text:
Copyright © 2007–2018 The MacPorts Project
Copyright © 2002–2004 The OpenDarwin Project
MacPorts is an easy to use system for compiling, installing, and managing open source software. MacPorts may be conceptually divided into two main parts: the infrastructure, known as MacPorts base, and the set of available ports. A MacPorts port is a set of specifications contained in a Portfile that defines an application, its characteristics, and any files or special instructions required to install it. This allows you to use a single command to tell MacPorts to automatically download, compile, and install applications and libraries. But using MacPorts to manage your open source software provides several other significant advantages. For example, MacPorts:
Installs automatically any required support software, known as dependencies, for a given port.
Provides for uninstalls and upgrades for installed ports.
Confines ported software to a private "sandbox" that keeps it from intermingling with your operating system and its vendor-supplied software to prevent them from becoming corrupted.
Allows you to create pre-compiled binary installers of ported applications to quickly install software on remote computers without compiling from source code.
MacPorts is developed on macOS, though it is designed to be portable so it can work on other Unix-like systems, especially those descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). In practice, installing ports only works on macOS. MacPorts base can be compiled on Linux (and possibly other POSIX-compatible systems) where it is mainly used to set up mirrors and generate support files for installations on macOS.
The following notational conventions are used in the MacPorts Guide to distinguish between terminal input/output, file text, and other special text types.
Terminal I/O and file text.
Commands to be typed into a terminal window.
Command output to a terminal window.
File text.
Other special text types.
A hyperlink: spontaneous combustion.
A file:
A command: ifconfig.
An option: port
This chapter shows you how to install MacPorts and its prerequisites step-by-step. Note that the section about installing Xcode is macOS-specific. If you wish to install MacPorts on another platform, first make sure you have a working C compiler installed, skip ahead to installing MacPorts from source, and continue to the end of the chapter.
Xcode is a package provided by Apple containing compilers, libraries and additional tools required to develop applications for macOS.
Always make sure to install the latest available version of Xcode for your macOS release; using outdated versions of Xcode may cause port install failures. Also note that Xcode is not updated via OS X's Software Update utility on OS versions prior to 10.6, and is updated via the Mac App Store starting with 10.7.
Follow the instructions for your version of macOS:
Download the latest version of Xcode from the Apple developer website or get it using the Mac App Store.
Once you have Xcode installed, open a terminal, run
xcode-select --install, and
click the Install button to install the required command line developer tools. Don't worry if you see
a message telling you the software cannot be installed because it is not currently available from the
Software Update Server. This usually means you already have the latest version installed. You can also
get the command line tools from the
Apple developer website.
Download the latest version of Xcode from the Apple developer website or get it using the Mac App Store.
Xcode 4.3 and later do not automatically install the command line tools, but MacPorts requires them. To install them, open the Xcode application, go to the Preferences window, to the Downloads section, and click the Install button next to Command Line Tools. Be sure to return to this window after every Xcode upgrade to ensure that the command line tools are also upgraded.
If you wish to create Installer packages with
port pkg, you will also need
to install PackageMaker, which is in the "Auxiliary Tools for Xcode" package as of
Xcode 4.3. The download page for this package can be opened via the Xcode -> Open Developer Tool ->
More Developer Tools... menu item. After downloading and mounting the disk image, drag the
PackageMaker application to your /Applications directory.
If you are using Mac OS X 10.6, there are two branches of Xcode which could be considered to be the latest, 3.2.x and 4.x. Xcode 4 costs money, but Xcode 3 is still available free of charge. There are two options for downloading it:
Xcode 3.2 - smaller download, but you will need to run Software Update after installing to get the latest version. Note that Apple might at some point discontinue providing these updates via their update servers.
Xcode 3.2.6 and iOS SDK 4.3 - includes the iOS SDK which is not needed for MacPorts.
Both are available from the Apple developer website. You may also be able to install Xcode 3.2 from your Mac OS X 10.6 DVD and then run Software Update to get the latest version.
Ensure that those of the following options that are available in the installer for your version of Xcode are selected:
If you have an earlier release of Mac OS X, you may download the latest version of Xcode for Mac OS X 10.5 (Xcode 3.0 and Xcode 3.1 Developer Tools) or 10.4 (Xcode 2.4.1 and Xcode 2.5 Developer Tools) from the Apple developer website.
Ensure that those of the following options that are available in the installer for your version of Xcode are selected:
If you are using macOS, you should install MacPorts using the macOS package installer unless you do not wish
to install it to
/opt/local/, the default MacPorts location, or if you wish to install
a pre-release version of MacPorts base. However, if you wish to install multiple copies of MacPorts or install
MacPorts on another OS platform, you must install MacPorts from
the source code.
The macOS package installer automatically installs MacPorts, sets the shell environment, and runs a selfupdate operation to update the ports tree and MacPorts base with the latest release.
Download the latest
MacPorts-2.6.3- installer from the releases
on GitHub. Here
are direct links for the latest versions of macOS:
Double-click the downloaded package installer to perform the default "easy" install.
After this step you are done already, MacPorts is now installed and your shell environment was set up automatically by the installer. To confirm the installation is working as expected, now try using port in a new terminal window.
port version
Version: 2.6.3
In case of problems such as "command not found", make sure that you opened a new terminal window or consult Section 2.5, "MacPorts and the Shell". Otherwise, please skip the remainder of this chapter and continue with Chapter 3, Using MacPorts in this guide.
If you installed MacPorts using the package installer, skip this section. To install MacPorts from the source code, follow the steps below.
Download and extract the MacPorts 2.6.3 tarball. Either do so using your browser and the Finder, or use the given commands in a terminal window.
curl -O https://distfiles.macports.org/MacPorts/MacPorts-2.6.3.tar.bz2
tar xf MacPorts-2.6.3.tar.bz2
Afterwards, perform the commands shown in the terminal window. If you wish to use a path other
/opt/local, follow the instructions for installing multiple copies of MacPorts
cd MacPorts-2.6.3/
sudo make install
Please continue with Section 2.5, "MacPorts and the Shell" to set up your shell environment.
If you installed MacPorts using the package installer, skip this section.
There are times when some may want to run MacPorts from a version newer than the current stable release. Maybe there's a new feature that you'd like to use, or it fixes an issue you've encountered, or you just like to be on the cutting edge. These steps explain how to setup MacPorts for developers, using only Git to keep MacPorts up to date.
Though a distinction is made between pre-release and release versions of MacPorts base, the ports collection supports no such distinction or versioning. The selfupdate command installs the latest ports tree, and updates MacPorts base to the latest released version.
Check out MacPorts source
Pick a location to store a working copy of the MacPorts code. For this example,
/opt/mports will be used, but you can put the source anywhere. This example
will create
/opt/mports/macports-base containing everything needed for
mkdir -p /opt/mports
cd /opt/mports
git clone https://github.com/macports/macports-base.git
git checkout v2.6.3 # skip this if you want to use the development version
Build and Install MacPorts
MacPorts uses autoconf and makefiles for installation. These commands will build and install
MacPorts to
/opt/local. You can add
--prefix to
./configure to relocate MacPorts to another directory if needed.
cd /opt/mports/macports-base
./configure --enable-readline
sudo make install
make distclean
(Optional) Configure MacPorts to use port information from Git
This step is useful if you want to do port development. Check out the ports tree from git:
cd /opt/mports
git clone https://github.com/macports/macports-ports.git
Then open
/opt/local/etc/macports/sources.conf in a text editor. The last line
should look like this:
rsync://rsync.macports.org/macports/release/tarballs/ports.tar [default]
Change it to point to the working copy you checked out:
file:///opt/mports/macports-ports [default]
Now MacPorts will look for portfiles in the working copy and use Git instead of rsync to update your ports tree.
You should setup your PATH and other environment options according to Section 2.5, "MacPorts and the Shell".
Occasionally a MacPorts developer may wish to install more than one MacPorts instance on the same
host. Only one copy of MacPorts may use the default prefix
/opt/local, so for
additional installations use the option
--prefix as shown below. It's also recommended
to change the applications dir using
--with-applications-dir to avoid conflicts in
--without-startupitems to automatically set
startupitem_install no
in the new
macports.conf, which is required to avoid conflicts in
/Library/LaunchAgents or
The first command temporarily removes the standard MacPorts binary paths because they must not be present while installing a second instance.
export PATH=/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin
./configure --prefix=$MP_PREFIX --with-applications-dir=$MP_PREFIX/Applications --without-startupitems
sudo make install
MacPorts base upgrades are performed automatically (when a newer release is available) during a selfupdate operation. To upgrade a copy of MacPorts that was installed from source to the newer release of the source code, simply repeat the source install with the newer version of the MacPorts source code.
Uninstalling MacPorts is a drastic step and, depending on the issue you are experiencing, you may not need to do so. If you are unsure, ask on the macports-users mailing list first. If you are sure you want to uninstall, read on.
If you want to uninstall MacPorts and the port command is functioning, first uninstall all the installed ports by running this command in the Terminal:
sudo port -fp uninstall installed
All that will be left in your installation prefix now will be files that were not registered to any
port. This includes configuration files, databases, any files which MacPorts renamed in order to allow a
forced installation or upgrade, and the base MacPorts software itself. You may wish to save your
configuration files (most are in
$prefix/etc), databases, or any other unique data
by moving it aside.
If the port command is not functioning, you can proceed on to the next steps, but if you had installed any ports that install files to nonstandard locations, those files might not be removed.
When MacPorts is installed, a
macports macOS user and group are created for
privilege separation. If you want to remove them, you can use these commands from an account that has
admin privileges:
sudo dscl . -delete /Users/macports
sudo dscl . -delete /Groups/macports
If you configured MacPorts to use a different user or group name, then specify that instead of
Individual ports may create users and groups as well; you can remove them with the same commands, but
macports with the user or group name you wish to delete.
If you want to remove all remaining traces of MacPorts, run the following command in the Terminal. If
you have changed
applications_dir or
frameworks_dir from their default values, then replace
/opt/local with your
prefix, replace
/Applications/MacPorts with your
applications_dir, and/or add
frameworks_dir to the list, respectively.
If you are running macOS 10.15 Catalina or later and have not disabled System Integrity Protection
(SIP), you will need to remove the
macports user first.
sudo rm -rf \ /opt/local \ /Applications/DarwinPorts \ /Applications/MacPorts \ /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.* \ /Library/Receipts/DarwinPorts*.pkg \ /Library/Receipts/MacPorts*.pkg \ /Library/StartupItems/DarwinPortsStartup \ /Library/Tcl/darwinports1.0 \ /Library/Tcl/macports1.0 \ ~/.macports
If you use a shell other than bash (perhaps tcsh), you may need to adjust the above to fit your shell's syntax.
Depending on which version of MacPorts you have and which ports you have installed, not all of the above paths will exist on your system; this is OK.
MacPorts requires that some environment variables be set in the shell. When MacPorts is installed using the macOS package installer, a "postflight" script is run after installation that automatically adds or modifies a shell configuration file in your home directory, ensuring that it defines variables according to the rules described in the following section. Those installing MacPorts from source code must modify their environment manually using the rules as a guide.
Depending on your shell and which configuration files already exist, the installer may use
.tcshrc, or
The postflight script automatically sets the
PATH variable, and optionally the
MANPATH and
DISPLAY variables according to the rules described
below. If a current shell configuration file exists at installation time it is renamed to
"mpsaved_$timestamp". Those installing MacPorts
from source code must modify their environment manually using the rules as a guide.
PATH variable
This variable is set by the postflight script to prepend the MacPorts executable paths to the
current path as shown. This puts the MacPorts paths at the front of
so that the MacPorts binaries will take precedence over vendor-supplied binaries.
export PATH=/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:$PATH
The user environment's $PATH is not in effect while ports are being installed, because the
$PATH is scrubbed before ports are installed, and restored afterwards. To change the search
path for locating system executables (rsync, tar, etc.) during port installation, see the
macports.conf file
binpath. But changing this variable is for advanced users only,
and is not generally needed or recommended.
MANPATH variable
Condition: If prior to MacPorts installation a
MANPATH variable exists in
a current
.profile that contains neither the value
${prefix}/share/man, nor any empty items separated by a colon, the
postflight script sets the
MANPATH variable as shown below. Otherwise, the
MANPATH variable is omitted.
export MANPATH=/opt/local/share/man:$MANPATH
DISPLAY variable
Condition: If installing on a Mac OS X version earlier than 10.5 (Leopard), and if a shell
configuration file exists at time of MacPorts installation without a
variable, the postflight script sets a
DISPLAY variable as shown below. The
DISPLAY variable is always omitted on Mac OS X 10.5 or higher.
export DISPLAY=:0.0
To verify that the file containing the MacPorts variables is in effect, type env in the terminal to verify the current environment settings after the file has been created. Example output for env is shown below.
Changes to shell configuration files do not take effect until a new terminal session is opened.
MANPATH= TERM_PROGRAM=Apple_Terminal TERM=xterm-color SHELL=/bin/bash TERM_PROGRAM_VERSION=237 USER=joebob __CF_USER_TEXT_ENCODING=0x1FC:0:0 PATH=/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin PWD=/Users/joebob EDITOR=/usr/bin/pico SHLVL=1 HOME=/Users/joebob LOGNAME=joebob DISPLAY=:0.0 SECURITYSESSIONID=b0cea0 _=/usr/bin/env
You can set an environment variable in order to use your favorite text editor with the port edit command.
