I am suspicious that in GemStone, the class variable names need to be sorted (see Class>>_sortedClassVarNames and it's senders, especially Class>>asClassDefinition and Class>>asUncachedClassDefinition).

I got here by following the thread started by MCVariableDefinition>>sortedVariables, since it is being used in #= for MCClassDefinition ... I don't want packages to all of a sudden start comparing as unequal because the sorting algorithm has changed ... 

After thinking just a tad more, GemStone **is** ordering the class variable names when it creates class definitions, so this may not really be an issue, but I think that creating a test case or two in this area is called for. At a minimum I would think that ensuring that real life packages don't end up with false negatives is the most important with a test case or two to lock in the expected ordering components so that we can get early warnings about changes in this area...