I suggest adding an i8kutils-1.8.ebuild for sys-apps/i8kutils. For me a simple cp i8kutils-1.17.ebuild i8kutils-1.8.ebuild worked. The 1.8 version is as stable as the 1.17 version on my system. The change seems to be especially important since i8krellm (http://www.coding-zone.com/i8krellm.phtml) needs a i8kutils version >= 1.5 (i am working on an ebuild for i8krellm)
If you didn't notice...17 > 8, so i8kutils-1.17 forfills i8kutils version >= 1.5, and 1.17 is the newest version released.
yepp. you are totally right.