Dear GAP Forum,

We have had a number of recent enquiries for or about the GUAVA coding theory
package, so this message is to explain the status of the package.

The original package (for GAP3) was developed mainly by a group of Belgian
graduate students, who, having completed their degrees and so forth, have not
been able to maintain it for some years now.

On various occasions since then, people have been available and willing to
work on it for short periods, leading to the current version (1.5 for GAP
4.2), which is available in the "deposited contributions" section of the GAP
FTP and Web sites. No one has yet taken on a continuing role as maintainer of
the package, and it is currently unmaintained. In particular, at least one bug
is known (contact gap-trouble if you want the details) for which we currently
have no fix. The bug is also known to exist in the last GAP3 version of the
package.

So, this message is a warning and a request. The warning is that, while you
are welcome to use the current version of GUAVA, you should be aware that it
is unmaintained, and look out for problems. The request is for anyone willing
to take on the maintenance, or simply to submit bugfixes. In either
eventuality, please contact gap-trouble.

Steve Linton