The ${IMAGE} variable is already marked deprecated in PMS. It would be nice to have it removed in a future EAPI alike AA and KV were removed.
This variable hasn't been exported by portage for years: http://git.overlays.gentoo.org/gitweb/?p=proj/portage.git;a=commit;h=486c66235de2a25dcd29d1f6d671f3795ff8949d
(In reply to comment #1) > This variable hasn't been exported by portage for years: Then portage doesn't follow the PMS :P.
and yet no one has cared a single bit. seems like a good indication to just mark it dead now and be done.
Just got to be sure we don't run into the same problem we had with AA if we do that.
*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 170671 ***