not write one by myself.
What a dope
Before you start patting yourself on the back, I have tried your so-called progam Tornado Power Control. I have decided to place it in my junk Mobile apps folder, soon to be deleted. And please quit whining..it is very unbecoming.
merwin said:
Yeah. I'm a hypocrite!
Problem: HTC Tornado... I wanted to have the screen dim all the time
Solution: I wrote the completely free application, Tornado PowerControl
Problem: HTC Tornado/HTC Excalibur... I wanted to be able to overclock the CPU based on CPU usage
Solution: I added that feature to Tornado PowerControl
Problem: I wanted to convert the old nokia RTTTL ringtones into MIDI format., as well as to other monophonic phones
Solution: I wrote the completely free application Tones4All
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4a
Problem: I wanted to be able to convert said RTTTL ringtones into said formats without downloading any applications
Solution: I wrote the completely free web-application, Tones4All PHP
http://merwin.bespin.org/t4aphp
In conclusion:
Yeah... I do nothing to help the community, or to create solutions myself.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As many of you may know, unlocking the One X with the tools on the HTCDev website doesn't give you full freedom on your own phone. You can flash new roms, but other things like radio's and hboots can't be flashed because the phone doesn't have S-Off. Also there is the issue of warranty, users with a HTCDev unlocked phone are having problems with getting warranty from HTC, also with issues that are not caused by unlocking or other software. There are a lot of devices where S-Off has been achieved, but sometimes it took a great amount of work and time. My last phone, the HTC Desire was the one of the first HTC's to ship with S-On and it took almost a year to find an exploit to gain S-Off. I don't know anything about what it takes to reach such a milestone but I did appreciate it very much. It finally allowed me to flash a different hboot so I could install a lot more applications on it. (see topic)
Long story short:
To speed up development it may be a good idea to give something back to the developers who spend a great amount of time in getting to that ultimate goal: S-Off.
The idea was proposed in the S-Off Discussion Topic and there some people, including myself, have already promised to donate an amount of money to
the first group or person who develops a safe, simple to use method to get S-Off.
Of course we don't want people keeping all their secrets for themselves, but that is a risk when you set a bounty on something. My hope is that people will be fair and if someone made a great contribution, they will be acknowledged by the group or person who made the final solution and maybe can share in the prize money. But something like that is difficult to catch in words beforehand, let's first wait what the results are. Then when the solution is found, I think we are all reasonable enough to find a satisfying solution if the situation calls for it.
Like stated, we are searching for a safe, simple to use solution. Safe and simple are words that are up to interpretation. What is simple for some maybe witchcraft to others. Again to compare it to my previous phone, the HTC Desire, what the Alpharev team (now Revolutionairy) has achieved is what I call a safe and simple solution. Then there is the issue of different bootloaders/radio's, there are a lot of different combinations and the One X is only a month old, so there will be a lot more combinations by the time we get S-Off. I think it is fair to only count solutions that work with the latest WWE OTA/RUU available at the time the solution is proposed, or the method must provide some way to downgrade to the needed software to let the method work.
I hope everyone who promises money will also pay if the solution is found, so only fill in the spreadsheet if you are really willing to donate to the developer who finds the solution. How we exactly are going to collect that money is debatable, but I think Paypal is the easiest solution. Collecting the money beforehand is impossible, because we don't know if the solution is ever found. I myself will pay $ 20 to the developer who finds the solution.
If you want to donate, fill in this spreadsheet
The minimum amount that you can donate is $ 5
Obviously there is no maximum, but for now the maximum via the spreadsheet is 50 dollars/euro's/pounds. If you want to donate more that's very nice, but then please send a PM to abc27. There were some fake entries with high amounts, so to prevent this, just send a PM so we know it's a genuine donation.
It is fine to post in this topic that you have donated, to keep this topic on top. But please do not post without filling in the spreadsheet, because I'm not going to check the entire topic for people who have posted that they'll donate but didn't fill in the spreadsheet.
If you want to see the people who've donated and see the total amount, click here
And I need to thank abc27 for creating the spreadsheet, which was a way better idea than counting the donations in this topic by hand
Donation The Hall of Fame:
Drefsab 20 British Pound
Evil-Dragon 20 British Pound
Johncore 20 British Pound
jmpmjmpm 20 British Pound
jonas2295 30 US Dollar
Orca74 25 Euro
nsane 50 US Dollar
preacher65 20 British Pound
dortok 20 British Pound
birkoffsjunk 20 British Pound
nikorette 30 US Dollar
doublecheese 100 US Dollar
Lainen73 25 Euro
bleary 20 British Pound
angusc 20 British Pound
salada2k 30 US Dollar
Frank G. 25 Euro
skylinegtrvspec 50 US Dollar
Jezzy11 20 British Pound
(minimal amount for getting in the Hall of Fame: 20 GBP / 25 Euro / 30 US Dollars, will try to update once a day)
US$ 20 from me
- reserved 2 -
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dHBheXJMMjZsQ2RWNmo3NEVwTUIxdlE6MQ#gid=0
Use this. It's a much more elegant method.
Edit: Fixed a small error in the spreadsheet. Should be working now.
Put me in for £20 for now, I may add more later if the exploit is still not found but this next month i've got a lot more outgoings than usual.
abc27 said:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dHBheXJMMjZsQ2RWNmo3NEVwTUIxdlE6MQ#gid=0
Use this. It's a much more elegant method.
Edit: Fixed a small error in the spreadsheet. Should be working now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is indeed quite a bit easier. I will update the first post with the spreadsheet.
edit: can you implement a feature that the minimum amount is 5 dollar/euro/pound?
wph said:
I hope everyone who promises money will also pay if the solution is found, so only post when you are really willing to donate to the developer who finds the solution. How we exactly are going to collect that money is debatable, but I think Paypal is the easiest solution. I will pay $ 20 to the developer who finds the solution.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had posts like this several times on HD2 forums, so I will say it again. I will be very happy to donate for s-off about 20 euros, but my only problem is that I cant use Paypal from Serbia. So to do that I would need some other solution.
