Confusion over Linux vs. GNU/Linux
The truth is that GNU is the kernel of the Emacs OS.
(in re wishlist) A scary aspect of a GUI scripting language for GNOME is that it should work over the network. I wonder if that means an X dependency. *shudder*
If hacking the linker is required (I don't know that it is), then there's another benefit of the LinuxSTEP work. :-) As for "install" vs. "drop in place", the simple (so probably wrong) solution would be a daemon. Isn't what's needed really "drop in the right place"?
One thing that really worries me is that I don't see any communication between GNUStep/LinuxSTEP and freedesktop.org.
Applying the CSS box model to Gtk sounds interesting. I suspect backward compatibility will be a large obstacle. The planned padding has not yet been added to GtkAlignment in CVS HEAD. I don't see or recall that adding it to GtkContainer was considered. You should perhaps bring this up soon on gtk-devel-list.