MacPorts will check
VISUAL and
EDITOR in this order, allowing you to either use a default editor shared with other
programs (
VISUAL and
EDITOR) or a MacPorts-specific one
For example, to use the nano editor, add this line to your bash config:
export EDITOR=/usr/bin/nano
To use the user-friendly GUI editor BBEdit (installation required), add this line:
export EDITOR=/Applications/BBEdit.app/Contents/Helpers/bbedit_tool
To keep a command-line text editor as default while using BBEdit with portfiles, add this:
export EDITOR=/usr/bin/vi export MP_EDITOR=/Applications/BBEdit.app/Contents/Helpers/bbedit_tool
This chapter describes using port, port variants, common tasks and port binaries.
port is the main utility used to interact with MacPorts. It is
used to update
Portfiles and the MacPorts infrastructure, and install and manage
help action shows some brief information about the specified action, or if no
action is specified, shows basic usage information for port in general.
port help selfupdate
Usage: selfupdate --no-sync Upgrade MacPorts itself and run the sync target --no-sync Do not run the sync target, i.e., do not update the ports tree. Only checks for (and installs, if available) new versions of MacPorts.
selfupdate action should be used regularly to update the local ports tree with
the global MacPorts ports repository so you will have the latest versions of software packages
available. It also checks for new releases of MacPorts itself, and upgrades it when necessary.
sudo port selfupdate
---> Updating MacPorts base sources using rsync MacPorts base version 2.6.3 installed, MacPorts base version 2.6.3 downloaded. ---> Updating the ports tree ---> MacPorts base is already the latest version
selfupdate detects that a newer version of MacPorts is available, it automatically
updates the installed copy of MacPorts base to the latest released version. In that case, you will see
this message:
---> Updating MacPorts base sources using rsync MacPorts base version 2.6.2 installed, MacPorts base version 2.6.3 downloaded. ---> Updating the ports tree ---> MacPorts base is outdated, installing new version 2.6.3 Installing new MacPorts release in /opt/local as root:admin; permissions 755
If the
selfupdate procedure fails you'll see a message like this:
Error installing new MacPorts base: command execution failed
As always, you can use the debug flag
-d to enable verbose output. If your
selfupdate failed, re-run it with debug output enabled to see all output generated by
the build system.
sudo port -d selfupdate
The output may give you an idea why the build failed. Look for the first occurrences of
"error". If you cannot figure out what's wrong yourself, feel free to ask on the
<firstname.lastname@example.com> mailing list and attach the output generated by
sudo port -d selfupdate.
selfupdate accepts a single switch:
Only update MacPorts itself, do not update the tree of
sync action performs a subset of
selfupdate. It synchronizes the
ports tree, as does
selfupdate, but it does not check for MacPorts upgrades. On macOS,
unless there is a special reason not to do so, run selfupdate instead.
sync does not accept any switches.
diagnose action checks for common issues in the user's environment and reports all
issues it finds to the user, along with possible fixes for said problem.
diagnose accepts a single switch:
Only displays warnings and errors, rather than the status of all tests run.
reclaim action attempts to reclaim space by uninstalling inactive ports, and
removing unnecessary files that were downloaded during the installation process.
reclaim accepts switches to configure automatic reminders.
If passed, the reclaim process will not be run.
Enable regular reminders to run port reclaim.
Disable regular reminders to run port reclaim.
list action lists the currently available version of the specified ports, or if
no ports are specified, displays a list of all available ports. The list of available ports is very
long, so use search if you are looking for a specific
port list
port list always lists the most recent version available in MacPorts, which is
not necessarily the version you have installed. For this reason, port list
installed likely produces unexpected output. In most cases where you would
list, using
installed or
echo is the better
choice instead. Both port installed and port echo installed
would produce the output you might expect from the command, port list installed
will not (and, to make matters worse, will be slow).
You will hardly need port list at all to work with MacPorts. When searching, port search is the better choice and when trying to list ports, port installed and port echo are much more useful.
search action allows finding ports by partial matches of the name or description.
Other fields can be matched against, and matched in different ways, by using options. port
search is the tool of choice if you are looking for a specific software in MacPorts. We
recommend you read up on some of its flags to improve your efficiency when searching for ports. Run
port help search for an exhaustive list of possible switches.
Suppose you are looking for PHP in MacPorts. You might start with port search php
and notice your query produces a lot of output. In fact, at the time of writing this, this search
produces 661 matches. By default, port search searches both name and description of
a port. While we're looking for PHP, we can reduce the number of hits by using the
--name flag. Furthermore, we only want ports whose name starts with "php",
so we add the
--glob flag (actually, we could leave it out because it is the default)
and modify the search term to
port search --name --glob 'php*'
Furthermore, we can enable compact output by using the
--line switch. This causes only
a single line to be printed for each match:
port search --name --line --glob 'php*'
Among a large number of PHP modules you will find the main PHP ports, which are named
<version>. Choose one to install.
If you know regex and know about the format of the PHP versions, you can further reduce the output of port search:
port search --name --line --regex '^php\d*$'
php 5.5 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php4 4.4.9 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php5 5.3.28 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php52 5.2.17 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php53 5.3.28 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php54 5.4.31 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php55 5.5.15 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor php56 5.6.0RC2 lang www PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor
Let us look at another example that is less complicated. Assuming you are looking for
rrdtool, a popular system to store and graph time-series data, the simple search
approach works well:
port search rrd
cacti @0.8.8b (net) Cacti is a complete RRDtool network graphing solution. jrrd @1.0.4 (java) Java interface to RRDTool netmrg @0.20 (net) An RRDtool frontend for network monitoring, reporting, and graphing that generates day/week/month MRTG style graphs. network-weathermap @0.97c (net) Weathermap is a network visualisation tool, to take graphs you already have and display an overview of your network as a map. It supports RRD, MRTG (RRD and old log-format), and tab-delimited text files. Other sources are via plugins or external scripts. php-rrd @1.1.3 (php, net, devel) PHP rrdtool extension php5-rrd @1.1.3 (php, net, devel) PHP rrdtool extension php5-rrdtool @1.0.5 (php, net, devel) this port is only a stub and has been made obsolete by php5-rrd php53-rrd @1.1.3 (php, net, devel) PHP rrdtool extension php54-rrd @1.1.3 (php, net, devel) PHP rrdtool extension php55-rrd @1.1.3 (php, net, devel) PHP rrdtool extension rrdtool @1.4.7_5 (net) Round Robin Database Found 11 ports.
The possible switches to
search and their meaning are:
Match the search string in a case-sensitive manner.
Match the literal search string exactly.
Treat the given search string as glob search string (i.e., expand wildcards
?, and
This is the default behavior.
Treat the given search string as regular expression.
Test the search string against
<field>. Can be specified multiple
times to test against multiple fields. The default is
--name --description.
Possible values for
<field> are
Search for ports in a given category.
Search for ports that depend on the port given as search string. The
--depends is an alias for all other
options combined. Note that only dependencies specified in default variants will
be found.
Test the search string against ports' descriptions.
Test the search string against the homepage field of all ports.
Search for ports maintained by a specific maintainer.
Search only ports' names.
Test the search string against the path of the directory that contains the port.
Search for variant names.
info action is used to get information about a port: name, version, description,
variants, homepage, dependencies, license, and maintainers.
port info yubico-pam
yubico-pam @2.16 (security) Variants: universal Description: The Yubico PAM module provides an easy way to integrate the YubiKey into your existing user authentication infrastructure. The module can be configured to validate YubiKeys against Yubico's YubiCloud infrastructure, a custom YubiKey validation server or it can be used for offline authentication with newer YubiKeys supporting a challenge-response protocol. Homepage: https://github.com/Yubico/yubico-pam Build Dependencies: pkgconfig, autoconf, automake, libtool Library Dependencies: ykpers, yubico-c-client Platforms: darwin License: BSD Maintainers: firstname.lastname@example.com
deps action lists the dependencies of a port. Dependencies are the packages are
required by a port at runtime (library and runtime dependencies) or required to install it (build,
fetch, and extract dependencies).
port deps apache2
Full Name: apache2 @2.2.27_0+preforkmpm Library Dependencies: apr, apr-util, expat, openssl, pcre, perl5, zlib
Note that the list of dependencies might depend on the variants you chose. For example, choosing the
+openldap variant of
apache2 adds a dependency on
port deps apache2 +openldap
Full Name: apache2 @2.2.27_0+openldap+preforkmpm Library Dependencies: apr, apr-util, expat, openssl, pcre, perl5, zlib, openldap
deps accepts two switches:
Do not read the
Portfile to determine dependencies. Instead, rely on
the information cached in the port index. Note that (despite specifying them), this option
will ignore any effects of variants. It is, however, much faster.
Exclude dependencies only required at build time, i.e., fetch, extract, and build dependencies.
variants action allows you to check what variations of a port are available
before you install it. Variants are a way for port authors to provide options you can use to customize
your build at install time. See Invoking Port Variants
below to install ports that have variants.
port variants apache2 +universal
apache2 has the variants: eventmpm: Use event MPM (experimental) * conflicts with preforkmpm workermpm openldap: Enable LDAP support through OpenLDAP [+]preforkmpm: Use prefork MPM * conflicts with eventmpm workermpm +universal: Build for multiple architectures workermpm: Use worker MPM * conflicts with eventmpm preforkmpm
This output lists all variants followed by their description. If a variant depends on or conflicts
with other variants, a line detailing that follows. A variant name prefixed by
indicates that it has been enabled (on the command line), while a prefix
- indicates
that it has been disabled. When bracketed, a prefix
+ means that the variant is enabled
by default.
[] are derived from the
() are derived from the
See Section 6.2.3, "variants.conf" for more information on
The action
install is used to install a port. Once you determined the name of a port
you want (possibly using port search), you
can install it using this command. See Section 3.2.1, "Invoking Variants" on how to choose
variants when installing a new port. For example,
sudo port install apache2 -preforkmpm +workermpm
installs the
apache2 port without the
preforkmpm, but with the
workermpm variant.
If the installation of a port fails, you can enable verbose or debug output by giving the
-v or
-d flag to port:
sudo port -v install apache2
All debug information is also kept in
main.log for the port you
installed. Its path will be printed automatically if the installation fails. You can manually get the
path using port logfile portname. Note that logfiles will
automatically be deleted on successful installation.
If the installation of a port fails, you should always clean and try again, i.e., run
sudo port clean
and re-execute the command you ran before.
You might also want to try enabling trace mode, which can prevent conflicts caused by files installed
by other ports or in common system locations, such as
/usr/local. To do that,
re-run the installation with the
-t flag, i.e.,
sudo port -t install
If the port still fails to install after you have followed these steps, please file a ticket and attach the
main.log of
a clean attempt.
The installation of a single port consists of multiple phases. These phases are fetch, extract,
patch, configure, build, destroot, archive, and finally install. You may break up a port's
installation into smaller steps for troubleshooting by using the name of one of these phases as
action rather than
install. For example
sudo port destroot apache2
will run the installation of
apache2 until the destroot phase. See Section 5.3, "Port Phases" for a complete list of phases and a detailed description.
install takes the following switches:
By default, a binary sanity check called
rev-upgrade is run automatically
after each successful installation. Pass this flag, if you want to avoid running this step,
for example if you want to run it explicitly later after a number of installations using
sudo port rev-upgrade, or if you know it will detect problems but want to
defer dealing with them.
By default, each port you install using the
install explicitly (contrary to ports
installed as a dependency of a different port) is marked as "requested".
If you want MacPorts to treat a port you installed manually as if it was automatically installed
as a dependency (e.g., if a dependency failed to build and you re-tried installing the dependency only),
pass this flag.
The action
clean deletes intermediate files created by MacPorts while installing
a port. A port clean is often necessary when builds fail and should be the first
thing to try after a failed installation attempt.
sudo port clean
port clean can also be used to remove corrupted downloads after a failed
fetch phase, by specifying the
--dist flag:
sudo port clean --dist
deletes all files that have been downloaded for the given port.
clean accepts the following options:
Remove temporary archives.
Remove downloaded files.
Remove log files.
Remove the
work directory, i.e., the directory used by MacPorts to
build a software. This removes all traces of an attempted build and is the default
All of the above combined.
uninstall action will remove an installed port. It is one of the actions you will
use fairly often in MacPorts.
sudo port uninstall
MacPorts will refuse to uninstall ports that are still needed by other ports. For example:
sudo port uninstall libcomerr
---> Unable to uninstall libcomerr @1.42.9_0, the following ports depend on it: ---> kerberos5 @1.11.3_0 ---> subversion @1.8.9_0 ---> subversion-perlbindings-5.16 @1.8.9_0 Error: port uninstall failed: Please uninstall the ports that depend on libcomerr first.
You can recursively uninstall all ports that depend on the given port before uninstalling the port
itself to work around this. To do that, use the
--follow-dependents flag.
sudo port uninstall --follow-dependents libcomerr
You can also override this safety check using the
-f (force) flag. Since
this will obviously break the dependents you shouldn't do this unless you know what you are
sudo port -f uninstall libcomerr
Uninstalling a port will not uninstall ports that have been automatically installed as dependencies of
the uninstalled port and are otherwise unused. You can trigger this behavior by passing the
--follow-dependencies flag. Ports that were manually installed (i.e., are marked as
"requested") or have other dependents will not be removed. You can manually uninstall the
unneeded ports later using the
leaves pseudo-port, e.g., using sudo port
uninstall leaves.
uninstall supports the following switches:
Recursively uninstall ports that depend on the specified port before uninstalling the port itself. See also the textual description above.
Also uninstall ports that were automatically installed as dependencies of the removed port and are no longer needed.