Already over €100 / $100 adjusted for exchange rates.
do you have a link to see the spreadsheet directly so we can see the totals?
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0ArpcAQiUWv5XdHBheXJMMjZsQ2RWNmo3NEVwTUIxdlE#gid=0
There you go. It's at the confirmation page of the form too.
Thanks for start that thread mates.
20€ here.
P.D: I think that topic can be improved a little, lot of people here aren't native english speakers (like me) and the word "bounty" can be unknown for them so I propose a topic like:
"[S-OFF BOUNTY] Donate here to archive S-OFF"
Include "Donate", that is a more common word onto the topic, will improve the visibility of the thread.
Unfortunately the student budget limits me but I am happy donating £10
Put me down, for £10. Would do more but things pretty tight for a few months.
Sent from my HTC One X
$30 from me to the developer who achieves a safe way to get safety off
Sent from my HTC One X running LeeDroid eXtreme 5.0.0
clyder said:
I had posts like this several times on HD2 forums, so I will say it again. I will be very happy to donate for s-off about 20 euros, but my only problem is that I cant use Paypal from Serbia. So to do that I would need some other solution.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Any ideas on solutions that do work for people without access to PayPal?
wph said:
Any ideas on solutions that do work for people without access to PayPal?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Direct Debit wire?
Postal Cheque?
Cheque?
I'm sure it can all be sorted.
I'm assuming that whoever posted as Mike1986 with €600 was a troll? It was flagged and deleted anyway.
I can do $10, maybe more but I'll pledge $10 for now.
20 USD
OMG. I unlocked and rooted my Lollipop M8 today, but i only see Sunshine for making S-OFF, and it isnt free. Another way to get S-OFF one m8?
Man WTF the 25$?! I can live 5 days with 25$, so bull****.
And if there's no way, what i lose stuck on S-ON? I have international M8.
*sigh*
No, Sunshine is the only way
turko9999 said:
OMG. I unlocked and rooted my Lollipop M8 today, but i only see Sunshine for making S-OFF, and it isnt free. Another way to get S-OFF one m8?
Man WTF the 25$?! I can live 5 days with 25$, so bull****.
And if there's no way, what i lose stuck on S-ON? I have international M8.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
$25 is nothing compared to how much it cost the creators of sunshine, they destroyed loads of phones whist creating sunshine, obviously you need to test it before you release it to the public, and in the beginning it didn't always work, each phone at $500+ a pop isn't cheap, and they didn't all survive testing, so $25 is nothing.
You loose the ability to back flash, convert your phone to another version, jump around with firmware, s-on allows only current firmware flash and next step up, HBOOT flashing, modified firmware flashes, radio flashing, CID and MID changes, all sorts, I cant live without s-off myself.
you can pretty much rest assured that now you've rooted and possibly flashed a custom recovery, unlocked and flashed a custom rom, you've lost the ability to get any further updates from HTC, unless there is an RUU about for your phone to return it to full stock condition, it possible with s-on, but can be a nightmare.
Before you do anything with your phone, first learn how to fix it.
Sell the device for 500, and live for another 100 days
But thats of course not how we should see it !? Weird world we live in.........
Seanie280672 said:
you can pretty much rest assured that now you've rooted and possibly flashed a custom recovery, unlocked and flashed a custom rom, you've lost the ability to get any further updates from HTC, unless there is an RUU about for your phone to return it to full stock condition, it possible with s-on, but can be a nightmare.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Disagree for a bit on this, there are many stock backups here in the M8 forum. The general section has a topic about that stickied and there is also a thread here in the Q&A section that holds lots of them.
Even the owners own stock backup is more than enough. Restore the stock nandroid and flash the stock recovery from the new ota, apply the update and voila.....stock updated. I'm not sure why many people always want to rely on RUU's ?
haha, the only reason I needed S off was to sim unlock...was way too easy to just Call T-mobile and get my code!!!
I can't believe threads like this are getting closed left and right on XDA. I think Sunshine charging $25 is a very important topic to discuss on XDA, and there should be a proper place to discuss it.
I have seen root-ninja say he is willing to PM people his expenses to S-Off which were in the few thousands. So what... the number of people that have S-Offed is multiple hundreds easy if not 1000's, and he is making $25 off each of them. That means he has earned his money back and a few years worth of salary on top of that, all for 1 weeks work and a $2000 investment. Great for him, as an individual developer I am happy to see him get some cash. I wish he would realize how he is severely hurting/violating the spirit of hacking.
This is software, hacking software. It should be free and open-source with a donation link. This is a place of learning, so please, teach how it was done. If more devs go down this road it will be very sad for XDA and the entire phone-hacking scene. Less devs will learn, all things will be kept secret and cost money, instead of turning to XDA because we cannot trust carriers and mfgs, we will not be able to trust XDA.
Sad days ahead if we don't as a group complain, boycott, and chastise this sort of bad behavior.
PS: Is anyone at all concerned about the list of permissions the app uses. Sure it is "needed" for hacking, but what else could it be used for???
if i could pay the twenty five dollars i would....
im 16
i dont have a credit card and my parents aren't exactly the most willing to allow me to use twenty five dollars on sunshine.....
im pretty sure the devs who worked on sunshine have got their money back and more...
this is a great place of learning. it hurts when some of us cant do anything about this.
its been a year since ive been hoping they drop the payment or they add a free method for s-off.
so far none.
this only slows down dev work and hurts dev culture
leaving things open source would help everyone.....
secrets have their costs......
Just think about what happens when they stop the development on s-off, i dont think anybody else comes along and get it done for free. Because there is still up till now no other dev who dared to gain s-off.
Nobody ever complained when s-off was free ...... of course not it was FREE ! But now they ask for a price. Yes for some a big amount. But people who complain about that should not even think about s-off. S-off is not even needed to flash custom roms or run custom kernels.
