>> Finally, what do you think about platforms like NetBSD/FreeBSD + GNU-libc
 >> (promoted by Debian) or OpenSolaris + APT with GNU user tools
 >> (http://www.gnusolaris.org)?

> The reason is simple: because the systems pkgsrc was first ported to
> where a lot more coherent than the mess Linux is.
Example I show makes the code simpler, smaller and easier to
maintain. ;)

> To answer the question
> about kFreeBSD/kNetBSD from Debian: I don't see the use in them.
True for now, but who knows.

> Live would be much easier if we can just ignore them or treat them
> like a special platform.
Sounds strange for me, pkgsrc tends to be as portable as it is
possible. Isn't it?

> We don't want to check for every small tool
> whether it is reallly POSIX awk, simply because that is *expensive*.
Not so expensive at bootstrap time at least for presence of utility
and detecting its type/capabilities (BSD, GNU, ln -s etc.).

> It could perhaps be done during bootstrap, but even then:
> requirements sometimes change, e.g. because a new tool is imported.
Everything is easy. After upgrading base system, sysadmin (or pkgsrc
user) should upgrade configuring Makefile just like
autoconf+configure.

> Even Interix is consistent, I would simply go with LSB for Linux and
> ignore everything else.
AFAIK Debian (popular platform) completely ignores LDB just
like you ignore non-LSB platforms ;-) I'm not sure about redhat,
gentoo, ubuntu and some others.

-- 
Best regards, Aleksey Cheusov.