Just flashed it tonight and so far so good. Let ya know my results.
Edit: OK so first I flashed the latest late nightly, then flashed the universal mopedryder APN fix and realized I didn't need it after re-reading everything. I wiped all and reflashed the ROM alone. I am receiving SMS but can't get MMS unless on hangouts(like everybody says). Haven't been able to check on LTE or anything yet as I haven't left the house yet. Will check when I go to the gym later today. Would I necessarily need one of the moped Ryder fixes? I am getting anal about it saying sprint in my drop down bar but oh well for now. Can change that later. Wondering how to get everything working on this. I love it. Super smooth and fast. Much lighter than stock ROM and uses up less resources. Got my Samsung apps.apk to install but can't get s memo or s note.APM to install.
As for your question on the fix, no some users have reported no longer needing it, but we do recommend leaving it in our SD for those just in case reasons, otherwise if alls working good no need to flash it
Also about messaging, its known that stock app just won't work, changes in the KitKat chase it to not connect correctly for certain message types, hangouts, handcent, evolvesms, and I believe textra and chomp have all been reported as working tho
As for your drop down and such on a cm ROM I'd highly recommend the xposed framework with the xblast tools mod available on XDA, to make carrier labels blank just enter a single space in the blank box and save/reboot
As for the Samsung apps, you may be able to get some to work but from what I've seen a lot of those apps look for the touchwiz like the phone had originally and cm doesn't so a lot of the Samsung specific apps just won't work or install correctly
Good to hear your up,running, and enjoying it tho, that's what its all about
Also if you don't already have them, paid apps that many users here including myself use to make ROM changing or updating or whatever easier are
1. Titanium Backup Pro (I think we all agree in this one, just NEVER restore system files and you'll have a much better time lol)
2. Root Explorer pro (even the free one, its just all around good with a simple user interface)
Although I have seen a new free one I tried out called root browser I believe, have a black folder with I android guy with an eye patch, was very nice for a free one
Launchers would be up to you, I use Nova prime currently due to the snappiness it always seems to have although there's one setting adw has that nova doesn't which is changing system ui font color which I really wish Nova had but I just gotta live without lol
And I personally also have widgetlocker from the same company that make the Nova launcher but as I recall the widget locker causes issues on cm so I currently don't use that
But all and all the things listed above will make things easier or more customizable