And then the complaint about the 2000 investment , also nonsense because they messed up many devices. Not only the M8 ! Think about that before saying things like that. The team behind s-off goes many years back already. I frankly doubt that a year salary would make up for it !!!
And the rights and permissions s-off needs.....if you are scared or worried ? DON'T USE IT
Nobody is forcing anybody to use it. Stay safe.....stay stock
This all has nothing to do with xda, xda has no rights whatsoever on s-off + the involved development
Take it or leave it ! Right @beaups !!!
rpmccormick said:
I can't believe threads like this are getting closed left and right on XDA. I think Sunshine charging $25 is a very important topic to discuss on XDA, and there should be a proper place to discuss it.
I have seen root-ninja say he is willing to PM people his expenses to S-Off which were in the few thousands. So what... the number of people that have S-Offed is multiple hundreds easy if not 1000's, and he is making $25 off each of them. That means he has earned his money back and a few years worth of salary on top of that, all for 1 weeks work and a $2000 investment. Great for him, as an individual developer I am happy to see him get some cash. I wish he would realize how he is severely hurting/violating the spirit of hacking.
This is software, hacking software. It should be free and open-source with a donation link. This is a place of learning, so please, teach how it was done. If more devs go down this road it will be very sad for XDA and the entire phone-hacking scene. Less devs will learn, all things will be kept secret and cost money, instead of turning to XDA because we cannot trust carriers and mfgs, we will not be able to trust XDA.
Sad days ahead if we don't as a group complain, boycott, and chastise this sort of bad behavior.
PS: Is anyone at all concerned about the list of permissions the app uses. Sure it is "needed" for hacking, but what else could it be used for???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
1.) Permissions are declared for fun, and as a learning experience for users. For you, as a "developer", you should know that as a root exploit we can get whatever permissions we want without declarations.
2.) We've covered the costs and our pricing strategy time and time again. If you think the price is unfair, don't buy it. If you think it should be free, and everything on XDA should be free, then spend the time yourself and develop another solution, and then provide it and support it for free. It should only take you a week, right?
These things take a lot of time, and money. a LOT of time. How many unlocks are being released for other devices lately? Where can I paid or free Samsung bootloader unlock on a blocked device? How about Motorola? LG? Sony?.....
The simple fact is this: f we weren't able to charge for SunShine, we would not have been able to dedicate the resources to develop it., and you'd have no s-off today.
Sorry no, you are telling half truths, and flat out lies. I have no idea why you would do this.
No, I offered to let someone take over the financial responsibility and re-release for free, I didn't offer to PM expenses of a "few thousands". Few thousand is what was spent in the first week of April. Few weeks? SunShine has been in development for well over a year .Few years of salary, your kidding.
Taking your word that you are a developer, you should know very well something like this doesn't magically appear in one week. As a developer, you are well aware that a root app does not need to really declare any permissions. I could add them on the fly, I mean the app is running as root. So why all the permissions, just to raise awareness of permissions. Do you want me to remove all permissions and just add them on the fly without alerting you? Its a pretty trivial thing to do, and you would never know.
We are far from the only ones doing this, we are just the cheapest, and safest, yet we are the only ones attacked over it.
Offer still stands, commit to taking over full financial requirements of our development, and we can re-release for free.
rpmccormick said:
I can't believe threads like this are getting closed left and right on XDA. I think Sunshine charging $25 is a very important topic to discuss on XDA, and there should be a proper place to discuss it.
I have seen root-ninja say he is willing to PM people his expenses to S-Off which were in the few thousands. So what... the number of people that have S-Offed is multiple hundreds easy if not 1000's, and he is making $25 off each of them. That means he has earned his money back and a few years worth of salary on top of that, all for 1 weeks work and a $2000 investment. Great for him, as an individual developer I am happy to see him get some cash. I wish he would realize how he is severely hurting/violating the spirit of hacking.
This is software, hacking software. It should be free and open-source with a donation link. This is a place of learning, so please, teach how it was done. If more devs go down this road it will be very sad for XDA and the entire phone-hacking scene. Less devs will learn, all things will be kept secret and cost money, instead of turning to XDA because we cannot trust carriers and mfgs, we will not be able to trust XDA.
Sad days ahead if we don't as a group complain, boycott, and chastise this sort of bad behavior.
PS: Is anyone at all concerned about the list of permissions the app uses. Sure it is "needed" for hacking, but what else could it be used for???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am coming from the perspective of M9, not M8... I posted here because the M9 thread was closed.
You said yourself you bought 4 M9's and I thought you said you had S-Off in a week, no? I am a dev, hardware and software, but not a super-star like you, and though I truly believe I could get S-off, it would probably take me a year of my life that I cannot devote.
I have great respect for you man, and for the XDA community at large. The core of me truly believes that forcing a charge on modders is wrong. Well, if you want to charge for your do it all for you app that is not wrong, but you should also post clear instructions on what your app does so that others could easily do the same, themselves, for free. Knowledge should be free. You are hoarding your knowledge in order to increase profits for your app. I do not mean to offend, just to share my opinion, which is that your tactics are immoral. Please take that statement with a grain of salt, as I do not mean to offend, I am sure you do not believe they are immoral, and I also believe that paying for any form of Knowledge or Art is immoral. I do realize I am in the minority there.
EDIT: Are there others doing it for more money? Who? Do you really just make enough to keep up with your dev-expenses? or if 1% of the people that paid donated, would that cover your dev expenses and the other 99% is just cash on top? Maybe my scales-of-economy are way off here, but it seems to me by the number of people with S-Offed M8's and M9's, that you should be rolling in it at $25/head, no?
rpmccormick said:
I am coming from the perspective of M9, not M8... I posted here because the M9 thread was closed.
You said yourself you bought 4 M9's and I thought you said you had S-Off in a week, no? I am a dev, hardware and software, but not a super-star like you, and though I truly believe I could get S-off, it would probably take me a year of my life that I cannot devote.
