"Yes ns_eval is definitely new, and perhaps there was some question in the past of its reliability."
Naw, it's more like the thread model for aolserver changed and none of us paid enough attention, well, not me at least - I remember reading about ns_eval but didn't make the connection with watching tcl lib files.
Go for it, and hey, while you're at it, make the APM use the template form
builder :) :)