Avoid running any uninstall hooks, such as commands that update cache files.
contents action displays a list of all files that have been installed by a given
port. You can only use
contents for ports you installed.
port contents xorg-renderproto
Port xorg-renderproto contains: /opt/local/include/X11/extensions/render.h /opt/local/include/X11/extensions/renderproto.h /opt/local/lib/pkgconfig/renderproto.pc /opt/local/share/doc/renderproto/renderproto.txt
Common uses for
contents are finding the location of a port's executable after
installing it. The following line is usually helpful in this case:
port -q contents
portname| grep -E '/s?bin/'
-q (quiet) flag suppresses the header line in this case, but is not strictly necessary.
contents accepts:
Prints a human-readable representation of the files' sizes.
--units UNIT
Used in conjunction with
--size to choose the unit of the file size.
Valid parameters for
UNIT are
List sizes in bytes.
Ki, or
List sizes in
KiB, i.e., 1024 bytes.
Mi, or
List sizes in
MiB, i.e., 1024 * 1024 bytes.
Gi, or
List sizes in
GiB, i.e., 1024 * 1024 * 1024 bytes.
k, or
List sizes in
kB, i.e., 1000 bytes.
M, or
List sizes in
MB, i.e., 1000 * 1000 bytes.
G, or
List sizes in
GB, i.e., 1000 * 1000 * 1000 bytes.
installed action displays the installed versions and variants of the specified
ports, or if no ports are specified, all installed ports. It also displays whether a port is
"active", i.e., whether the files belonging to this port are currently present on disk or
inactive, i.e., stashed away in a compressed tarball.
port installed
The following ports are currently installed: a52dec @0.7.4_0 (active) adns @1.4_0 (active) apache2 @2.2.27_0+preforkmpm (active) apr @1.5.1_0 (active) apr-util @1.5.3_0 (active) aquaterm @1.1.1_0 (active) asciidoc @8.6.9_1+python27 (active) … XviD @1.3.3_0 (active) xz @5.0.5_0 (active) yasm @1.2.0_0 (active) ykpers @1.12.0_0 (active) youtube-dl @2014.07.25.1_0+python27 (active) yubico-c-client @2.12_0 (active) yubico-pam @2.16_0 (active) zlib @1.2.8_0 (active)
-v to also display the platform and CPU architecture(s) for which the
ports were built, and any variants which were explicitly negated.
port -v installed libsdl
The following ports are currently installed: libsdl @1.2.15_3-x11 (active) platform='darwin 13' archs='x86_64'
outdated action checks your installed ports against the current ports tree to see
they have been updated since you installed them. Note that you will only get new versions by updating
your ports tree using
selfupdate (or
port outdated
The following installed ports are outdated: gnupg 1.4.16_0 < 1.4.18_0 gnupg2 2.0.22_2 < 2.0.25_0 gpg-agent 2.0.22_1 < 2.0.25_0 gpgme 1.5.0_0 < 1.5.1_0 HexFiend 2.1.2_1 < 2.3.0_0 libksba 1.0.8_0 < 1.3.0_0 p5.16-class-methodmaker 2.180.0_1 < 2.210.0_0 p5.16-gnupg-interface 0.330.0_3 < 0.500.0_1 p5.16-ipc-run 0.910.0_1 < 0.920.0_0
port outdated lists the ports for which an upgrade is available and on the second column, why MacPorts thinks the port needs an upgrade. In most cases, this will be an increase in the version number. If it isn't, more details will be given.
upgrade action upgrades installed ports and their dependencies to the latest
version available in MacPorts. In most cases, you will run
sudo port upgrade outdated
to update all ports that have an upgrade available. You can, however, selectively upgrade ports if you want to delay other upgrades until later. This is not recommended unless you know what you are doing, since you might experience software errors for the ports that have not yet been upgraded. To upgrade individual ports, specify the name(s) of the port(s) to upgrade:
sudo port upgrade gnupg2
Note that MacPorts may decide to upgrade other dependent ports before upgrading the port you requested to be updated. Do not attempt to prevent this, since it will very likely lead to problems later.
upgrade does not uninstall the old version of a port. Instead, it deactivates it,
i.e., it stashes the files belonging to the older version away in a tarball. This allows you to go
back to the older version if there happens to be a problem with the updated one. To do that,
port installed
to determine the version number of the old version you want to re-activate, and run
sudo port activate
to go back to the old version.
If you do not want to keep the old versions around while upgrading, you can pass
-u when upgrading:
sudo port -u upgrade outdated
However, we instead recommend keeping the older versions around for a while and running
sudo port uninstall inactive
once in a while.
upgrade accepts a number of switches:
Always consider the given ports outdated, regardless of whether they actually are.
If the installed variants do not match those requested, upgrade (and change variants) even if the port is not outdated. You can use this to switch the variant selection on an installed port, e.g., using
sudo port upgrade --enforce-variants apache2 -preforkmpm +workermpm
Note that
--enforce-variants will also enforce your variant selection in
all dependencies. If you know this is not necessary, you can avoid processing dependencies
using the global
-n flag:
sudo port -n upgrade --enforce-variants apache2 -preforkmpm +workermpm
Do not automatically install replacement ports for a port that you have installed, but was replaced with a different one.
dependents action reports what ports depend upon a given (installed) port, if
port dependents openssl
apache2 depends on openssl curl depends on openssl cyrus-sasl2 depends on openssl git depends on openssl kerberos5 depends on openssl lftp depends on openssl libssh depends on openssl mosh depends on openssl openldap depends on openssl p5.16-net-ssleay depends on openssl python27 depends on openssl python32 depends on openssl qt4-mac depends on openssl ruby19 depends on openssl serf1 depends on openssl textmate2 depends on openssl wireshark depends on openssl
Note that
dependents does not work for ports that are not installed on your system.
If you want to find out, which ports depend on a port that you have not installed, you can use
port echo depends:
This command will, however, not cover dependencies that are only present in non-default variants.
livecheck action checks to see if the application corresponding to a given port
has been updated at the developer's download site. This action is mostly useful for port maintainers to
determine whether their port needs to be updated, but other may also wish to see if a port packages the
latest available version. See Section 5.8, "Livecheck / Distcheck" for more information on
port livecheck rb19-sass
rb19-sass seems to have been updated (port version: 3.3.10, new version: 3.3.14)
livecheck finds no higher version at the port's download site, it prints
nothing. The option
-d (debug) may be used for detailed livecheck processing
The lint action checks if the
Portfile conforms to the MacPorts standards
specified in Portfile Development. You should use this if you
modified a
Portfile before submitting patches back to MacPorts.
If a
Portfile validates fine the following message is shown.
port lint rb19-sass
---> Verifying Portfile for rb19-sass ---> 0 errors and 0 warnings found.
Otherwise the warnings and errors are listed.
port lint abiword
---> Verifying Portfile for abiword Warning: Variant use_binary does not have a description Warning: Variant use_source does not have a description Warning: no license set ---> 0 errors and 3 warnings found.
lint has the following flag:
Enables additional checks that are mostly whitespace-related and best practices.
Variants are a way for port authors to provide options for a port that may be chosen at installation. Typically, variants are optional features that can be enabled, but are not necessarily useful for all users and are thus not enabled by default. To display the available variants for a port, if any, use this command:
port variants
For example:
port variants apache2
apache2 has the variants: eventmpm: Use event MPM (experimental) * conflicts with preforkmpm workermpm openldap: Enable LDAP support through OpenLDAP [+]preforkmpm: Use prefork MPM * conflicts with eventmpm workermpm universal: Build for multiple architectures workermpm: Use worker MPM * conflicts with eventmpm preforkmpm
This output lists all variants followed by their description. If a variant depends on or conflicts
with other variants, a line with the details on that follows. Variant lines that have a
+ are enabled and those with
- are disabled.
[] are derived from the
() are derived from the
See Section 6.2.3, "variants.conf" for more information on
A variant can only be selected when a port is installed. After you have determined what variants a given port has, if any, you may install a port using a variant by specifying its name preceded by a plus sign on the command line, for example
sudo port install apache2 +openldap
Multiple variants can be selected by simply listing them one after another separated by a space.
sudo port install apache2 +openldap +universal
Use a minus sign to deselect a variant that is on by default.
sudo port install apache2 -preforkmpm +workermpm
Note that you will not see any confirmation of successful variant selection and MacPorts will not warn you if you misspelled a variant's name. If your installation is successful, but the chosen feature still seems to be missing, check for possible typos. You can use port installed to verify that the port has been installed with the chosen variant.
This happens because MacPorts will also use the specified variants for any dependencies. For example,
sudo port install apache2 +mariadb
is accepted even though
apache2 does not have a
+mariadb variant. However,
it depends on the
apr-util port which does have the
variant and will be installed with it.
MacPorts will remember the variants that were used when installing a port. If you upgrade a port later, the same variants will be used, unless you manually specify different variants.
Portfile can specify a default set of variants that will be used when you do
not manually override it. Not all ports specify default variants – if there are no default variants, no
variants are chosen by default.
If you wish to disable a variant that has been enabled by default, either by the
Portfile, or by your configuration in
variants.conf, you can
negate the variant in question by prefixing the variant name with a minus on the command line:
sudo port install apache2 -preformmpm +workermpm
This section lists common operations you may want to perform when managing a MacPorts installation. These
are the workflows you will need most while using MacPorts. We recommend you read at least this section as
a primer into how to use MacPorts. More details about the usage can be found in Section 3.1, "The port Command"
and the
port(1) manpage available by running man 1 port in
a Terminal.
Mind the "sudo" for some of the subsequent examples, which is necessary if you have a default MacPorts installation.
The local ports tree is a collection of files that contain information on which packages are available
through MacPorts and how they can be installed. You should regularly update your ports tree to get
access to updated versions of software and bug fixes. To do that, use
sudo port selfupdate
Password: ---> Updating MacPorts base sources using rsync MacPorts base version 2.6.3 installed, MacPorts base version 2.6.3 downloaded. ---> Updating the ports tree ---> MacPorts base is already the latest version The ports tree has been updated. To upgrade your installed ports, you should run port upgrade outdated
To see what's new after running
selfupdate, you can use port
outdated to generate a list of ports that have newer versions available. This can help in
estimating the time required for sudo port upgrade outdated, even though this depends
on further factors such as binary package availability and a port's build time.
port outdated
The following installed ports are outdated: gnupg 1.4.16_0 < 1.4.18_0 gnupg2 2.0.22_2 < 2.0.25_0 gpg-agent 2.0.22_1 < 2.0.25_0 gpgme 1.5.0_0 < 1.5.1_0 HexFiend 2.1.2_1 < 2.3.0_0 libksba 1.0.8_0 < 1.3.0_0 p5.16-class-methodmaker 2.180.0_1 < 2.210.0_0 p5.16-gnupg-interface 0.330.0_3 < 0.500.0_1 p5.16-ipc-run 0.910.0_1 < 0.920.0_0
To upgrade all your installed and outdated ports, run
sudo port upgrade outdated
In case you want to upgrade only a specific port (not recommended unless you know what you are doing), replace "outdated" in the command given above with the port's name:
sudo port upgrade makedepend
Password: ---> Computing dependencies for makedepend ---> Fetching makedepend ---> Attempting to fetch makedepend-1.0.3.tar.bz2 from http://lil.fr.distfiles.macports.org/makedepend ---> Verifying checksum(s) for makedepend ---> Extracting makedepend ---> Configuring makedepend ---> Building makedepend ---> Staging makedepend into destroot ---> Computing dependencies for makedepend ---> Installing makedepend @1.0.3_0 ---> Deactivating makedepend @1.0.2_0 ---> Activating makedepend @1.0.3_0 ---> Cleaning makedepend
Note that MacPorts will upgrade any dependencies of a port first before updating the port itself. So even if you request the update of a single port only, other ports may be upgraded first because they are in the dependency tree. Do not try to avoid this, as it will very likely lead to problems later on – the new version of the port you want to upgrade might require the newer dependency, or it might only have been upgraded at all to be rebuilt against the updated dependency, in which case avoiding the update of the dependency defeats the purpose of the reinstallation.
By default, upgrading ports in MacPorts does not remove the older versions. This is a safety measure to ensure you can go back to a working and tested version in case an update goes wrong. To save disk space, you should periodically uninstall any old versions you no longer need.
port installed inactive
to get a list of inactive ports you likely no longer need.