I have great respect for you man, and for the XDA community at large. The core of me truly believes that forcing a charge on modders is wrong. Well, if you want to charge for your do it all for you app that is not wrong, but you should also post clear instructions on what your app does so that others could easily do the same, themselves, for free. Knowledge should be free. You are hoarding your knowledge in order to increase profits for your app. I do not mean to offend, just to share my opinion, which is that your tactics are immoral. Please take that statement with a grain of salt, as I do not mean to offend, I am sure you do not believe they are immoral, and I also believe that paying for any form of Knowledge or Art is immoral. I do realize I am in the minority there.
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Click to collapse
It took 24hours once the device was in hand, that doesn't mean we didnt buy other ARM64 devices over the last year, nor that we haven't spent months learning the architecture, nor changes in Android 5.x, nor writing new tools.
We don't force a charge, nor do we hold a monopoly on the subject, yet we are the only ones facing personal attacks for it.
Knowledge does not come to us for free, we invest heavily into gaining that knowledge. I do find it ironic that you are lecturing me on this, considering I have open sourced more Android exploits than any other person, and that I've posted my training material (from a $3500 per person session) for free online. Why should I have to pay for all these things, but you shouldn't? This kind of attitude and attack makes me regret contributing as much as I have, and still do.
Please don't regret, I am trying to have a discussion, not attack you. I have great respect for you.
EDIT: Great point on root apps and permissions. I am a sheep like the rest of them, I take risks and I even paid you against my own morals, but honestly the entire community needs to change their way of thinking... no one should ever run any root app that is not open source.
PS: I have open-sourced much in my life as well, but I am sure not half as much, as good, or as important as you have. I truly do not mean to disrespect you, just change the way the community thinks about ALL non-OS things.
PPS: It is mfgs/big4 that are immoral by not giving us all the option to S-Off, to carrier unlock, to flash a non-branded RUU, and to change the HBOOT logo. You are our greatest soldiers against their oppression. Keep up the good work, and make it easy for others to learn how to do the same. Thank you.
jcase said:
It took 24hours once the device was in hand, that doesn't mean we didnt buy other ARM64 devices over the last year, nor that we haven't spent months learning the architecture, nor changes in Android 5.x, nor writing new tools.
We don't force a charge, nor do we hold a monopoly on the subject, yet we are the only ones facing personal attacks for it.
Knowledge does not come to us for free, we invest heavily into gaining that knowledge. I do find it ironic that you are lecturing me on this, considering I have open sourced more Android exploits than any other person, and that I've posted my training material (from a $3500 per person session) for free online. Why should I have to pay for all these things, but you shouldn't? This kind of attitude and attack makes me regret contributing as much as I have, and still do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Jcase, don't listen to the haters. Everyone in the world thinks they are entitled to everything. If they can't afford it then they should either work harder so they can afford it or find their own way. I say congrats for coming up with a niche product and making some money on it. This world would be a better place if people spent less time complaining and more time working hard to make a better life for them and their families.
Sent from my HTC One_M8 using XDA Free mobile app
I really wish people would knock it off with this mess. There are few phones left that can be made truly open, and it's only because of Sunshine that the HTC One M7/8/9 phones are on that list. What do people want? No phones that can be turned into developer phones?
Seriously guys, the next time you are thinking of whining about $25, consider that for many phones, there is no solution. Want to do anything more than root a Samsung Galaxy S6? Good luck with that.
Maybe we need to add a section with pricing for JTAG services or S-off SD-cards. I recall for a while there was a pool of people who went in to buy one of those factory service cards for well over $1000, and split the cost between them. I wonder what that worked out to per S-off.
At $25, Sunshine is a steal. Even if you get unlucky, and up shelling out $50, it's a good deal. If you are truly stupid, and shell out $75, you still at least have a developer phone.
I just hope jcase and beaups don't get tired of the crap and decide to go do something else with their time, as I have really enjoyed my M8 with S-off, and I would like to think they will still be around when the M10 comes out.
Wow, a while since I've posted in here and cannot believe the attitude of a so called dev on another dev.
It's deeply ungrateful and uncalled for to attack a handful of devs that, aside from the money, have obviously put a lot of time and effort into bringing such an exploit to the masses. Not just for this one thing, but also for gaining the knowledge to do it.
Anyone who declares he/she is a dev, should understand the time and effort that goes into these things.
I myself do understand as I have developed a few projects myself.
What's wrong with charging a perfectly reasonable sum? Do people complain to the networks when they have to pay for unlock codes?
What about paid apps on Google play, should they all be free?
No they shouldn't because at the end of the day it's up to the user if they want to pay or not. Nobody forces anyone's hand in their pocket.
So what if what has been recouped is so many times the cost? Does it matter if they made a dollar or a million? It just goes to show how many people desperately wanted it if that is the case.
The other alternative is nothing then there would be bountys flying about begging for someone to do it.
These guys took it upon themselves to provide a product, laid it on the table and said take it or leave it.
Don't get upset about it, don't moan about the cost, don't attack the provider of the product.
Quite simply sit back, think of the value it will bring to you, if you don't think its worth it, leave it alone and go and find an alternative solution.
Good day.
jshamlet said:
I really wish people would knock it off with this mess. There are few phones left that can be made truly open, and it's only because of Sunshine that the HTC One M7/8/9 phones are on that list. What do people want? No phones that can be turned into developer phones?
Seriously guys, the next time you are thinking of whining about $25, consider that for many phones, there is no solution. Want to do anything more than root a Samsung Galaxy S6? Good luck with that.
Maybe we need to add a section with pricing for JTAG services or S-off SD-cards. I recall for a while there was a pool of people who went in to buy one of those factory service cards for well over $1000, and split the cost between them. I wonder what that worked out to per S-off.
At $25, Sunshine is a steal. Even if you get unlucky, and up shelling out $50, it's a good deal. If you are truly stupid, and shell out $75, you still at least have a developer phone.
