This has been discussed repeatedly in the past. Lacking a clear vision for how to shoe-horn this added functionality into CPAN, there seems to be a trend towards independent communities of interest attempting to make sense of modules in some specific area of functionality.

A few examples:

• The Poop-Group summary page lists and compares database object persistence modules.
• I've used a similar format in my review of method-generating modules, although this remains incomplete.
• The DateTime group is attempting to synthesize the best ideas from the existing Date::* and Time::* modules into a single coherent collection.

Given the difficulty in evaluating modules without fully understanding the context they're used in, I think this type of topic-area review might be as good as it gets, at least in the short term.

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