The "keepdir /var/empty" in openssh's src_install which was added for fixing #37977 has actually become unneccessary in the meantime, at least with recent versions of Portage and OpenSSH -- OpenSSH's "install" make target already creates an empty /var/empty directory and Portage actually creates the directory even if it doesn't contain any files. This would mean /var/empty would actually be empty (at least, for non-HPN users), which might be useful for other applications. So please remove the "keepdir /var/empty" from the openssh ebuild.
i don't think we can (or should) rely on such semantics. instead, the init script should create the dir on demand at runtime. we probably should also move /var/empty creation to baselayout.
Baselayout has been creating /var/empty since 2.1. The commit id is fee181d9.
