However, in order to do this /properly/, we need the egg filenames to
include version information. I won't go into the details, but i'll
just say that without that, we'd have to use our existing mechanisms
for live (cvs/snv/git/etc) packages, and these would be
unsatisfactory, both from a packager and a user point of view, when it
comes to eggs.
Many eggs -- not all, I think -- include a 'version' file which contains the current version number of the egg. A Web app could be written that would supply the current eggs as is, but providing different URLs for them that include their version number. Where version info is unavailable, the default version '0.0' could be used.
This would be easy to implement, I think, and wouldn't impose any undue burden upon Felix and the other egg-infrastructure maintainers.
Responding to Mario's comment, perhaps the major chicken version number could be prefixed to the egg version. I don't use Gentoo but I can see why they would want to have the egg-specific version as well.
Graham