Right now the problem can be seen with the following:
The people in the TADS community are knowledgeable in TADS. The first hurdle is learning specifically how the documented VM works.
The second cliff face of a hurdle is that there are very few centralized sources of info on Glk, what it is, how it works, what its limits are, the current state of the Glk implementation of HTML TADS, what has been implemented, what is missing (using MJR’s work as a template), contribution standards and protocol, and more that i haven’t even gotten around to yet. Just trying to figure out the tech stack took me reading through multiple sources and asking around.
This is a jarring mess of confusion to ask volunteer TADS devs to wade through and contribute to your codebase. The only known solution that I have found for someone wanting to join in is staring at the complete volume of C++ code until it finally makes sense, and there’s no telling how long that could take a volunteer team of new contributors to tackle.
For instance, what if a volunteer finally gazed at MJR’s VM code and the Glk code long enough to finally understand them, and then discovered a fundamental incompatibility between the two? A new volunteer has no assurance that this isn’t a problem that is waiting for them, much less where to start.
EDIT: Found Glk info. Crossed out stuff accordingly.