The following ports are currently installed: gnupg @1.4.16_0 gnupg2 @2.0.22_2 gpg-agent @2.0.22_1 gpgme @1.5.0_0 HexFiend @2.1.2_1 libksba @1.0.8_0 p5.16-class-methodmaker @2.180.0_1 p5.16-gnupg-interface @0.330.0_3 p5.16-ipc-run @0.910.0_1
Check the list for any ports you might still want to keep. To remove all of them at once, run
sudo port uninstall inactive
Password: ---> Uninstalling p5.16-gnupg-interface @0.330.0_3 ---> Cleaning p5.16-gnupg-interface ---> Uninstalling gnupg @1.4.16_0 ---> Cleaning gnupg ---> Uninstalling gpgme @1.5.0_0 ---> Cleaning gpgme ---> Uninstalling gnupg2 @2.0.22_2 ---> Cleaning gnupg2 ---> Uninstalling gpg-agent @2.0.22_1 ---> Cleaning gpg-agent ---> Uninstalling HexFiend @2.1.2_1 ---> Cleaning HexFiend ---> Uninstalling libksba @1.0.8_0 ---> Cleaning libksba ---> Uninstalling p5.16-class-methodmaker @2.180.0_1 ---> Cleaning p5.16-class-methodmaker ---> Uninstalling p5.16-ipc-run @0.910.0_1 ---> Cleaning p5.16-ipc-run
Of course you could also select only a specific inactive port, but that requires to specify the exact version:
sudo port uninstall HexFiend @2.1.2_1
Password: ---> Uninstalling HexFiend @2.1.2_1 ---> Cleaning HexFiend
To uninstall all inactive ports but a single one, you can use the following shortcut:
sudo port uninstall inactive and not
If you want to find all ports that depend on a given other port, you can use
port echo depends:
If you are only interested in the dependent ports that you actually have installed, you can use the
quicker and more accurate
port dependents
gnupg2 depends on libksba gpg-agent depends on libksba
MacPorts also has a recursive version of the
dependents action called
port rdependents libksba
The following ports are dependent on libksba: gnupg2 gpgme gpg-agent
Finally, to find out which port you manually installed caused the automatic installation of a dependency, use the following expression:
port installed requested and rdependentof:
port installed requested and rdependentof:libksba
The following ports are currently installed: gnupg2 @2.0.25_0 (active)
After a while of using MacPorts, installing and uninstalling ports, packages that have been
automatically installed as dependencies for other ports are left behind, even though they are no longer
necessary. Ports that have not been manually installed ("requested") and do not have any
dependents are called "leaves" and can be identified using the
pseudo-port, for example in conjunction with the
echo or
port echo leaves
git-flow @0.4.1_2 gmake @4.0_0 gpgme @1.5.1_0 hs-download-curl @0.1.4_0 pkgconfig @0.28_0 py27-docutils @0.12_0 python32 @3.2.5_0 texi2html @5.0_1 yasm @1.2.0_0
These leaves may be wanted, but are in most cases unneeded. See Section 3.3.7, "Keep Your Installation Lean by Defining Leaves as Requested Ports" to find out how to mark some of the leaves as requested. You can uninstall all leaves using
sudo port uninstall leaves
Note that the uninstallation can cause new ports to become leaves. To uninstall all leaves, you can use the
rleaves pseudo-port instead.
To go through this process interactively so you can make sure you're not uninstalling anything you want to keep,
you can install the
port_cutleaves port. After installation, run it with
sudo port_cutleaves
Well, before we come to the procedure of defining your requested ports, let's have a look at a typical scenario where you want to understand what is actually installed and what is on the other hand truly necessary for your system. Say checking leaves of your MacPorts installation gives this output:
port echo leaves
git-flow @0.4.1_2 gmake @4.0_0 gpgme @1.5.1_0 hs-download-curl @0.1.4_0 pkgconfig @0.28_0 py27-docutils @0.12_0 python32 @3.2.5_0 texi2html @5.0_1 yasm @1.2.0_0
Now it is up to the user to decide what's needed and what is not. We've noticed
pkgconfig is needed to build many ports, and while it is strictly not needed after
installation, we'd like to keep it around to avoid installing it over and over again.
texi2html, and
yasm are only needed to
mplayer2, and since that software is rarely updated, we will re-install those
ports again when they are needed. Since they are all distributable, MacPorts will use pre-built binaries
for their installation anyway, so re-installing them wouldn't take long anyway. We don't really know why
the rest of the leaves were installed, so we're just going to remove them for now.
Since we decided to keep
pkgconfig, we are going to mark it as manually installed
("requested" in MacPorts lingo) using:
sudo port setrequested pkgconfig
When you've step-by-step figured out which ports you want to keep on your system and have set them as requested, you'll have a list of unnecessary ports, which you can get rid of using
sudo port uninstall leaves
Note that uninstalling leaves may mark new ports as leaves, so you will have to repeat the process.
You can install the
port_cutleaves port, which is a special script for the job. It
allows you to interactively decide whether to keep or uninstall a port. Run it as
sudo port_cutleaves
[Leaf 1 of 8] hs-download-curl @0.1.4_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: ** hs-download-curl @0.1.4_0 will be kept. [Leaf 2 of 8] gmake @4.0_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** gmake @4.0_0 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 3 of 8] texi2html @5.0_1 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** texi2html @5.0_1 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 4 of 8] yasm @1.2.0_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** yasm @1.2.0_0 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 5 of 8] python32 @3.2.5_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** python32 @3.2.5_0 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 6 of 8] py27-docutils @0.12_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** py27-docutils @0.12_0 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 7 of 8] git-flow @0.4.1_2 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** git-flow @0.4.1_2 will be uninstalled. [Leaf 8 of 8] gpgme @1.5.1_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** gpgme @1.5.1_0 will be uninstalled. ---> Deactivating gmake @4.0_0 ---> Cleaning gmake ---> Uninstalling gmake @4.0_0 ---> Cleaning gmake ---> Deactivating texi2html @5.0_1 ---> Cleaning texi2html ---> Uninstalling texi2html @5.0_1 ---> Cleaning texi2html ---> Deactivating yasm @1.2.0_0 ---> Cleaning yasm ---> Uninstalling yasm @1.2.0_0 ---> Cleaning yasm ---> Deactivating python32 @3.2.5_0 ---> Cleaning python32 ---> Uninstalling python32 @3.2.5_0 ---> Cleaning python32 ---> Deactivating py27-docutils @0.12_0 ---> Cleaning py27-docutils ---> Uninstalling py27-docutils @0.12_0 ---> Cleaning py27-docutils ---> Deactivating git-flow @0.4.1_2 ---> Cleaning git-flow ---> Uninstalling git-flow @0.4.1_2 ---> Cleaning git-flow ---> Deactivating gpgme @1.5.1_0 ---> Cleaning gpgme ---> Uninstalling gpgme @1.5.1_0 ---> Cleaning gpgme The following ports were uninstalled: gmake @4.0_0 texi2html @5.0_1 yasm @1.2.0_0 python32 @3.2.5_0 py27-docutils @0.12_0 git-flow @0.4.1_2 gpgme @1.5.1_0 Search for new leaves? [no] / (y)es: y [Leaf 1 of 1] py27-roman @2.0.0_0 (active): [keep] / (u)ninstall / (f)lush / (a)bort: u ** py27-roman @2.0.0_0 will be uninstalled. ---> Deactivating py27-roman @2.0.0_0 ---> Cleaning py27-roman ---> Uninstalling py27-roman @2.0.0_0 ---> Cleaning py27-roman The following ports were uninstalled: py27-roman @2.0.0_0 Search for new leaves? [no] / (y)es: y There are no new leaves to process.
You can get a list of all ports you previously set as requested (or installed manually) using:
port installed requested
We recommend you check the list of leaves from time to time to keep your system free of too much "garbage". You should also periodically check the list of your requested ports and mark any ports you no longer need as unrequested using
sudo port unsetrequested
Then check for new leaves to cut down the number of installed ports and the size of your MacPorts installation.
MacPorts can pre-compile ports into binaries so applications need not be compiled when installing on a target system. MacPorts supports two types of binaries: archives and packages.
Binary archives can only be used on a target system running MacPorts. They allow MacPorts utilities to
skip the build (which is usually the phase that takes longest) and begin installation after the destroot
phase. Binary archives are automatically created whenever a port is installed, and can also be
downloaded from a server. MacPorts runs a buildbot infrastructure that creates prebuilt binary packages
for all ports in MacPorts for the default installation prefix. Buildbots exist for systems later or
equal to Snow Leopard. If a port builds successfully and its license and those of its dependencies allow
binary redistribution, the archives are uploaded to
packages.macports.org and will be
automatically used by MacPorts during installation.
You can manually create an archive (and see debug output for its creation) using
sudo port -d archive logrotate
---> Installing logrotate @3.8.6_2+gzip […] DEBUG: Creating logrotate-3.8.6_2+gzip.darwin_13.x86_64.tbz2 […] a . a ./+COMMENT a ./+CONTENTS a ./+DESC a ./+PORTFILE a ./+STATE a ./opt a ./opt/local a ./opt/local/etc a ./opt/local/sbin a ./opt/local/share a ./opt/local/var a ./opt/local/var/run a ./opt/local/var/run/logrotate a ./opt/local/var/run/logrotate/.turd_logrotate a ./opt/local/share/logrotate a ./opt/local/share/man a ./opt/local/share/man/man5 a ./opt/local/share/man/man8 a ./opt/local/share/man/man8/logrotate.8.gz a ./opt/local/share/man/man5/logrotate.conf.5.gz a ./opt/local/share/logrotate/CHANGES a ./opt/local/share/logrotate/COPYING a ./opt/local/share/logrotate/logrotate.conf.example a ./opt/local/share/logrotate/org.macports.logrotate.plist.example a ./opt/local/sbin/logrotate a ./opt/local/etc/logrotate.d a ./opt/local/etc/logrotate.d/.turd_logrotate DEBUG: Archive logrotate-3.8.6_2+gzip.darwin_13.x86_64.tbz2 packaged
Binary archive files are placed in
${prefix}/var/macports/software/. The archive
file type is set in
macports.conf using the
portarchivetype key. The default format is
tbz2; other options are:
cpgz, and
Binary packages are standalone binary installers that are precompiled; they do not require MacPorts on
the target system. As such, they are helpful in generating disk images or installers to be redistributed
to users without relying on MacPorts for installation. Binary installers created with MacPorts are
.pkg (macOS Installer packages). MacPorts can also convert
.pkg package into a macOS
.dmg disk image. You can create binary
packages using port as shown in the following examples.
If you want to create installer packages using MacPorts for redistribution, make sure you do not
use a standard installation of MacPorts in
/opt/local. If you do that, your
installer package conflicts with MacPorts on systems that do have MacPorts
Instead, follow Section 2.2.4, "Install Multiple MacPorts Copies" and choose a prefix specific
to the software you are trying to package, e.g.,
/opt/logrotate for
logrotate. Then use this custom MacPorts installation to build your package.
Create a macOS
.pkg installer for the
pstree port:
sudo port pkg pstree
You may also create a macOS
.dmg disk image file instead:
sudo port dmg pstree
In most cases you probably want to package a port and all its library and runtime dependencies in a single package. You can use a metapackage to do this. Create one using:
sudo port mpkg gimp2
Just as with a single package, a metapackage can also be wrapped in a
sudo port mdmg gimp2
All packages are placed in a port's work directory, which you can locate using:
port work
A port is a distribution of software that can be compiled and
installed using MacPorts. A
Portfile describes all
the required steps such as where to get the source code from upstream,
which patches have to be applied and which other tools and commands are
required to build the source code.
Each port consists of multiple files in a directory, usually within
a category subdirectory of the root of a ports tree. The MacPorts
Project distributes the main ports tree that is by default
in all installations of MacPorts. This section serves as a reference for
the directory structure of a single port and the layout of the files
within. The only required file in a port is the
A MacPorts Portfile is a Tcl script that usually contains only the simple keyword/value combinations and Tcl extensions as described in the Portfile Reference chapter, though it may also contain arbitrary Tcl code. Every port has a corresponding Portfile, but Portfiles do not completely define a port's installation behavior since MacPorts base has default port installation characteristics coded within it. Therefore Portfiles need only specify required options, though some ports may require non-default options.
A common way for Portfiles to augment or override MacPorts base
default installation phase characteristics is by using
Portfile phase declaration(s). If you use Portfile
phase declaration(s), you should know how to identify the
"global" section of a Portfile. Any statements not contained
within a phase declaration, no matter where they are located in a Portfile,
are said to be in the global section of the Portfile; therefore the global
section need not be contiguous. Likewise, to remove statements from the
global section they must be placed within a phase declaration.
The main phases you need to be aware of when making a Portfile are these:
The default installation phase behavior performed by the MacPorts base works fine for applications that use the standard configure, make, and make install steps, which conform to phases configure, build, and destroot respectively. For applications that do not conform to this standard behavior, any installation phase may be augmented using pre- and/or post- phases, or even overridden or eliminated. See Example Portfiles below.
For a detailed description of all port phases, see the Portfile Reference chapter.
Here we list the individual Portfile components for an application that conforms to the standard configure, make, and make install steps of most open source application installs.
This should be the first line of a Portfile. It sets the correct editing options for vim and emacs. See Port Style for more information. Its use is optional and up to the port maintainer.
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4
PortSystem line
This statement is required for all ports.
PortSystem 1.0
Port name
name rrdtool
Port version
version 1.2.23
Port categories
A port may belong to more than one category, but the first (primary) category should match the directory name in the ports tree where the Portfile is to reside.
categories net
Platform statement
platforms darwin
Port maintainers
A port's maintainers are the people who have agreed to take
responsibility for keeping the port up-to-date. The
maintainers keyword lists the maintainers' GitHub
usernames or email addresses, preferably in the obfuscated form which
hides them from spambots. For more, see the full explanation of the
keyword in the Global
Keywords section of the Portfile
Reference chapter.
maintainers @neverpanic \ jdoe \ example.org:julesverne
Port description
description Round Robin Database
Port long_description
long_description RRDtool is a system to store and display time-series \ data
A port's application homepage
homepage https://people.ee.ethz.ch/~oetiker/webtools/rrdtool/
A port's download URLs
master_sites https://oss.oetiker.ch/rrdtool/pub/ \ ftp://ftp.pucpr.br/rrdtool/
Port checksums
The checksums specified in a Portfile are checked with the fetched tarball for security. For the best security, use rmd160 and sha256 checksum types. Checksums should also include the target file's size.
checksums rmd160 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a \ sha256 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa53 \ size 1061530
To find the correct checksums for a port's distribution file, follow one of these examples:
openssl dgst -rmd160 rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz
openssl dgst -sha256 rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz
RIPEMD160( ... rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz)= 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a SHA256( ... rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz)= 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa53
or update the version in the Portfile:
sudo port edit rrdtool
and run:
port -v checksum rrdtool
---> Fetching distfiles for rrdtool ---> Verifying checksums for rrdtool ---> Checksumming rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz Error: Checksum (rmd160) mismatch for rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz Portfile checksum: rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz rmd160 ...WRONGCHECKSUM... Distfile checksum: rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz rmd160 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a Error: Checksum (sha256) mismatch for rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz Portfile checksum: rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz sha256 ...WRONGCHECKSUM... Distfile checksum: rrdtool-1.2.23.tar.gz sha256 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa53 The correct checksum line may be: checksums rmd160 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a \ sha256 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa5 Error: Failed to checksum rrdtool: Unable to verify file checksums Error: See ...SOMEPATH.../rrdtool/main.log for details. Error: Follow https://guide.macports.org/#project.tickets to report a bug. Error: Processing of port rrdtool failed
Port dependencies
A port's dependencies are ports that must be installed before another port is installed.
depends_lib port:perl5.8 \ port:tcl \ port:zlib
Port configure arguments (optional)
configure.args --enable-perl-site-install \ --mandir=${prefix}/share/man
In this section we begin by taking a look at a complete simple Portfile; then we see how to augment default phases by defining pre- and post- phases, how to override default phases, and finally how to eliminate port phases.
