> 1) What I did has a sound architectural reason behind it, and is
   > completely upward compatible.

   so, rearchitecting something is only allowed to change names when
   renaming old, "working" functionality with something new and different?
   it's not allowed to make existing functionality "clearer" in light
   of the other changes going on?

Renaming splimp() would have been a no-op, and would have broken
upward compatibility, for no good reason.  That's silly, and I won't
do it.

   "completely upward compatible"?  Does that mean "the pmax port
   should have continued working as it previously did"?

No.  The pmax port would have worked fine if it hadn't been updated.
However, it was, and the changes apparently weren't sufficient and/or
correct.  This is unfortunate, but the changes and ramifications
*were* explained well in advance.