"To no avail," in this case, means that he has not yet replied. I know there's an adoption procedure; I've used it before (Iterator::Simple, when Perl 5.12 broke it) - contacting the author is the first step.
What I'm wondering is whether the community knows anything about Abe's reasons for dropping the module beyond the obvious, which is that he no longer uses it and wasn't maintaining it. Because I can totally understand that, but if there was some reason beyond "I haven't looked at this for 8 years and it's time to clean up my life" it would be nice to know it before I really start getting my hands dirty with the code.
Of course, it's too late. I'm already looking at it and feeling certain parental urges, and I know those signs. It's like a puppy dog, just begging for attention, and it's just the size module I like - not too big or hairy, but truly useful.
My sister takes in cats; I seem to be starting to take in CPAN modules.