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4 PortSystem 1.0 name rrdtool version 1.2.23 categories net platforms darwin license GPL-2+ maintainers julesverne description Round Robin Database long_description RRDtool is a system to store and display time-series data homepage https://people.ee.ethz.ch/~oetiker/webtools/rrdtool/ master_sites https://oss.oetiker.ch/rrdtool/pub/ \ ftp://ftp.pucpr.br/rrdtool/ checksums rmd160 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a \ sha256 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa53 \ size 1061530 depends_lib path:bin/perl:perl5 \ port:tcl \ port:zlib configure.args --enable-perl-site-install \ --mandir=${prefix}/share/man
To augment a port's installation phase, and not override it, you may use pre- and post- installation phases as shown in this example.
post-destroot { # Install example files not installed by the Makefile file mkdir ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}/examples file copy ${worksrcpath}/examples/ \ ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}/examples }
To override the automatic MacPorts installation phase processing, define your own installation phases as shown in this example.
destroot { xinstall -m 755 -d ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name} xinstall -m 755 ${worksrcpath}/README ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name} }
To eliminate a default phase, simply define a phase with no contents as shown.
build {}
Because many software packages do not use
configure, a keyword is provided to eliminate the
configure phase. Another exception is the
destroot phase may not be eliminated. See the
chapter Portfile Reference for full
Startupitems may be placed in the global section of a Portfile.
startupitem.create yes startupitem.name nmicmpd startupitem.executable "${prefix}/bin/nmicmpd"
Variants are a way for port authors to provide options that may be invoked at install time. They are declared in the global section of a Portfile using the "variant" keyword, and should include carefully chosen variant descriptions.
The most common actions for user-selected variants is to add or remove dependencies, configure arguments, and build arguments according to various options a port author wishes to provide. Here is an example of several variants that modify depends_lib and configure arguments for a port.
variant fastcgi description {Add fastcgi binary} { configure.args-append \ --enable-fastcgi \ --enable-force-cgi-redirect \ --enable-memory-limit } variant gmp description {Add GNU MP functions} { depends_lib-append port:gmp configure.args-append --with-gmp=${prefix} } variant sqlite description {Build sqlite support} { depends_lib-append \ port:sqlite3 configure.args-delete \ --without-sqlite \ --without-pdo-sqlite configure.args-append \ --with-sqlite \ --with-pdo-sqlite=${prefix} \ --enable-sqlite-utf8 }
Variant names may contain only the characters A-Z, a-z, and the underscore character "_". Therefore, take care to never use hyphens in variant names.
In the example variant declaration below, the configure argument
--without-x is removed and a number of others are
variant x11 description {Builds port as an X11 program with Lucid widgets} { configure.args-delete --without-x configure.args-append --with-x-toolkit=lucid \ --without-carbon \ --with-xpm \ --with-jpeg \ --with-tiff \ --with-gif \ --with-png depends_lib-append lib:libX11:XFree86 \ lib:libXpm:XFree86 \ port:jpeg \ port:tiff \ port:libungif \ port:libpng }
If a variant requires options in addition to those provided by keywords using -append and/or -delete, in other words, any actions that would normally take place within a port installation phase, do not try to do this within the variant declaration. Rather, modify the behavior of any affected phases when the variant is invoked using the variant_isset keyword.
post-destroot { xinstall -m 755 -d ${destroot}${prefix}/etc/ xinstall ${worksrcpath}/examples/foo.conf \ ${destroot}${prefix}/etc/ if {[variant_isset carbon]} { delete ${destroot}${prefix}/bin/emacs delete ${destroot}${prefix}/bin/emacs-${version} } }
Variants are used to specify actions that lie outside the core functions of an application or port, but there may be some cases where you wish to specify these non-core functions by default. For this purpose you may use the keyword default_variants.
default_variants +foo +bar
The default_variant keyword may only be used in the global Portfile section.
Patch files are files created with the Unix command diff that are applied using the command patch to modify text files to fix bugs or extend functionality.
If you wish to contribute modifications or fixes to a Portfile, you should do so in the form of a patch. Follow the steps below to create Portfile patch files
Make a copy of the Portfile you wish to modify; both files must be in the same directory, though it may be any directory.
cp -p Portfile Portfile.orig
Edit the file to make it as you want it to be after it is fetched.
Now use the Unix command diff -u to create a "unified" diff patch file. Put the name of the port in the patchfile, for example, Portfile-rrdtool.diff.
diff -u Portfile.orig Portfile > Portfile-rrdtool.diff
A patch file that is a "unified" diff file is the easiest to interpret by humans and this type should always be used for ports. The Portfile patch below will change the version and checksums when applied.
--- Portfile.orig 2011-07-25 18:52:12.000000000 -0700 +++ Portfile 2011-07-25 18:53:35.000000000 -0700 @@ -2,7 +2,7 @@ PortSystem 1.0 name foo -version 1.3.0 +version 1.4.0 categories net maintainers nomaintainer description A network monitoring daemon. @@ -13,9 +13,9 @@ homepage http://rsug.itd.umich.edu/software/${name} master_sites ${homepage}/files/ -checksums rmd160 f0953b21cdb5eb327e40d4b215110b71 +checksums rmd160 01532e67a596bfff6a54aa36face26ae extract.suffix .tgz platforms darwin
Now you may attach the patch file to a MacPorts Trac ticket for the port author to evaluate.
Necessary or useful patches to application source code should generally be sent to the application developer rather than the port author so the modifications may be included in the next version of the application.
Generally speaking, you should create one patch file for each
logical change that needs to be applied. Patchfile filenames should
uniquely distinguish the file and generally be of the form
where the
identifier is a reference to the
problem or bug it is supposed to solve. An example filename would be
To create a patch to modify a single file, follow the steps below.
Locate the file you wish to patch in its original location within the unpacked source directory and make a duplicate of it.
cd ~/Downloads/foo-1.34/src
cp -p Makefile.in Makefile.in.orig
Edit the file and modify the text to reflect your corrections.
Now cd to the top-level directory of the unpacked source, and use the Unix command diff -u to create a "unified" diff patch file.
cd ~/Downloads/foo-1.34
diff -u src/Makefile.in.orig src/Makefile.in > patch-destdir-variable-fix.diff
You should execute diff from
the top-level directory of the unpacked source code, because during
the patch phase MacPorts by default uses the patch argument
-p0, which does not strip prefixes with any leading
slashes from file names found in the patch file (as opposed to
-p1 that strips one, etc), and any path not
relative to the top-level directory of the unpacked source will fail
during the patch phase.
If you find an existing source file patch you wish to use
that contains leading path information (diff was executed from a
directory higher than the top-level source directory), you will
need to use the patch phase
patch.pre_args to specify a
-px value for how many prefixes with leading
slashes are to be stripped off.
A patch file that is a "unified" diff file is the
easiest to interpret by humans and this type should always be used
for ports. See the example below where a patch adds
DESTDIR support to
--- src/Makefile.in.orig 2007-06-01 16:30:47.000000000 -0700 +++ src/Makefile.in 2007-06-20 10:10:59.000000000 -0700 @@ -131,23 +131,23 @@ $(INSTALL_DATA)/gdata $(INSTALL_DATA)/perl install-lib: - -mkdir -p $(INSTALL_LIB) + -mkdir -p $(DESTDIR)$(INSTALL_LIB) $(PERL) tools/install_lib -s src -l $(INSTALL_LIB) $(LIBS) - cp $(TEXT) $(INSTALL_LIB)/ + cp $(TEXT) $(DESTDIR)$(INSTALL_LIB)/
Place the patch
patch-destdir-variable-fix.diff in the directory
${portpath}/files and use it in a port using
patchfiles keyword.
may be in a local Portfile repository during development, or
files/ may be in a port's
${portpath} in the global MacPorts
patchfiles patch-destdir-variable-fix.diff
MacPorts applies patch files automatically, but you may want to know how to apply patch files manually if you want to test patch files you have created or you wish to apply uncommitted Portfile patches.
Change to the directory containing the file to be patched. In this example, we'll apply a Portfile patch to the postfix port.
cd $(port dir postfix)
Now apply the patch from your Downloads folder, or wherever you put it. The patchfile knows the name of the file to be patched.
patch -p0 < ~/Downloads/Portfile-postfix.diff
patching file Portfile
To create and test Portfiles that are not yet published in the MacPorts ports tree,
you may create a local Portfile repository as shown. Replace the hypothetical user
julesverne with your username in the example below.
sources.conf in a text
editor. For example, to open it into TextEdit:
open -e ${prefix}/etc/macports/sources.conf
Insert a URL pointing to your local repository location before the rsync URL as shown.
file:///Users/julesverne/ports rsync://rsync.macports.org/macports/release/tarballs/ports.tar [default]
The file URL should always appear before the rsync URL so that local Portfiles can be tested that are duplicated in the MacPorts tree, because port will always operate on the first Portfile it encounters.
Place the Portfiles you create inside a directory whose name matches the port, which should in turn be placed inside a directory that reflects the port's primary category (the first category entry in the Portfile). For example, to create the directory for a hypothetical port "bestevergame" and to begin editing its Portfile in TextEdit, you can use these commands:
mkdir -p ~/ports/games/bestevergame
cd ~/ports/games/bestevergame
touch Portfile
open -e Portfile
See other sections in the Guide for help writing Portfiles. If you've already written the Portfile elsewhere, you can instead copy the Portfile into this directory.
If your Portfile needs to apply any patches to the port's source
files, create a
files directory and place the
patchfiles in it, and reference the patchfiles in your Portfile, as
explained in
Creating Source Code Patches.
After you create or update your Portfile, use portindex in the local repository's directory to create or update the index of the ports in your local repository.
cd ~/ports%%
Creating software index in /Users/julesverne/ports Adding port games/bestevergame Total number of ports parsed: 1 Ports successfully parsed: 1 Ports failed: 0
Once the local port is added to the
it becomes available for searching or installation as with any other
Portfile in the MacPorts tree:
port search bestever
bestevergame @1.1 (games) The Best Ever Game
This section contains practical guidelines for creating Portfiles that install smoothly and provide consistency between ports. The following sections are on the TODO list.
Portfiles may be thought of as a set of declarations rather than a piece of code. It is best to format the port file is if it were a table consisting of keys and values. In fact, the simplest of ports will only contain a small block of values. Nicely formatted compact tables will result in more values being visible at the same time.
The two columns should be separated by spaces (not tabs), so you should set your editor to use soft tabs, which are tabs emulated by spaces. By default, the top line of all Portfiles should use a modeline that defines soft tabs for the vim and emacs editors as shown.
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4
The left column should consist of single words, and will be separated from the more complex right side by spaces in multiples of four. Variable assignments and variant declarations are exceptions, and may be considered a single word on the left side, with a single space between words.
set libver "8.5"
When items require multiple lines with line continuation, they can be separated from the previous and next items with a blank line. Indent the additional lines to the same column that the right side begins on in the first line.
checksums rmd160 7bbfce4fecc2a8e1ca081169e70c1a298ab1b75a \ sha256 2829fcb7393bac85925090b286b1f9c3cd3fbbf8e7f35796ef4131322509aa53 \ size 1061530
Should a key item such as a phase or variant require braces, the opening brace should appear on the same line and the closing brace should be on its own line. The block formed by the braces is indented for visual clearance. Braces merely quoting strings, for example the description of variants, are placed on the same line without line breaks.
variant mysql5 description {Enable support for MySQL 5} { depends_lib-append port:mysql5 configure.args-replace --without-mysql5 --with-mysql5 }
Frequently multiple items are necessary in the second column. For
example, to set multiple source download locations, multiple
master_sites must be defined. Unless the second column
items are few and short you should place each additional item on a new
line and separate lines with a backslash. Indent the lines after the
first line to make it clear the items are second column values and also
to emphasize the unity of the block.
destroot.keepdirs ${destroot}${prefix}/var/run \ ${destroot}${prefix}/var/log \ ${destroot}${prefix}/var/cache/mrtg
TODO: Set variables so changing paths may be done in one place; use them anytime it makes updates simpler: distname ${name}-src-${version}
If there is the need to replace a port with another port or a
renaming is necessary for some reason, the port should be marked as
As an illustration of a typical workflow the port "skrooge-devel" shall be taken. This port had been used for testing new versions of skrooge, but it turned out to have become unnecessary due to the fact that skrooge's developers currently prefer a distribution via port "skrooge" instead.
At the end of this section the use of the obsolete PortGroup is suggested as an even shorter approach to the below described workflow.
