Well time to let this one simmer a while.  I appreciate the viewpoints.

For what it is worth, I am unconvinced that leaving OVMF, ArmVirt, or Emulator packages in the edk2 tree is the right choice.  I would be opposed to adding more as that would just continue the growth and noise of platforms within a "core" repo.  In my view there are other, more consistent options for how to develop platforms using edk2 leveraging submodules (or a locked manifest).  See Project Mu ( https://microsoft.github.io/mu/ ( https://microsoft.github.io/mu/ ) ) for a strategy I find extremely successful that supports open source and closed source projects equally.  Respectfully, Edk2-Platforms is another great example of doing it wrong, but lets not get into that on this thread.  :)

I too believe that a CI system in which platforms can report their compatibility with a change is critical and will let core code developers make educated decisions about their changes and their impact on downstream platforms.

Thanks
Sean