I never thought I'd do this but here goes.

I need to let everyone know that, in spite of the problems that may crop
up from time to time, Charles has been (for me) very responsive in the
code segments that I have sent him.

One of the things that I noticed early on was that he doesn't apply the
patches I send, he 'incorporates' them into what can only be called
'-not-current-yet' code.  I have been working on the Mitsumi CDROM
interface for the past month, and he has been very helpful in getting my
code so that it a) works with this 'pre-current' code and b) pointing
out the foibles of the code that I have sent him.

On the one hand, this is a very time consuming process that must take
him many hours of volunteer time (same as the rest of us).  This hand
crafted approach makes for solid code that has been inspected by several
sets of eyes.

On the other hand, this must be a very time consuming process that would
make it seem that he is unresponsive.  This approach also makes him seem
sort of anal-retentive.

While I have my own private complaints with Charles, I have never
received a chunk of really crappy code from him, whether he wrote it or
not.  That is equally a testament to his craftsmanship and early toilet 
training.

What I think needs to happen next is that the circle of core members
needs to step out one pace.  I'm sure that there are many people that
have the time and the training to be considered for inclusion in this
effort.  A few names immediately pop to mind (not my name, but you know
who I mean).  By adding to the size of the core team, it will reduce
some of the burden on those of you in the inner circle now.  

Another alternative is to start doing something like 'code reviews'.  We
do that in our Software Engineering section, and it works very well.
The first step is to identify people that have expertise in specific
areas and use them to review other people's code.  

That's enough for now.  I think I'll sign off and let this one hit the
fan with that -splut- noise that I am getting SO used to...