Skrooge's original devel port file looked like this:
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4 PortSystem 1.0 PortGroup kde4 1.1 fetch.type svn svn.url svn://anonsvn.kde.org/home/kde/trunk/extragear/office/skrooge svn.revision 1215845 name skrooge-devel version 0.8.0-${svn.revision} categories kde finance maintainers mk pixilla openmaintainer description Skrooge long_description Personal finance management tool for KDE4, with the aim of being highly intuitive, while \ providing powerful functions such as reporting (including graphics), persistent \ Undo/Redo, encryption, and much more... conflicts skrooge platforms darwin license GPL-3 homepage https://skrooge.org master_sites https://skrooge.org/files/ livecheck.type none distname skrooge depends_lib-append port:kdelibs4 \ port:libofx \ port:qca-ossl \ port:kdebase4-runtime \ port:oxygen-icons
The following steps have to be taken to ensure a smooth transition
for a MacPorts user updating his local installation using
sudo port upgrade:
add the line
replaced_by foo where foo is the
port this one is replaced by; when a user upgrades this port,
MacPorts will instead install the replacement port
replaced_by skrooge
increase the version, revision, or epoch, so that users who
have this port installed will get notice in
outdated that they should upgrade it and trigger the above
revision 1
clear distfiles (have a line reading only
distfiles) so that no distfile is downloaded for this
stub port
delete master_sites since there aren't any distfiles to download
disable livecheck
livecheck.type none
add a pre-configure block with a
ui_error and
return -code error explaining to users who try to
install this port that the port has been replaced
pre-configure { ui_error "Please do not install this port since it has been replaced by 'skrooge'." return -code error }
With above modifications the port file eventually looks like this:
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4 PortSystem 1.0 name skrooge-devel svn.revision 1215845 version 0.8.0-${svn.revision} revision 1 replaced_by skrooge categories kde finance maintainers mk pixilla openmaintainer description Skrooge long_description Personal finance management tool for KDE4, with the aim of being highly intuitive, while \ providing powerful functions such as reporting (including graphics), persistent \ Undo/Redo, encryption, and much more... platforms darwin license GPL-3 homepage https://skrooge.org livecheck.type none pre-configure { ui_error "Please do not install this port since it has been replaced by 'skrooge'." return -code error } distfiles
A user upgrading ports will experience the following for port "skrooge-devel":
sudo port upgrade skrooge-devel
---> skrooge-devel is replaced by skrooge ---> Computing dependencies for skrooge ---> Fetching skrooge ---> Verifying checksum(s) for skrooge ---> Extracting skrooge ---> Configuring skrooge ---> Building skrooge ---> Staging skrooge into destroot ---> Deactivating skrooge-devel @0.8.0-1215845_0 ---> Cleaning skrooge-devel ---> Computing dependencies for skrooge ---> Installing skrooge @0.8.0.6_0 ---> Activating skrooge @0.8.0.6_0 ########################################################## # Don't forget that dbus needs to be started as the local # user (not with sudo) before any KDE programs will launch # To start it run the following command: # launchctl load /Library/LaunchAgents/org.freedesktop.dbus-session.plist ########################################################## ###################################################### # Programs will not start until you run the command # 'sudo chown -R $USER ~/Library/Preferences/KDE' # replacing $USER with your username. ###################################################### ---> Cleaning skrooge
In case a user actually tries to install the obsolete port "skrooge-devel" it would be pointed out by an error message that this is impossible now:
sudo port install skrooge-devel
---> Fetching skrooge-devel ---> Verifying checksum(s) for skrooge-devel ---> Extracting skrooge-devel ---> Configuring skrooge-devel Error: Please do not install this port since it has been replaced by 'skrooge'. Error: Target org.macports.configure returned: Log for skrooge-devel is at: /opt/local/var/macports/logs/_opt_local_var_macports_sources_rsync.macports.org_release_ports_kde_skrooge-devel/main.log Error: Status 1 encountered during processing. To report a bug, see <https://guide.macports.org/#project.tickets>
Using the PortGroup obsolete makes the task described in the previous subsection much easier:
# -*- coding: utf-8; mode: tcl; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- vim:fenc=utf-8:ft=tcl:et:sw=4:ts=4:sts=4 PortSystem 1.0 PortGroup obsolete 1.0 name skrooge-devel replaced_by skrooge svn.revision 1215845 version 0.8.0-${svn.revision} revision 2 categories kde finance
The PortGroup defines a number of reasonable defaults for a port that is only
there to inform users that they should uninstall it and install something else
instead. You might want to override some of the defaults though. For details have
a look at the PortGroup's source code in
replaced_by can be specified before or after the
PortGroup line.
If a port has to be removed from MacPorts one should consider the hints concerning replacing it by some alternative port given above. It is recommended to wait one year before the port directory is actually removed from the MacPorts ports tree.
If there is no replacement for a port, it can simply be deleted immediately.
The buildbot is a port build service which builds ports using the MacPorts Buildbot (MPBB) scripts.
Every time a maintainer commits changes to MacPorts' ports Git repository the buildbot will check whether a rebuild of the corresponding port(s) would be necessary. If the port(s) in question are distributable their binary archives will be kept for subsequent distribution for all versions of the Mac operating system for which build machines are available. See the list of builders to find out which platforms these currently are.
If a build error occurred for a port its maintainer will be informed via an email so that problems which did not surface on the maintainer's machine will not go unnoticed. Port maintainers will find the waterfall and the builders views most useful since they give information about the build status and offer the possibility to build one's port(s) on specific builders.
Thus the buildbot helps to keep MacPorts consistent on various macOS versions, i.e., a maintainer does not need access to these versions anymore in order to assure that the port(s) maintained build without problems. Currently only the default port variants will be built and kept.
This chapter serves as a reference for the major elements of a Portfile: port phases, dependencies, StartupItems, variables, keywords, and Tcl extensions.
MacPorts keywords are used to specify required or optional items within a Portfile, or to override default options used by MacPorts base for individual ports. Keywords are to be used within the "global" and "variant" sections of Portfiles, and not within optional port phase declarations.
The global keywords listed below specify information for ports as a whole, whereas the keywords listed under a port phase specify information to be used during a particular installation phase.
The first non-comment line of every Portfile; it should be followed by PortGroup inclusions (if any) and then a blank line. It defines which version of the Portfile interpreter will be used. (There is currently only one version.)
PortSystem 1.0
The name of the port. To avoid special interpretation by shells and the like, names should contain only alphanumeric characters, underscores, dashes or dots. For projects whose proper names contain "+" characters, change these to "x" (e.g., "libstdc++" becomes "libstdcxx").
name foo
The version of the ported software.
version 1.23.45
Optional keyword (default is 0) that is used to track port revisions. It should not be incremented for port revisions unless it would benefit users to upgrade an installed port, and cleared when the port is updated to a newer version.
It should be used if a bug in the Portfile was found and all installations of this port have to be updated. If the change only affects new installations, there is no need to increase it.
revision 1
An optional keyword (default value is 0) that must be used when a port is updated to a version that is numerically less than the previous version, for example 1.10 -> 1.2 or 20070928 -> 1.0. Some Portfile authors have used large epoch values that look like a date, but there is no reason to do so. The epoch is simply an unsigned integer, and the only requirement is that it never be decreased. Remember that once set, it can never be removed because it takes precedence over version and revision.
epoch 1
An epoch is not needed for most ports. If a port's version numbers advance in normal dotted-decimal sequence, there is no reason to add an epoch.
The category under which the ported software falls. The first category should be the same as the directory within which the Portfile is stored; secondary and tertiary categories may be selected.
categories net security
A port's maintainers are the people who have agreed to take
responsibility for keeping the port up-to-date. Most ports have only
a single maintainer, but some ports have two or more co-maintainers.
maintainers keyword lists the maintainers'
GitHub usernames or email addresses. GitHub usernames start with an
@ symbol. Email addresses are preferably listed in
the obfuscated form below to hide them from spambots:
For addresses in domain @macports.org, simply omit the domain name.
For addresses in other domains, e.g.,
<email@example.com>, use the convention
example.org:account to specify the
In the example below, the port is maintained by a GitHub user
named neverpanic, and the owners of the two email addresses
<email@example.com> and
maintainers @neverpanic \ jdoe \ example.org:julesverne
Braces can be used to express that these refer to the same
person, for example the GitHub username and an email. In the
following example, the port is maintained by a GitHub user named
jverne, that can also be contacted directly at
maintainers {@jverne example.org:julesverne}
The address
nomaintainer designates a port that
is not maintained by anybody and may be modified by any committer.
Feel free to claim maintainership of a nomaintainer port if
desired. The address
openmaintainer designates
a port that has a maintainer who allows minor changes to be
committed without his or her prior approval. Port maintainers who
are not committers are encouraged to add
openmaintainer to their ports.
A one-sentence description of the ported software.
description A classic shooter arcade game.
A long description of the ported software. Break long lines with escaped newlines.
long_description A classic shooter arcade game derived from \ the game alien-munchers. Not suitable for \ children under two years old.
Port application's homepage.
homepage https://www.example.org/apps
A list of the platforms on which the port has been tested.
Required, but not interpreted in any way by the software at this time; it is purely informational for users.
Possible values:
darwin (=
macosx or
In general, it can just be set to
darwin. (
puredarwin is an OS based on Apple's
open-source Darwin releases without any of Apple's proprietary bits.) See also
platforms darwin
The CPU architectures for which this port can be built. Archs currently
supported by macOS are: i386, ppc, ppc64, x86_64. If this option is not
set, it is assumed that the port can build for all archs. If a port does not
install any architecture-specific files, use the special value
If the building architecture isn't among supported_archs, port fails with an error message, except when building on x86_64 and supported_archs contains i386 or when building on ppc64 and supported_archs contains ppc, in which case the port will be built in 32-bit mode.
supported_archs i386 ppc
supported_archs noarch
The proper format for license consists of the license name, followed by a hyphen and number if indicating a specific version. A space should be placed between licenses if there is more than one that applies. If an element in the license list is itself a list, it is interpreted as offering a choice of any one of the licenses in the sub-list.
If the version number is a ".0" version, the ".0" should be omitted to make the version an integer. If the author gives the choice of using a given license or "any later version" of it, append a plus sign (+) to the version number. If the version specified in this case is also the earliest version, just leave out the version number entirely since it implies all versions.
license GPL-3
license {freetype GPL}
By default, it is assumed that ports may use libraries or headers from their dependencies and thus form a derivative work. A dependency with an incompatible license thus prevents the port from being distributed in binary form. If a dependency with an incompatible license is not used in such a way that a derivative work is formed, or should not prevent binary distribution for any other reason, add its name to this list.
license_noconflict openssl
license_noconflict readline gdbm
Available in 2.6.0 and later. By default, it is assumed on
macOS that ports will not need tools from Xcode.app unless (1)
Command Line Tools aren't installed, (2) you are on an old version
of Mac OS X that does not support the xcode-select mechanism, or (3)
the port uses
build.type xcode or includes the
xcode PortGroup. If a port needs to use Xcode (i.e.,
xcodebuild) in any way,
use_xcode yes should be set or
the port should include the xcode PortGroup. The environment
variable DEVELOPER_DIR is now exported during all build phases, set
to the value of
${configure.developer_dir} which may be
the directory of Xcode or CLT depending on use_xcode. This means
that libxcselect shims (i.e., /usr/bin/clang) will resolve to
Xcode/CLT. Build systems that ignore the environment may
accidentally use Xcode which will cause a failure in trace mode.
use_xcode no
use_xcode yes
Global variables are variables available to any Portfile. For a list of additional variables available to ports that are assigned to a MacPorts Portgroup, see portgroup(7).
All of these variables except
prefix are
Installation prefix, set at compile time and displayed in
${prefix}/etc/macports/macports.conf —- may be
overridden on a per-port basis, for example to install into a
wholly-contained subdirectory of ${prefix}, but most ports should
have no reason to do so.
Path to the MacPorts Tcl libraries.
Full path to the Portfile of the port being executed. Portfile repositories are defined in the file sources.conf.
Path to files directory relative to
Full path to files directory.
Full path to work directory.
Full path to extracted source code.
Full path into which software will be destrooted.
Location to store downloaded distfiles.
The Unix user at the time of port installation.
The Unix group at the time of port installation.
The underlying operating system platform (e.g., "darwin" on macOS, "freebsd", etc.).
The hardware architecture -- either "powerpc" or "i386".
The version number of the host operating system (e.g., "12.3.0" for Darwin 12.3.0 a.k.a. OS X 10.8.3).
Endianness of the processor -- either "big" (on PowerPC systems) or "little" (on Intel systems).
The major version number of the host operating system (e.g., "12" for Darwin 12.x).
The MacPorts port installation process has a number of distinct phases that are described in detail in this section. The default scripts coded into MacPorts base performs the standard configure, make, and make install steps. For applications that do not conform to this standard, installation phases may be declared in a Portfile to augment or override the default behavior as described in the Portfile Development chapter.
Fetch the
${distfiles} from
${master_sites} and place it in
${checksums} specified in a
Portfile to the checksums of the fetched
Unzip and untar the
${distfiles} into the
path ${prefix}/var/macports/build/..../work
Apply optional patch files
specified in
${patchfiles} to modify a port's
source code file(s).
${configure.cmd} in
${build.cmd} in
Execute commands to run test suites bundled with a port, available only for a fraction of ports. This is an optional phase, run only if port test is executed, and always works with a build from source, not a binary. A failure is only for the user's information, and does not block a subsequent installation from the build.