I just hope jcase and beaups don't get tired of the crap and decide to go do something else with their time, as I have really enjoyed my M8 with S-off, and I would like to think they will still be around when the M10 comes out.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
+1 on this
I dare anyone of these guys complaining, to go and try and create an s-off tool, see how many 1000's of dollars of phones you destory before you get it right and all of your time spent on it, then give it away for free ????? really, I wouldnt.
When I was using my M7, and firewater was still alive, it used to fail, no matter what combination of rom's and kernals I used, now this was before sunshine was created, I used a shop in the UK based in sheffield, thankfully, an area I visit on a regular basis, they s-off HTC phones by java card for a price of £15 GBP, funny enough thats $25 ish http://www.fonefunshop.co.uk/Unlocking/htc_s-off_service.htm
the day I got home with my new M8, about 2 months ago, I unlocked it, flashed a custom recovery, rooted it, this was all before its first ever boot, I then booted it for the first time and ran sunshine through it, the stock rom and stock firmware never stood a chance.
Stop your complaining or live with s-on.
Seanie280672 said:
$25 is nothing compared to how much it cost the creators of sunshine, they destroyed loads of phones whist creating sunshine, obviously you need to test it before you release it to the public, and in the beginning it didn't always work, each phone at $500+ a pop isn't cheap, and they didn't all survive testing, so $25 is nothing.
You loose the ability to back flash, convert your phone to another version, jump around with firmware, s-on allows only current firmware flash and next step up, HBOOT flashing, modified firmware flashes, radio flashing, CID and MID changes, all sorts, I cant live without s-off myself.
you can pretty much rest assured that now you've rooted and possibly flashed a custom recovery, unlocked and flashed a custom rom, you've lost the ability to get any further updates from HTC, unless there is an RUU about for your phone to return it to full stock condition, it possible with s-on, but can be a nightmare.
Before you do anything with your phone, first learn how to fix it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I understand but i believe they have made greater amounts of profit than just getting back the money for the phones they wasted. Not saying that it should be free but 25$ is a bit a lot for the ones living in the third world countries and the developers of sunshine overlooked that completely when deciding the cost.
shad0wboss said:
I understand but i believe they have made greater amounts of profit than just getting back the money for the phones they wasted. Not saying that it should be free but 25$ is a bit a lot for the ones living in the third world countries and the developers of sunshine overlooked that completely when deciding the cost.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ok I understand, so lets say they gave it away for free now, how do you think all the people that paid would react ? id be P*VIST, its a no win situation, and developoment on it is continuious with each new release of a new version of android. ie Lollipop, it took a couple of weeks for sunshine to work on the newer HBOOT 1.61, before that sunshine only supported upto HBOOT 1.57.
Seanie280672 said:
ok I understand, so lets say they gave it away for free now, how do you think all the people that paid would react ? id be P*VIST, its a no win situation, and developoment on it is continuious with each new release of a new version of android. ie Lollipop, it took a couple of weeks for sunshine to work on the newer HBOOT 1.61, before that sunshine only supported upto HBOOT 1.57.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
THat's why I said it shouldn't be "free" but the price should be reduced. This tool shouldn't only be for the people from the west but for everyone around the world. The price has been unfairly defined for this product for everyone. And for the people who paid 25$, they did because they could, so it doesn't sound "unfair" to me.
Update:
I did notice some users pledging, but didn't realized we actually got something going on, I'll be updating with an estimated pledge sum, I'm not naming individuals but at least summarizing this, the ball is rolling and hopefully the purpose of this (which is attract developers in a good, respectful and rewarding way) will pay off!
Dear Fire Phone owners:
We are looking very disorganized and scattered on efforts, we also have GOOD but limited dev support due to the quantity of Fire Phone owners and so the quantity of them that actually visit XDA is even lower.
So let's join efforts, I see @madushan1000 doing effort to unlock the bootloader and willing to blow his own qfuses for it, on his hard earned money.
If you know a developer, or are a developer, we must seek answer for the following answers:
1.- How many phones do you need to play around until you blow up the right qfuse?
(If the answer is n <= 10, I don't see why we can't all join a bounty *paid upfront* for that developer to buy the damn 10 phones ~$1350 dlls, if he gets it done on the first attempt, he deserves the remaining hard earned money solely for rewarding, and even more.)
2.- Is there any exploitable bug on the qcom trustzone that can at least trick into thinking the phone is unlocked? What would be needed to do so?
(If all that's required is a time and effort to do it, I don't see why we can pledge on a *serious* bounty and paid the developer $1000 dlls when done, if he is a reputed developer and has evidence or prior work, I don't even see why we can't paid upfront either.)
3.- Are you interested in a bounty for fixing the camera code on the existing CM11 rom? What would be the required incentive for it? (can you do it @ggow, @madushan1000?)
We should be able to brainstorm and just think in joining efforts, even if my questions or ideas are the wrong ones, hell! then just tell everyone out loud which idea or process is the right one! Let's work together people!
I just saw 13,000 fire phones sold in Ebay, what the hell?, 1000 fire phone owners that visit XDA can't pledge $1000 dlls?
If this is seriously not doable I will just delete the post right away, but let's at least seek some developers and show them we can organize a good offer, we might find some interesting results.
I will pitch in for an unlock. Not sure of amount until it happens.
The Fire Phones on ebay are still going for over a 100 each. With the new tablets announced today and as people forget the fire phone, the price should drop VERY soon... I hope. I would love to pick up a spare.
Got mine on eBay on $57.50, i hope devs can unlock the bootloader fix the camera and the NFC
Wow, I'm glad to see something like this going on. But I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to do any serious work until next month or so. My final exams coming up. And next I have to find a job.
Anyway, I'm working on a kexec module my spare time, Provided that it works, We can start developing a boodloader unlock. People with already bricked phones might be able to help too by trying to unbrick their phones following something like this http://www.androidbrick.com/ultimate-qualcomm-snapdragon-unbrick-guide-snapdragons-are-unbrickable/ . If someone finds a working method it would help very much for the development.
