Hi,
had the same problem... but solved it
Solution: it turned out that my unixODBC had gone bad; reason: I did something stupid with my /usr dir, so I had to restore it from backup. Because of that, my /var/tmp/portage and/or portage database (?) was out of sync. What I did was systematically refresh all packages, installed on my system *after* the date from the backup, starting with packages php might use. And Hey Presto: It turned out that the trouble came from a missing unixODBC.
Is there a way to clean up a faulty portage database? It would have helped me
Furthermore: It looks to me as if the php compile process gives a bit of a weird message, talking about a "fork" problem. It seems that this message is a clear indication that *some* of the packages needed by php are in a bad state... Happy Hunting!
