looks like a big improvement to me. if you are into experimenting, i would try this out with just a table and no fieldsets. use subtabs for things like 'contrib', 'installed'. the default should show lots of modules i would think, like today.
* I don't like the "required modules" section. It doesn't seem
yeah, i think this can go.
* The version number is irrelevant and useless for a huge number
um, version is one of the main benefits of this. i like being able to look at my installed modules and then http://drupal.org/project/Modules and see if i am up to date. i'm all for metadata and ini format. jjeff is over here asking for icons for modules. even a tiny icon and a big icon. i reckon those would be metadata fields. personally, i think i like alpha by package first. as for 'drupal core', i think you want to follow the lead of the installer. i think even the word 'drupal' is a variable pointing to the name of the install profile.