Alright, that makes things much clearer. 
I'm looking at this code snippet in platform.py:
    if system == 'unknown':
        system = ''
    if node == 'unknown':
        node = ''
    if release == 'unknown':
        release = ''
    if version == 'unknown':
        version = ''
    if machine == 'unknown':
        machine = ''
    if processor == 'unknown':
        processor = ''

So essentially what you want me to do is add code that tries to replace
the ''s with meaningful information. From what I understand, os.uname()
is only defined in posix-based systems (it is imported from the module
posix, after all). That means that 'unknown' is returned because the
uname command is unable to retrieve the necessary information. Are there
any alternatives to uname that could provide me with system info?