As per hal issues I proposed to have tow sets of libraries on the rom to bypass the amazon liblog.so issues. May be @ggow is working on it? I don't have to proper knowledge about android build system to do it, or the resources.
madushan1000 said:
Wow, I'm glad to see something like this going on. But I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to do any serious work until next month or so. My final exams coming up. And next I have to find a job.
Anyway, I'm working on a kexec module my spare time, Provided that it works, We can start developing a boodloader unlock. People with already bricked phones might be able to help too by trying to unbrick their phones following something like this http://www.androidbrick.com/ultimate-qualcomm-snapdragon-unbrick-guide-snapdragons-are-unbrickable/ . If someone finds a working method it would help very much for the development.
As per hal issues I proposed to have tow sets of libraries on the rom to bypass the amazon liblog.so issues. May be @ggow is working on it? I don't have to proper knowledge about android build system to do it, or the resources.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
- Bypassing the liblog issues unfortunately is only one part of the problem - that in itself is tricky to do. A mega amount of changes required to the android stack.
- The camera issues require the HAL source code from Amazon or they need to be written from scratch.
- I am currently looking into what can be done about the camera. I have started looking at the binaries to see if they can be patched.
- I have also been studying the bootloaders, @madushan1000 I'll message you separately when I have a spare moment.
Thanks, I'll try to help you with the hal stuff in the future.
We should see a flood of people joining this forum due the eBay sales. 120 plus a year of prime was what made me buy. I'd pitch in a bit if it were unlocked. After tax and shipping, the phone has only cost me $31. Better than a Windows phone as a spare I would surmise even without seeing my package delivered yet.. Should be here any minute from USPS.
And I'm still driving this to get more people to say I'm up with $XX for the bounty, seriously no one was replied with a quantity WTF?
If anyone is reading this and still doesn't understand, a "bounty" is to get your offering of money for our developers @madushan1000 and @ggow for helping us get our Fire Phones with an unlocked bootloader or with a decent camera on CM11
Example: I'm in with $30 for the bounty
count me on $20 for bootloader unlock
Thread cleaned.
Please discuss other subject matter elsewhere and keep on topic here.
Also, keep it respectful.
Thanks,
Darth
Forum Moderator
I needed prime and a phone and made an impulse decision I immediately regretted after I learned there is a locked bootloader. Put me in for 20.
Also, I have a small coffee roasting shop and if either of you devs are coffee drinkers send me a pm me and I'll ship you some good stuff. That's not a bounty, it is an effort to increase productivity.
I'm in for $20 if somebody can handle this. I'd like to have a solid phone to hack on that's not my main.
I pledge 20.00 US dollars to this.
Sent from my Fire Phone using XDA Free mobile app
I'll pledge 100 for an unlock bootloader.
I will throw in $20
I through in 30$ i am looking forward to it ?
I will throw in a new phone with prime and $100.
i will throw in $20 and been waiting for it
I would give another $20. It looks like Amazon has no plans for it. I emailed them a few days ago:
" Hi,
I understand that you want us to provide the steps to Unlock the bootloader for your Fire Phone device.
I'd like to bring to your kind attention that unlocking your phone’s bootloader will cause you to lose all the data from your phone and voids your phone's warranty. That is the reason why currently we don't have plans of releasing a bootloader unlock for the fire phone.
However, I've forwarded your message to our development team for consideration as we make further improvements. Customer feedback like yours is very important in helping us improve the Fire phone experience."
So its been a while since i had an htc.
The last one i had was so easy to root s-off super cid.
when it wasnt, i always loved the challenge.
If i recall you had to extract a file called mmcblk0p4 and modify it. Or just modify it with a hex editor right on your phone and place it back with a root explorer. actually i still have it in an old folder.
What is the problem here? How did htc fix that exploit? Why cant we figure it out?
Not that i dont appreciate an awesome app that does it for you. But i always loved doing it myself.
Not trying to bash or start a debate over moralities. Just an interesting and informative convo.
where there is a will there is a way!
Well actually I guess because the people who were discovering the exploits actually created sunshine and are distributing methods via this app only.
There's nobody that can use the app to figure out how the actual app does it?
Maybe I am thinking its more simple than it is. I know i sure as hell cant.
myphonesbetter said:
There's nobody that can use the app to figure out how the actual app does it?
Maybe I am thinking its more simple than it is. I know i sure as hell cant.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's an old discussion, but if you look up the Sunshine app thread you'll come across the explanation of why they decided to charge and what went into achieving S-OFF. Short answer: it's really hard.
Been about a year since i logged in apparently.
computerslayer said:
It's an old discussion, but if you look up the Sunshine app thread you'll come across the explanation of why they decided to charge and what went into achieving S-OFF. Short answer: it's really hard.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That is the perfect answer. it really hard.
its because some people are lazy and others are greedy thats why.
Honestly paying for an app to just do everything takes the fun out of it. Im not a coder or anything but most of what i have learned is from flashing phones and modding video games lol. Just dont have quite enough of an obsessive personality to be a full on mr robot.
I can see making a payed version that does the work for you and takes away the risk of bricking your phone. for the people who just want want want.
This im sure would make more than enough to cover costs. especially if the dev was in india or something.
Used phones with cracked screens or broken headphone jacks are a dime a dozen.
Or how about someone just reverse engineer the sunshine app. Or FIND AN EXPLOIT. and release it to the forums.
FAIR GAME right?
This team spent 100s of dollars and 100s accumulative hours to exploit something that costs 100's of millions of dollars and who knows how many hours to create and distribute.
The development thread seems so commercial now. Wouldn't be surprised if most of them were making money data mining selling info to advertisers.
Isnt that where the real money is these days.
I cant pay for it for the same reason i cant pay money for the better gun in a video game. Just pay to win. doesn't feel the same.
Also android is open source and free.
It blows my mind that only this one group of people can figure out how to do this.