Execute the command make install
Using a
variable is a part of standard GNU coding practices, and
this variable must be supported in an application's install
routines for MacPorts' destroot phase to work without manual
Portfile scripting or source patching. Urge developers to fully
DESTDIR in their applications.
Understanding the destroot phase is critical to understanding MacPorts, because, unlike some package management systems, MacPorts "stages" an installation into an intermediate location, not the final file destination. MacPorts uses the destroot phase to provide:
Port uninstalls - a port's files may be cleanly uninstalled because all files and directories are recorded during install.
Multiple port versions may be installed on the same host,
since a port's files are not directly inserted into
${prefix} but rather hard-linked into
${prefix} from an intermediate location
during a later activation phase.
Any empty directories in
${destroot} upon
completion of the destroot phase are removed unless a directory name
is placed in the value field of the optional
destroot.keepdirs keyword.
Archive a port's destrooted files into
${prefix}/var/macports/software. See Port Images in the MacPorts Internals chapter for
Extract the port's files from the archive in
${prefix}/var/macports/software to
their final installed locations, usually inside
MacPorts keywords are used to specify required or optional items within a Portfile, or to override default options used by MacPorts base for individual ports. Keywords are to be used within the "global" and "variant" sections of Portfiles, and not within optional port phase declarations.
In other words, port phase keywords are not located within port phase declarations, but rather they refer to port phases and set options for those phases, and they take effect whether or not phase declarations have been explicitly defined in a Portfile.
Keyword list modifiers are keywords that end in -append, -delete or -replace. Keywords that support list modifiers are identified under appropriate reference sections below.
-append adds a value to the keyword, -delete removes a previously added item. -replace takes two arguments and replaces the first value from the keyword with the second value. -strsed treats the keyword value as a string and filters it through strsed using the given pattern. There is also a deprecated syntax for -replace which takes only one argument and behaves the same as -strsed.
Keyword list modifiers are most frequently used for these three purposes:
Preserve configure defaults set by a previously executed Portfile keyword or by MacPorts base
MacPorts base sets the gcc compiler flags CFLAGS and LDFLAGS
for all ports using
configure.cflags and
configure.ldflags, therefore to keep from
overwriting the default compiler flags use
configure.cflags-append and
Preserve PortGroup Dependencies
Ports in a PortGroup have default library dependencies set by
MacPorts base. Therefore, never use
in ports belonging to a PortGroup or it will overwrite the default
library dependencies. Instead, use
Add or Delete Items for Variants
When a variant requires more or fewer dependencies, distfiles, or patchfiles, when the variant is invoked you want to add or remove items to the appropriate keyword values list set in the global section of the Portfile. Use the appropriate keywords, for example:
depends_lib-append or
depends_lib-delete or
distfiles-append or
distfiles-delete or
patchfiles-append or
patchfiles-delete or
Keywords that support pre_args and post_args are used to assemble
command strings together in a row, as described in the reference
sections below. But it should be noted that all keyword argument
modifiers implicitly support keyword list modifiers. For example, the
configure.pre_args also supports
configure.pre_args-append and
The list of keywords related to the fetch phase.
A list of URLs from which a port's
${distfiles} may be retrieved.
Keyword values for
master_sites may include
predefined site lists known as "mirrors", such as
sourceforge, gnu, etc. The file(s) declared in
will be fetched from one of the locations defined in
master_sites, while trying to find the best reachable
mirror for the user's connection.
For a complete list of mirrors and their list of sites, see
the file
mirror_sites.tcl located in
_resources/port1.0/fetch/ in the ports tree.
If a
master_sites keyword has multiple values,
after any mirrors are expanded the list of sites is sorted by ping
response times. The sites are then tried in sorted order until
${distfiles} are found.
none (but the
mirror is always implicitly appended)
master_sites https://www.example.org/files/ \ https://mirror.example.org/example_org/files/
You may also use mirror site lists predefined by MacPorts. Here the sourceforge, gnu, and freebsd mirrors are used.
master_sites sourceforge gnu freebsd
When using mirror master_sites, the subdirectory
${name} is checked on every mirror. If the
mirror subdirectory does not match ${name}, then you may specify
it using after the mirror separated by a colon.
master_sites sourceforge:widget \ gnu:widget
For ports that must fetch multiple download files from
different locations, you must label the files with tags and
match the tags to a
distfiles keyword. The
format is
In the example below, file_one.tar.gz is fetched from
sourceforge mirrors in subdirectory
file tagtwo.tar.gz is fetched from the gnu mirrors in
subdirectory sources.
master_sites sourceforge::tagone \ gnu:sources:tagtwo distfiles file_one.tar.gz:tagone \ file_two.tar.gz:tagtwo
Subdirectory to append to all mirror sites for any list
specified in
master_sites.mirror_subdir magic
A list of sites from which a port's patchfiles may be downloaded, where applicable.
patch_sites ftp://ftp.patchcityrepo.com/pub/magic/patches
Subdirectory to append to all mirror sites for any list
specified in
patch_sites.mirror_subdir magic
The name of the distribution filename, not including the extract suffix (see below).
distname ${name}
The full distribution filename, including the extract suffix. Used to specify non-default distribution filenames; this keyword must be specified (and tags used) when a port has multiple download files (see master_sites).
distfiles ${name}-dev_src.tgz
distfiles file_one.tar.gz:tagone \ file_two.tar.gz:tagtwo
The last path component of
${distpath}. Override
it to store multiple ports' distfiles in the same directory (such as
multiple ports providing different versions of the same software),
or if a stealth
update has occurred.
dist_subdir gcc
dist_subdir ${name}/${version}_1
Sets the path to source directory relative to workpath. It can be used if the extracted source directory has a different name then the distfile. Also used if the source to be built is in a subdirectory.
worksrcdir ${name}-src-${version}
worksrcdir ${distname}/src
Some mirrors require special options for a resource to be properly fetched.
Change the fetch type. This is only necessary if a bzr, cvs, git, hg, or svn checkout is being used.
standard is used for a normal http or ftp fetch
${distfiles} and is used as
fetch.type svn svn.url svn://example.org svn.revision 2100
HTTP or FTP user to fetch the resource.
Default: none
TODO: add example
HTTP or FTP password to fetch the resource.
Default: none
TODO: add example
Whether to use EPSV command for FTP transfers.
fetch.use_epsv no
Whether to ignore the host SSL certificate (for HTTPS).
fetch.ignore_sslcert yes
Bzr may be used as an alternative method of fetching distribution files using the keywords in this section. However, fetching via bzr may cause non-reproducible builds, so it is strongly discouraged.
bzr fetch.type
is used to fetch source code from a bzr repository.
This specifies the url from which to fetch files.
Default: none
bzr.url lp:inkscape
bzr.url lp:~callelejdfors/pycg/trunk
Optional tag for fetching with bzr, this specifies the revision to checkout
Default: -1 (the last committed revision)
bzr.revision 2209
CVS may be used as an alternative method of fetching distribution files using the keywords in this section. However, fetching via CVS may cause non-reproducible builds, so it is strongly discouraged.
cvs fetch.type
is used to fetch source code from a CVS repository.
Specify the url from which to fetch files.
Default: none
cvs.root :pserver:firstname.lastname@example.com:/sources/emacs
Password to login to the CVS server.
Default: none
cvs.password nice-password
Optional for fetching with CVS, this specifies the code revision to checkout.
Default: none
cvs.tag HEAD
A date that identifies the CVS code set to checkout.
Default: none
cvs.date "12-April-2007"
A CVS module from which to check out the code.
Default: none
cvs.module Sources
Git may be used as an alternative method of fetching distribution files using the keywords in this section. However, fetching via Git may cause non-reproducible builds, so it is strongly discouraged.
git fetch.type
is used to fetch source code from a git repository.
This specifies the url from which to fetch files.
Default: none
git.url git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/git/git.git
git.url https://www.kernel.org/pub/scm/git/git.git
Optional tag for fetching with git, this specifies the tag or other commit-ish that git should checkout. Note that any tag on a branch besides HEAD should be prefixed by origin/.
Default: none
git.branch 72bf1c8
git.branch origin/next
Mercurial may be used as an alternative method of fetching distribution files using the keywords in this section. However, fetching via Mercurial may cause non-reproducible builds, so it is strongly discouraged.
hg fetch.type
is used to fetch source code from a Mercurial repository.
This specifies the url from which to fetch files.
Default: none
hg.url https://www.kernel.org/hg/index.cgi/linux-2.6/
hg.url http://hg.intevation.org/mercurial
Optional tag which should be fetched. Can be a Mercurial tag or a revision. To prevent non-reproducible builds use of tip as revision is discouraged.
Default: tip
hg.tag v1.3
hg.tag ceb884843737
Subversion may be used as an alternative method of fetching distribution files using the keywords in this section. However, fetching via Subversion may cause non-reproducible builds, so it is strongly discouraged.
svn fetch.type
is used to fetch source code from an svn repository.
This specifies the url from which to fetch files.
Default: none
svn.url https://www.example.com/svn-repo/mydirectory
svn.url svn://svn.example.com/svn-repo/mydirectory
Optional tag for fetching with Subversion, this specifies the peg revision to checkout; it corresponds to the @REV syntax of the svn cli.
Default: none
svn.revision 37192
Optional tag for fetching with Subversion, this specifies whether to check out the code into a working copy, or just export it without the working copy metadata. An export is preferable because it takes half the disk space, but some software expects to be built in a working copy (for example because it wants to record the revision number into itself somewhere).
Default: export
svn.method checkout
The list of keywords related to the checksum phase.
Checksum(s) of the distribution files. For ports with multiple distribution files, filenames must be included to associate files with their checksums. Each checksum entry should also indicate the file's size.
At least two checksum types (typically rmd160 and sha256) should be used to ensure the integrity of the distfiles.
Default: none
checksums rmd160 0c1147242adf476f5e93f4d59b553ee3ea378b23 \ sha256 baf8a29ff721178317aac7b864c2d392b1accc02de8677dd24c18fd5717bf26e \ size 1039840
checksums ${distname}${extract.suffix} \ rmd160 0c1147242adf476f5e93f4d59b553ee3ea378b23 \ sha256 883715307c31ae2c145db15d2404d89a837f4d03d7e6932aed21d1d1f21dad89 \ size 2429530 \ hobbit.tar.gz \ rmd160 82b9991f3bf0ceedbf74c188c5fa44b98b5e40c9 \ sha256 2c3afd16915e9f8eac2351673f8b599f5fd2ff9064d4dfe61f750d72bab740b3 \ size 8594032
The list of keywords related to the extract phase.
This keyword is used to specify that the extract phase should be done as the root user.
extract.asroot no
This keyword is used to specify the extract suffix type.
extract.suffix .tgz
This keyword is for downloads that are compressed using the 7z algorithm. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .7z
extract.cmd = 7za
use_7z yes
This keyword is for downloads that are tarred and bzipped. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .tar.bz2
extract.cmd = bzip
use_bzip2 yes
This keyword is for downloads that are compressed using the lzma algorithm. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .tar.lz
extract.cmd = lzip
use_lzip yes
This keyword is for downloads that are compressed using the lzma algorithm. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .lzma
extract.cmd = lzma
use_lzma yes
This keyword is for downloads that are uncompressed tar archives. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .tar
extract.cmd = tar
extract.pre_args = -xf
use_tar yes
This keyword is for downloads that are zipped. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .zip
extract.cmd = unzip
extract.pre_args = -q
extract.post_args = "-d ${extract.dir}"
use_zip yes
This keyword is for downloads that are compressed using the xz tool. When invoked, it automatically sets:
extract.suffix = .tar.xz
extract.cmd = xz
use_xz yes
This keyword is used to specify if the directory
worksrcdir is part of the distfile or if it
should be created automatically and the distfiles should be
extracted there instead. This is useful for distfiles with a flat
structure which would pollute the
with lots of files.
extract.mkdir yes
List of files to extract into
${worksrcpath}. Only use if default extract
behavior is not correct for your port.
extract.only foo.tar.gz
extract.only-append bar.tar.gz extract.only-delete foo.tar.gz
Command to perform extraction.
Default: gzip
extract.cmd gunzip
Main arguments to
extract.cmd; additional
arguments passed before and after the main arguments.
extract.args ${distpath}/${distfile}
The following argument modifiers are available:
extract.pre_args, defaults to:
extract.post_args, defaults to:
"| tar -xf -"
extract.pre_args xf extract.post_args "| gnutar -x"
The list of keywords related to the patch phase.
Specify the base path for patch files.
patch.dir ${worksrcpath}/util
Specify the command to be used for patching files.
Default: patch
patch.cmd cat
Specify patch files to be applied for a port; list modifiers specify patchfiles to be added or removed from a previous patchfile declaration.
Default: none
patchfiles patch-destdir-variable-fix.diff \ patch-source.c.diff
patchfiles-append patch-configure.diff patchfiles-delete patch-destdir-variable-fix.diff
Main arguments to
patch.cmd; optional
argument modifiers pass arguments before and after the main
Default: none
patch.args ???
The following argument modifiers are available:
patch.pre_args, defaults to:
patch.post_args, defaults to:
patch.pre_args -p1 patch.post_args ???
The list of keywords related to the configure phase.
