Python 2.4.1 on Windows raises "ValueError: invalid
literal for float(): -inf", though this works just fine
on unix distributions of Python 2.4.1.

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At most, this is a feature request (why did you think it would work?).

Floating point to string (and vice versa) conversions are done by the C 
library implementation, and sadly they are no consistent (you'll notice that 
printing an infinite value on windows doesn't print out 'inf' either).

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Oh, I thought Python 2.4.1 was the same language, regardless
of which platform it was running on.  I must be missing
something here.

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Well, everything to do with special floating point values is a platform 
dependent crapshoot (in fact, if you want to read more, googling for 
"platform dependent crapshoot" works quite well...).

Are you interested in working on a patch?  It's probably not straightforward 
at all.

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Snide comments are out of place here.  Standard C 89 is 
generally considered one language even though it has many 
platform dependencies.  Heroic efforts, mostly volunteer, have 
gone into masking many platform variations.  (For instance, look 
thru the C sources for system/compiler #ifdefs.)  These efforts 
continue.

http://docs.python.org/lib/built-in-funcs.html, float([x]) says

"Note: When passing in a string, values for NaN and Infinity may 
be returned, depending on the underlying C library. The specific 
set of strings accepted which cause these values to be returned 
depends entirely on the C library and is known to vary."

Please read the docs before claiming that documented behavior 
is a bug.

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FWIW, googling for the phrase does lead directly to revelant
discussion of the issues.