Seems like the fact that there is money to be made would encourage more guy fawkes' to create some friendly compotish.
Plus if more "exploiters" could start from there then eventually it could end up so much more refined. Just like everything else on these forums.
Anyways sunshine is free and along with water gives life to the entire planet. I think they got the name wrong.
walmart mod group. buy out all other "developers" (hackers) and charge the people that keep this whole thing going.
I can appreciate and even envy the business sense and intelligence it takes to do what they do. cant say if i was in their shoes i wouldnt do everything i could to monetize it. But its just sad to the the community go down the toilet. This forum used to be so much more exciting. it seems like it used to create developers now you just pick a rom and move on. mother ****ing sad face.
You do realize, if it was trivial and cheap to do, the dozens of people who come complain would have done it sometime in the last three years.
We even publish detailed write ups, and source code snippets to parts of sunshine, including vulnerabilities and exploits. We get people 90% of the way there.
Even with use giving away critical parts of the project, people still don't release free versions. Why? because it isn't easy, and it isn't cheap. You are going to ruin a lot of phones along the way, and your work on the "cheap ones" doesn't apply to the new expensive ones, you are starting over from scratch with each generation, often with each firmware release.
We don't sell data to anyone, no ads on our sites or apps, even the numerous free apps like weaksauce and depixel8 have no ads, nor do their associated websites (not counting the thieves that rehost them with ads, thats not us).
We bought out no one, we pay no one to develop for us. We reinvest funds into more phone and equipment, sometimes some booze, and often into charity. Even google called us out for our charity work on their VRP blog.
Good luck on your endeavors, I encourage you to make a free alternative, to invest the money and time we did out of your own pocket. Neither of us are educated in security or computer scienece, we picked it up along the way when trying to hack on phones. No excuses! Anyone complaining should be working on an alternative. Don't expect much donations, or if you put a price on it don't expect much money from it, it isn't there.
myphonesbetter said:
Been about a year since i logged in apparently.
That is the perfect answer. it really hard.
its because some people are lazy and others are greedy thats why.
Honestly paying for an app to just do everything takes the fun out of it. Im not a coder or anything but most of what i have learned is from flashing phones and modding video games lol. Just dont have quite enough of an obsessive personality to be a full on mr robot.
I can see making a payed version that does the work for you and takes away the risk of bricking your phone. for the people who just want want want.
This im sure would make more than enough to cover costs. especially if the dev was in india or something.
Used phones with cracked screens or broken headphone jacks are a dime a dozen.
Or how about someone just reverse engineer the sunshine app. Or FIND AN EXPLOIT. and release it to the forums.
FAIR GAME right?
This team spent 100s of dollars and 100s accumulative hours to exploit something that costs 100's of millions of dollars and who knows how many hours to create and distribute.
The development thread seems so commercial now. Wouldn't be surprised if most of them were making money data mining selling info to advertisers.
Isnt that where the real money is these days.
I cant pay for it for the same reason i cant pay money for the better gun in a video game. Just pay to win. doesn't feel the same.
Also android is open source and free.
It blows my mind that only this one group of people can figure out how to do this.
Seems like the fact that there is money to be made would encourage more guy fawkes' to create some friendly compotish.
Plus if more "exploiters" could start from there then eventually it could end up so much more refined. Just like everything else on these forums.
Anyways sunshine is free and along with water gives life to the entire planet. I think they got the name wrong.
walmart mod group. buy out all other "developers" (hackers) and charge the people that keep this whole thing going.
I can appreciate and even envy the business sense and intelligence it takes to do what they do. cant say if i was in their shoes i wouldnt do everything i could to monetize it. But its just sad to the the community go down the toilet. This forum used to be so much more exciting. it seems like it used to create developers now you just pick a rom and move on. mother ****ing sad face.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sunshine has been about since the HTC One M7 days, I paid and used it on my M7 and M8 and about to use it on 2 x M9's, me personally, I really dont have a problem paying the $25 for it to do what it does, personally I think its dead cheap for what these guys did to get around HTCs so called fixes.
Now on to why it even costs in the first place, imagine whilst developing an app to this level, how many phones you had to buy and destroy along the way, this app isnt just for pretty much every HTC made since the M7, of course you are going to want some of it back, if you didnt, you'd be bankrupt in 2 days, with every release of firmware or every new phone release, the app needs to be modified and updated, Hell, you pay $200 for Microsoft Windows for the same reasons.
jcase said:
You do realize, if it was trivial and cheap to do, the dozens of people who come complain would have done it sometime in the last three years.
We even publish detailed write ups, and source code snippets to parts of sunshine, including vulnerabilities and exploits. We get people 90% of the way there.
Even with use giving away critical parts of the project, people still don't release free versions. Why? because it isn't easy, and it isn't cheap. You are going to ruin a lot of phones along the way, and your work on the "cheap ones" doesn't apply to the new expensive ones, you are starting over from scratch with each generation, often with each firmware release.
We don't sell data to anyone, no ads on our sites or apps, even the numerous free apps like weaksauce and depixel8 have no ads, nor do their associated websites (not counting the thieves that rehost them with ads, thats not us).
We bought out no one, we pay no one to develop for us. We reinvest funds into more phone and equipment, sometimes some booze, and often into charity. Even google called us out for our charity work on their VRP blog.
Good luck on your endeavors, I encourage you to make a free alternative, to invest the money and time we did out of your own pocket. Neither of us are educated in security or computer scienece, we picked it up along the way when trying to hack on phones. No excuses! Anyone complaining should be working on an alternative. Don't expect much donations, or if you put a price on it don't expect much money from it, it isn't there.
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thanks for the response. It would be nice to get a response on the actual q i posted lol. (different thread)
I guess its easier when its trivial.
Its good to hear you guys donate some of it. and that youve release the majority of the code. i guess people are just lazy.
Honestly you dont need s-off. The main reason i would want it is incase i need to go back to stock for warranty reasons. In which case the money would be worth it. still more fun do follow a write and learn about what i am doing in the process.
