Credits / Who We Stand On
Everything we ship is GPL-3.0 and stands on the shoulders of people who shared first. Full credit, always.
// standing on giants
samloader (nlscc) — the original open FUS downloader and auth-param scheme. Bifrost (Zachary Wander) — the modern SmartDownload flow. SamFrew — catalogue and region research.
Iconify — GPL-3.0 theming engine and porting reference. Hex Installer — pioneered Samsung theme-package patching. We studied the public behaviour and wrote our own implementation. Repainter — Material You recolour research. ColorBlendr (Mahmud0808) — the modern dynamic-colour approach.
KernelSU (weishu) + KernelSU-Next — kernel-side root done right. Magisk (topjohnwu) + APatch (bmax121) — the other frameworks. Qualcomm_Loaders (leefshitz2) — EDL loader collection.
Built on Lawnchair / Launcher3 (Apache-2.0), with design inspiration from One UI Home, Nova Launcher, Hyperion, and Lawnchair. GPL-3.0 for the combined work.
// research that pointed the way
tryigit.dev — SM8850 UEFI/GBL whitepaper. ZeroPath — Qualcomm ABL bypass analyses. Kaspersky ICS CERT — BootROM/Sahara research (KLCERT-25-012). Christopher Wade — “Breaking Mobile Bootloaders” (QPSS 2022). Quarkslab — Samsung boot-chain deep dives.
GhostLock research ecosystem (NebuSec / CyberMeowfia, JoinChang, x-spy, YuKongA, BuSung-dev) — kernel exploit work we build on. Calif — the OEMpocalypse strategy series. Google Project Zero — years of in-the-wild Android chain writeups.
// what inspired us
It proved what was possible with Samsung theme packages. We want that capability to stay open, documented, and maintained.
Custom ROMs, themes and root for everyone who wanted it. The glory days, rebuilt in the open.
Root that lives in the kernel instead of fighting the system. Elegant, and a better default.
Every user who bricked a phone on a wrong-file guide. We build so that stops happening.
// our own ideas
What we figured out ourselves
- PolyQon recolours via Samsung's official colour slots — survives OTAs; no per-version hex patches.
- One UI 8.5 lockscreen clock via resource replacement — replace the resource, not the class.
- QS columns via settings —
qs_tile_column,sysui_qqs_count; settings-level, no fragile hooks. - Xposed module installs once — skips child processes and kills the double-hook problem.
- Fold-aware theming — folded/unfolded layouts and cover-display colour mapping.
- RootForge's device-matched matrix — one wrong file can brick a phone; a ranked matrix can't.
- Device-matched download ranking — arch + GKI + kernel scoring, best match first.
- Bootloader unlock wizard for every brand — one wizard, all the routes, risks stated.
- Orbit inside RootForge — firmware and rooting belong in one flow.
- Temp-root persistence — one exploit run per boot instead of re-running constantly.
- The unlock research — decoded the OEM-unlock gate stack and proved the bit-4
ablignores the flag. - This encyclopedia — no central “this device, these methods” map existed. We are building it, openly.
// how we credit
- Every port is source-verified and attributed in the repo and on the project page.
- We never copy code from closed tools — only facts and resource names, then write our own.
- If we missed you, tell us — it gets fixed the same day.