I've been trying to get back into Mutt. Sometimes I have time, sometimes I don't — it's hard to make any kind of commitment. If everyone capable of leading the project is in the same boat, then what Kurt describes is the only kind of growth solution I can see.
I admit I haven't been paying close attention for a while, but I haven't seen many people who are recognized contributors step forward to volunteer time. I don't know whether that's because nobody can or will, or because those who can and will don't think it's wanted. I'm certainly willing to remain to the extent that I have been, but we need there to be more people. I have code I technically could push, but I'd rather have review and commentary on it because I know that for all the hours I've put into it, it's not really enough to have one veteran who's been semi-retired for 10 years thinking about it alone in a cabin. If anyone else qualified in experience (with both C and the project) has even a modicum of time to make available, let's talk. But we also have to ask and answer: is that what mutt users want? Or is the community satisfied with maintenance mode and low growth? On Sun, Jan 4, 2026 at 6:53 PM Kurt Hackenberg <[email protected]> wrote: > On Sun, Jan 04, 2026 at 11:59:52AM +0800, Kevin J. McCarthy wrote: > > >No, sorry it's highly unlikely. Mutt has been in maintenance mode for > >the past 4 years. At this point my time is very limited, so I handle > >security issues or occasionally tiny fixes or improvements. But not > >large changes like this anymore. > > > >You might want to head over to the NeoMutt project and see what they > think. > > If this continues, eventually Mutt will die. That's what happens to > software when development ends. > > I don't want that. Mutt is a programmer's mail reader -- powerful, > flexible, configurable -- and done at high quality. I'm not satisfied > with NeoMutt as a successor. Anyway, if Mutt dies, NeoMutt will > probably die sometime later. > > Kevin is trying to step down from being the maintainer. Nobody has > volunteered to take over his job as it is, understandably. He seems to > have done it mostly by himself, and that's a lot of work. > > I think we need a different organization, one that distributes the > responsibility and work, and the control of the code, among more > people. Maybe there could be a team of 5-10 people that takes > responsibility for Mutt, with contributions from many other people, who > might join the core team someday. Part of the job would be ongoing > encouragement and help for contributors. > > Ideas? >