As far as data mining im talking about some of the more popular roms and apps out there. not just in the htc forum. Just a thought. why wouldn't they.
And the question isn't why its $25. I get that. It is totally worth it. Its so easy to use. I used to spend hours troubleshooting to get my phones s-off'd and running smooth on all the roms. now you can do it in seconds. these days i just pick one that works better than stock and stick with it. seems like stock updates kill the phones now.
Its why hasn't anybody exploited sunshine or made a completely different app that does the same thing. Or even better a write up on how to do it yourself.
To say its expensive on the older phones is a stretch and to say its too hard is eh.
I couldn't do it but you guys did (very quickly). so that means there is some 8 year old that could do it in his sleep.
And to say its out of pocket is a stretch when its a payed service. Most business endeavors or charities require some sort of investment.
And you can make a large chunk of the money back selling a bricked phone for parts. especially if its the latest model.
Why don't you guys release the code for free when you once you pay yourselves back. If more people started out where you left off (much like how you guys started) then the next generation would take no effort. If there were a thousand people testing and communicating and working together then the cost and time would be nothing.
There is nowhere to start anymore. there used to be all kinds of write ups that forced you to learn more about how everything works. then naturally some people figure out what they are actually doing are inspired to improve on it (sunshine for example). but now its just seems so overwhelming. Like nobody is there to help out when you get stuck.
I guess it dragged a little deeper than i wanted. But every time someone asks these questions it turns into insult matches or just the copy pasted comment of i don't think $25 is too much. if you cant afford that then blah blah . then all credibility is lost and people are persuaded to think as the majority of commenters think. Mouthbreathers will be mouthbreathers. But they are the ones that make this consumer based economy function properly.
Again, not trying to bash the people that put their time into this. More so trying to spark thoughts in people's minds who would normally just follow suit. Highlight different perspectives.
myphonesbetter said:
Its why hasn't anybody exploited sunshine or made a completely different app that does the same thing. Or even better a write up on how to do it yourself.
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Many people have tried to crack sunshine, I'm unaware of anyone being successful. It is actually pretty funny seeing how many hours people put into cracking SunShine, it is an worthless endeavor considering that most of the calculations are done server side, cracking the app doesn't get you anything as it is done server side. They would need to hack our WAN facing server, proxy through it and then hack the "offline" box we do the work on. This would be a felony on many levels. I like to think most people are honest, and don't go committing felony violations of CFAA over the fact that an app isn't free.
As far as a different app, it is hard, it is expensive, and most people with the skillset or drive, are tackling bigger problems.
Far as a writeup, we make plenty of them, where are your technical write ups?
myphonesbetter said:
To say its expensive on the older phones is a stretch and to say its too hard is eh.
I couldn't do it but you guys did (very quickly). so that means there is some 8 year old that could do it in his sleep.
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None of this is "very fast", it all has years of research behind it. Research we did, we put the time and money into. Yes even on old phones it is expensive, the software we use (IDA Pro and Jeb) alone are $1000s a year in licensing fees. Considering each person needs a license, its very costly. And yes, we are not thieves, we actually have licenses in our names. Many models we have spent money on, never sell more than a couple licenses. So the more popular models also fund the work done on models that don't make any sales. Sure we could just not add support for oddball models sold in only one country, but what fun is that.
myphonesbetter said:
And to say its out of pocket is a stretch when its a payed service. Most business endeavors or charities require some sort of investment.
And you can make a large chunk of the money back selling a bricked phone for parts. especially if its the latest model.
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The investment would be the out of pocket part, money to start projects doesnt just magically show up. New HTC u11 is what $600 bucks? One we fried the soc and mmc on? What $50 if we are selling it honestly (cause that thing wont EVER be repaired, and screen is about the only part re-usable)? Plus we run the risk of our debug builds leaking if someone is able to extract memory from the device, no thanks, not reselling a burned phone for $50(or even $300) and risk losing everything we have worked on for the last few years.
myphonesbetter said:
Why don't you guys release the code for free when you once you pay yourselves back. If more people started out where you left off (much like how you guys started) then the next generation would take no effort. If there were a thousand people testing and communicating and working together then the cost and time would be nothing.
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We have released plenty of free training material, white papers and example source code for people to start off of. Those resources would be much better than starting off with SunShine source code. As we have said, when SunShine is done, we will open source it. Considering no one does anything with what we do release, I have doubts anyone would do anything with everything we don't release. We were sure we would get 0 sales on Droid Turbo after publishing that write up, we thought someone would have a free exploit written that day. It has been years, nothing so far.
myphonesbetter said:
If there were a thousand people testing and communicating and working together then the cost and time would be nothing.
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LOL. People don't contribute to most mobile OSS projects, go look at copperhead, look at their commit history. I'm even guilty of it, my contributions besides projects I helped started are minimal (even my commits to AOSP are few).
myphonesbetter said:
There is nowhere to start anymore. there used to be all kinds of write ups that forced you to learn more about how everything works. then naturally some people figure out what they are actually doing are inspired to improve on it (sunshine for example). but now its just seems so overwhelming. Like nobody is there to help out when you get stuck.
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All of our write ups are still up, and we still publish more each year, I don't know what the heck you are going on about here. Please take the time to look rather than just make such claims.
myphonesbetter said:
Again, not trying to bash the people that put their time into this. More so trying to spark thoughts in people's minds who would normally just follow suit. Highlight different perspectives.
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Again, feel free to use the free resources we have and continue to provide to the community for free to build your own. We DO NOT discourage people from doing so, we actively encourage it by publishing a fair bit of our work for free. I even traveled on my own dime (not sunshine money, not someone else's money, but from my paycheck) without reimbursement to Las Vegas with Tim Strazzere and Caleb Fenton to provide trading FOR FREE. We over filled the maximum occupancy for the room. We were not allowed to take any more people.
In reality, and not to be insulting, it is pretty obvious you didn't properly research all of this.