It seems that this subject is going viral.
There is too much to go through, to make individual replies, so I will comment on some that caught my attention, without quoting:
Mensys is in the game to make money. If they don't, the game is over, because nobody else will be able to do it. Mensys is sub licensed by IBM to distribute OS/2. Without that license, distributing eCS would become a nightmare for anybody who wants to try it. Some still seem to think that everybody should get everything, for free. Sorry, but I don't agree. If that happened, nobody would buy eComStation, and with no sales, comes no development, or any kind of coordination. I think that Mensys has been more than generous to make available what they do make available, for free. I, for one, am willing to contribute to the project, when I can, and Mensys is free to use whatever I contribute. I am not so sure that I feel that way toward those who don't contribute to the project, and still demand all of the benefits.
Overall, very little is known about the OS/4 project. That is partly because it is being done in private, and in Russian (the language), but it is also because the developers have not been keeping users up to date. It is my impression, that the main focus of OS/4 is to rework the kernel. The loader part probably became necessary to make it possible to load the kernel, but I get the idea that the loader part of OS/4 has become "finished", and is not really being developed any more. QSINIT, while it has it's roots in OS/4, has become a stand alone project. While there is some question about the legality of the OS/4 kernel, there is little doubt that the QSINIT loader is original work.
I would note, that I get the impression that Mensys wants nothing to do with OS/4, because of the legal questions, and the developers don't want to admit what they are really doing. Mensys must have a fully legal product to sell, or they risk law suits. They also need well tested software (which is a major problem for them, because they don't have a large test base), to be able to assure their customers that they are buying a viable product. I am sure that there is also some concern that "spyware" might be included.
QSINIT has recently added some functionality that OS/2 desperately needs (working around UEFI problems, and making it possible to use memory above 4 GB, even if it is only for a RAMDISK). That puts QSINIT into the "must have" category. At the moment, the only major fault, is that ACPI doesn't get along with it. I expect that David A. is far too busy to think about trying to help fix that problem. I would hope that Mensys is smart enough to make sure that it does get fixed, once they get eCS 2.2 out the door, and then take steps to incorporate the new loader (or a sub set of it - Tetris is probably not necessary
) into eCS, in one way, or another. I would also hope that walking_x will work with them to accomplish that. Walking_x also needs to have a way to turn over the source, to somebody (Mensys would be the obvious recipient), if he should decide to quit, or if he should become incapable of doing so (need I mention the proverbial "What bus?"). The first step in doing that would be to license the work, in some way that it will not become a private project, as it is now (we saw what happened with GENMAC). Of course, that also means that the source needs to be made available, although a contract could probably be made, to delay the open source status, until such time as walking_x decided to quit, or became unable to continue. Making the source available doesn't mean that somebody else can pick it up, change it, and use it for their own benefit. That is why the license is required. Of course, there is nothing stopping somebody else from improving the source, or adding new features, as long as they follow the license. If they completely destroy their system while doing so, that is their problem.