From owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Thu May 6 01:54:29 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 80DFA16A4CE for ; Thu, 6 May 2004 01:54:29 -0700 (PDT) Received: from rwcrmhc11.comcast.net (rwcrmhc11.comcast.net [204.127.198.35]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 33BD343D48 for ; Thu, 6 May 2004 01:54:29 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from clint@0lsen.net) Received: from 0lsen.net ([24.20.127.157]) by comcast.net (rwcrmhc11) with ESMTP id <20040506085428013002gvgee>; Thu, 6 May 2004 08:54:28 +0000 Received: by 0lsen.net (Postfix, from userid 1001) id 2439F6F2; Thu, 6 May 2004 01:54:28 -0700 (PDT) Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 01:54:27 -0700 From: Clint Olsen To: Kris Kennaway Message-ID: <20040506085427.GB20499@0lsen.net> References: <20040506081747.GA7969@0lsen.net> <20040506082107.GA46385@xor.obsecurity.org> <20040506083437.GA20499@0lsen.net> <20040506084139.GA46638@xor.obsecurity.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20040506084139.GA46638@xor.obsecurity.org> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.1i Organization: NULlsen Network X-Disclaimer: Mutt Bites! cc: ports@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Ports gripe X-BeenThere: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting software to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 06 May 2004 08:54:29 -0000 On May 06, Kris Kennaway wrote: > > Um, what "port interface"? Portupgrade and friends. > Using ports is documented in the Handbook (your canonical source of > FreeBSD documentation): > > http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/ports-using.html Thanks for the links. It doesn't really cover the fundamental issues - explaining the relationship between a port, a package, when to use make or when it's better to use port{install,upgrade} etc. I have seen messages saying that portupgrade is preferred for a particular port over 'make install'. Some of the confusion stems from the fact that there's portinstall but no portdeinstall. There's pkg_deinstall, though, which appears to be a wrapper around pkg_delete. Intuitively you'd expect the dual of each command - or at least some explanation of why one exists and the other does not. In your original mail, you said I should have done "make all deinstall reinstall". However, the first question that came out of my mind was, what exactly does the 'all' target do in this case, and are you referring to all the ports or just this one port in particular? Thanks, -Clint