While it has taken a week, the infrastructure for the new shader system is in place.  From when I first restarted the project, the first thing I needed to do was  get a brain dead shader online to see ANYTHING in OpenGL.  After I was able to get a prototype going, I started on a more complex shader which could do your standard texture and lighting, and eventually bump mapping.  This is what has been running the engine for the past year or so.  However, with the push to take it to that next level, I needed a way do be able to import multiple shaders and have them integrate with the current engine seamlessly.  Now I can simply add another shader into the system, and give it a display list, and off it goes.  Even if it has its own unique needs, as this first explosion shader does.  So now it is more a matter of getting a functional shader rather than worrying about how to import it into the system.  I hope to improve many of the graphical aspects of the game with this new feature over the next month.  I will post my progress, of course. :)