ok, while waiting for someone to help me with my weak-ass python, i'm having 
the following problem:

at the install stage, i get the following error:

sudo ebuild afterstep-2.00_beta1.ebuild install
Password:
>>> md5 src_uri ;-) AfterStep-2.00.beta1.tar.bz2
>>> Checking AfterStep-2.00.beta1.tar.bz2's mtime...
>>> WORKDIR is up-to-date, keeping...
>>> It appears that afterstep is already compiled; skipping.
>>> (clean to force compilation)

>>> Install afterstep-2.00_beta1 into 
/var/tmp/portage/afterstep-2.00_beta1/image/ category x11-wm
/bin/cp AfterStep.desktop /usr/share/gnome/wm-properties/
ACCESS DENIED  open_wr:   /usr/share/gnome/wm-properties/AfterStep.desktop
/bin/cp: cannot create regular file 
`/usr/share/gnome/wm-properties/AfterStep.desktop': Permission denied
make: *** [install.data] Error 1

!!! ERROR: x11-wm/afterstep-2.00_beta1 failed.
!!! Function src_install, Line 53, Exitcode 2
!!! (no error message)

--------------------------- ACCESS VIOLATION SUMMARY 
---------------------------
LOG FILE = "/tmp/sandbox-afterstep-2.00_beta1-24222.log"

open_wr:   /usr/share/gnome/wm-properties/AfterStep.desktop
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

/tmp/sandbox-afterstep-2.00_beta1-24222.log:

open_wr:   /usr/share/gnome/wm-properties/AfterStep.desktop