1.6 release?

[Juan Manuel Palacios]

	Hey everyone!

	It's very pleasing to see the amount of work that has gone into base  
since our last release, but the negative side of that is that our  
current code delta between trunk and the last release branch is huge.  
Therefore I propose we make a 1.6 release with a new release branch  
from scratch, cut off from trunk ToT.

	For that to happen, it would be nice to have some input on the  
current state of trunk:

-) does any developer in particular plan to include new features/ 
improvements in the near future? If so, do these entail any obvious  
instability we should account for?
   *) Markus, anything else we should look forward to in your recent  
slew of build stage related improvements?

-) on the other hand, is there anything in particular anyone would  
like to see *NOT* released to the public just yet?
   *) Eugene, how "finished" would you call your work on trace mode  
improvements? Other than bugs that you may fix as they are reported,  
do you plan any major changes to the core of your work?
   *) Chris, what are your plans to switch us to the new registry? I  
haven't seen you committing any new code for this, so I don't have  
much of an idea of its state. Can you please fill us in? That put  
aside, I'm guessing we don't have to worry much about registry2.0  
since, from what I gather, it's effectively "turned off" in our  
sources, right?

-) documentation people, can we count on rewritten man pages to go  
with 1.6? How far off is the new guide?

	I appreciate not only input on these points raised above, but also  
on the overall state of trunk, in order to properly plan the 1.6  
release and a test & stabilization cycle.

	One special treat I'm planning to couple with this new release is  
our revamped website, finally! So don't be shy to provide all  
feedback that you have on that too, most welcomed! (you'll always  
find it at http://apollo.homeunix.net/macports) It's mostly complete  
in functionality (which I've been coordinating with Mac OS Forge  
admin for proper deployment) and content, only lacking now the main  
index.php page which I still haven't been able to get to. Do step up  
if you care to help in completing that final bit ;-)

	Regards and thanks for your attention and help!


-jmpp