MacPorts base sets some important default configure options, so
should use the -append version of most configure keywords so you don't
overwrite them. For example, MacPorts base sets default
configure.cflags so you should always use
configure.cflags-append to set additional CFLAGS in
Sets if the configure phase should be run. Can be used if the
port has no
./configure script.
use_configure no
Selects the command to be run in the default configure phase.
configure.cmd ./config.sh
Set environment variables for configure; list modifiers add and delete items from a previous Portfile configure.env keyword, or a default set by MacPorts base. If available, it is encouraged to use the predefined options (like configure.cflags) instead of modifying configure.env directly.
configure.env QTDIR=${prefix}/lib/qt3
configure.env-append ABI=32 configure.env-delete TCLROOT=${prefix}
Set optimization compiler flags; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.optflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.optflags -O2
configure.optflags-append -finline-functions configure.optflags-delete -Os
Set CFLAGS compiler flags; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.cflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.cflags -Os -flat_namespace
configure.cflags-append "-undefined suppress" configure.cflags-delete -O2
Set LDFLAGS compiler flags; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.ldflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
-L${prefix}/lib -Wl,-headerpad_max_install_names
configure.ldflags "-L${worksrcpath}/zlib -lz"
configure.ldflags-append "-L/usr/X11R6/lib -L${worksrcpath}/lib" configure.ldflags-delete -L${prefix}/lib/db44
Set CPPFLAGS to be passed to the C processor; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.cppflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.cppflags -I${worksrcpath}/include
configure.cppflags-append "-I/usr/X11R6/lib -I${worksrcpath}/lib -DHAVE_RRD_12X" configure.cppflags-delete -I${prefix}/lib/db44
Set CXXFLAGS to be passed to the C++ processor; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.cxxflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
TODO: add example
TODO: add description
TODO: add example
TODO: add description
Default: ???
TODO: add example
TODO: add description
Default: ???
TODO: add example
Set FFLAGS to be passed to the Fortran compiler; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.fflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.fflags -Os
Set FCFLAGS to be passed to the Fortran compiler; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.fcflags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.fcflags -Os
Set F90FLAGS to be passed to the Fortran 90 compiler; list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile configure.f90flags keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
configure.f90flags -Os
C compiler for the CC environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.cc ${prefix}/bin/gcc-mp-4.2
C preprocessor for the CPP environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.cpp /usr/bin/cpp-3.3
C++ compiler for the CXX environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.cxx /usr/bin/g++-4.0
Objective-C compiler for the OBJC environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.objc /usr/bin/gcc-4.0
Fortran compiler for the FC environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.fc ${prefix}/bin/gfortran-mp-4.2
Fortran 77 compiler for the F77 environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.f77 ${prefix}/bin/gfortran-mp-4.2
Fortran 90 compiler for the F90 environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.f90 ${prefix}/bin/gfortran-mp-4.2
Java compiler for the JAVAC environment variable when invoking the configure script.
configure.javac ${prefix}/bin/jikes
Select a compiler suite to fill the compiler environment
variables. All variables/tools a compiler suite can provide are set.
Manually set variables are not overwritten.
Keep in mind that not all compiler suites might be available on your
gcc-3.3 is available on Mac OS X 10.3 and
10.4 PowerPC,
gcc-4.0 is available on 10.4 and 10.5,
gcc-4.2 and
llvm-gcc-4.2 are
available on 10.5 and 10.6, and
clang is available
on 10.6 and later.
Only use it if a port really needs a different compiler.
apple-gcc-4.2 on Mac OS X 10.4
gcc-4.2 with Xcode 3.x on Mac OS X 10.5 and 10.6
llvm-gcc-4.2 with Xcode 4.0 through 4.2 on Mac OS X 10.6 and 10.7
clang with Xcode 4.3 and later on OS X 10.7 and later
configure.compiler macports-gcc-4.5
Set PERL flag for selecting a Perl interpreter.
configure.perl ${prefix}/bin/perl5.26
Set PYTHON flag for selecting a Python interpreter.
configure.python ${prefix}/bin/python2.7
Set RUBY flag for selecting a Ruby interpreter.
configure.ruby ${prefix}/bin/ruby
INSTALL flag for selecting an install
tool; used for copying files and creating directories.
configure.install ${prefix}/bin/ginstall
Set AWK flag for selecting an awk executable.
configure.awk ${prefix}/bin/gawk
Set BISON flag for selecting a bison executable, a parser generator.
configure.bison /usr/bin/bison
Set PKG_CONFIG flag for helping find pkg_config, a tool for retrieving information about installed libraries.
configure.pkg_config ${prefix}/bin/pkg-config
Set PKG_CONFIG_PATH flag for telling pkg_config where to search for information about installed libraries.
configure.pkg_config_path ${python.prefix}/lib/pkgconfig
Main arguments to
configure.cmd; optional
argument modifiers pass arguments before and after the main
Default: none
configure.args --bindir=${prefix}/bin
The following argument modifiers are available:
configure.pre_args, defaults to:
configure.post_args, defaults to:
configure.pre_args --prefix=${prefix}/share/bro configure.post_args OPT="-D__DARWIN_UNIX03"
Universal keywords are used to make a port compile on OS X for multiple architectures.
There is a default universal variant made available to all ports by MacPorts base, so redefining universal keywords should only be done to make a given port compile if the default options fail to do so.
Arguments used in the configure script to build the port universal.
TODO: add example
Additional flags to put in the CFLAGS environment variable
when invoking the configure script. Default value is based on
(PowerPC Tiger)
-isysroot ${developer_dir}/SDKs/MacOSX10.4u.sdk -arch i386 -arch ppc
(Intel Tiger / Leopard)
-arch i386 -arch ppc
(Snow Leopard and later)
-arch x86_64 -arch i386
TODO: add example
Additional flags to put in the CPPFLAGS environment variable when invoking the configure script.
(PowerPC Tiger)
-isysroot ${developer_dir}/SDKs/MacOSX10.4u.sdk
(others) none
TODO: add example
Additional flags to put in the CXXFLAGS environment variable
when invoking the configure script. Default value is based on
(PowerPC Tiger)
-isysroot ${developer_dir}/SDKs/MacOSX10.4u.sdk -arch i386 -arch ppc
(Intel Tiger / Leopard)
-arch i386 -arch ppc
(Snow Leopard and later)
-arch x86_64 -arch i386
TODO: add example
Additional flags to put in the LDFLAGS environment variable when invoking the configure script.
(PowerPC Tiger)
-Wl,-syslibroot,${developer_dir}/SDKs/MacOSX10.4u.sdk -arch i386 -arch ppc
(Intel Tiger / Leopard)
-arch i386 -arch ppc
(Snow Leopard and later)
-arch x86_64 -arch i386
TODO: add example
The list of configure keywords available for ports that need automake and/or autoconf.
Whether or not to use autoreconf
use_autoreconf yes
Arguments to pass to autoreconf.
--install --verbose
autoreconf.args --install --verbose --force
Directory in which to run
autoreconf.dir ./src
Whether or not to use automake.
use_automake yes
Environment variables to pass to automake.
Default: ???
automake.env CFLAGS=-I${prefix}/include
Arguments to pass to automake.
Default: ???
automake.args --foreign
Directory in which to run
automake.dir ./src
Whether or not to use autoconf.
use_autoconf yes
Environmental variables to pass to autoconf.
Default: ???
autoconf.env CFLAGS=-I${prefix}/include/gtk12
Arguments to pass to autoconf.
Default: ???
autoconf.args "-l src/aclocaldir"
Directory in which to run
autoconf.dir src
The list of keywords related to the build phase.
Make command to run in
${worksrcdir}. Only
use it if you can't use
Default: make
build.cmd scons
Defines which build software is required and sets
${build.cmd} accordingly. The available
options are BSD Make, GNU Make, and Xcode.
default (the default Make on
the current platform)
build.type bsd
Main arguments to
${build.cmd}; optional
argument modifiers pass arguments before and after the main
Default: none
build.args -DNOWARN
The following argument modifiers are available:
build.pre_args, defaults to:
build.post_args, defaults to:
build.pre_args -project AudioSlicer.xcode build.post_args CFLAGS_SYS="-DUSE_FREETYPE -DPREFER_FREETYPE"
Build target to pass to
${build.cmd}; list
modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile build.target
keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
build.target all-src
build.target-append doc extra build.target-delete compat
Set environment variables for build; list modifiers add and delete items from a previous Portfile build.env keyword, or a default set by MacPorts base.
Default: none
This keyword is for specifying whether or not it is safe for a
port to use multiple CPUs or multiple cores in parallel during its
build phase. If
use_parallel_build is not set to
"no" in a given port, the option
is passed to
${build.cmd} (if
${build.cmd} is make or
use_parallel_build no
The number of simultaneous jobs to run when parallel build is
enabled. The default value is based on the variable
buildmakejobs in
Default: If
buildmakejobs is 0, the
number of CPU cores in the machine, or the number of GB of
physical memory plus one, whichever is less. Otherwise,
the actual value of
The list of keywords related to the test phase.
Enable running test suites bundled with a port.
test.run yes
Test command to run relative to
test.cmd checks.sh
Test target to pass to
test.target checks
Main arguments to
test.cmd; optional
argument modifiers pass arguments before and after the main
Default: none
test.args -f Makefile.test
The following argument modifiers are available:
test.pre_args, defaults to:
test.post_args, defaults to:
Set environment variables for test; list modifiers add and delete items from a previous Portfile test.env keyword, or a default set by MacPorts base.
DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH is set here to
support testing dynamically linked libraries.
Default: none
The list of keywords related to the destroot phase.
Install command to run relative to
destroot.cmd scons
Main arguments to
${destroot.cmd}; optional
argument modifiers pass arguments before and after the main
Default: none
destroot.args BINDIR=${prefix}/bin
The following argument modifiers are available:
destroot.pre_args, defaults to:
destroot.post_args, defaults to:
destroot.pre_args -project AudioSlicer.xcode destroot.post_args INSTDIR=${destroot}${prefix}
Install target to pass to
list modifiers add or delete items from a previous Portfile
destroot.target keyword or the default set by MacPorts base.
destroot.target install install-config install-commandmode
destroot.target-append install-plugins destroot.target-delete install-commandmode
Arguments passed to
${destroot.cmd} via
${destroot.post_args} to install correctly
into the destroot.
destroot.destdir prefix=${destroot}${prefix}
If an application's Makefile properly supports the DESTDIR variable, MacPorts will automatically destroot the port properly. A port must destroot properly or the port will not install correctly, upgrade, or uninstall. If not, you may need to set this variable, or even patch the application's Makefile.
Umask to use during destroot.
destroot.umask 002
A list of directories that should not be removed if empty upon destroot completion.
Default: ???
destroot.keepdirs ${destroot}${prefix}/var/run \ ${destroot}${prefix}/var/log \ ${destroot}${prefix}/var/cache/mrtg
MacPorts tests for compliance to the common directory
structure in
${prefix}. If a port is not
compliant with the standard, set it to
You can find the macports standard in MacPorts File Hierarchy or in the porthier(7) man page.
destroot.violate_mtree is set to
yes, the following warning is issued during the
portname requests to install files outside the common directory structure!
This means that the port installed files outside of their
normal locations in
${prefix}. These could be
files totally outside of
${prefix}, which could
cause problems on your computer, or files inside of
${prefix} that are not in a standard location.
port contents
to see the location
for all files that were installed by a given port.
destroot.violate_mtree yes
Free and open source software is highly modular, and MacPorts ports often require that other ports be installed beforehand; these prerequisites for a given port are called a port's "dependencies".
The keywords used when specifying dependencies in a Portfile are related to port install phases, and they refer to what are called library, build, fetch, extract and run dependencies. Though all of them install dependencies before a given port is installed, specifying dependencies with the correct keyword is important for proper port upgrade and uninstall behavior, or when running targets other than install. For example, you may not uninstall a port that is a library dependency for another installed port, though you may remove one that is a build dependency. Likewise, if you run the fetch target for a port, only the fetch dependencies will be installed first, so they should be all that is needed for that target.
The list of dependencies to check before phases
install, and
package. Fetch dependencies are needed to download
the distfiles for a port, and are not needed at all once the software
is installed.
The list of dependencies to check before phases
install, and
package. Extract dependencies are needed to unpack a
port's distfiles into the work directory, and are not needed at all once
the software is installed.
The list of dependencies to check before phases
install, and
package. Build dependencies are needed when software
is being built, but not needed at all once it is installed.
The list of dependencies to check before phases
install, and
package. Library dependencies are needed both at
build time (for headers and libraries to link against) and at run
The list of dependencies to check before phase
Test dependencies are only needed when the port enables
testing (i.e.
test.run yes).
The list of dependencies to check before phases
install, and
package. Run dependencies are needed when the
software is run, but not to compile it.
There are two types of dependencies: port dependencies and file dependencies. Port dependencies can be satisfied by reference to a port (the MacPorts registry is queried), or by reference to a file (whether provided by a port or not). The most commonly-used type of dependencies in Portfiles are port dependencies, because dependencies should be provided by MacPorts ported software whenever possible, and usually only one port can provide the needed libraries and files.
But when satisfying a dependency with vendor-supplied software is preferred for special reasons, or when it is possible for more than one port to satisfy a dependency, then file dependencies may be used. An example of the former is with ubiquitous utilities like awk, grep, make or sed, where the versions in macOS are often sufficient; an example of the latter is with "-devel" ports—these ports provide a different version of the same files (though only one can be activated at a time).
Port dependencies, the preferred type, are specified as shown in these examples:
depends_lib port:rrdtool port:apache2 depends_build port:libtool depends_run port:apache2 port:php5
File dependencies should only be used if one of the reasons listed
above applies. There are three types:
bin for
lib for libraries, and
for any installed file. File dependencies are specified in the form:
bin dependencies,
<filespec> is the name of a program in a
bin directory like
${prefix}/bin, /usr/bin, /bin, and
the associated sbin directories.
lib dependencies,
<filespec> is the name of a library
(but without its extension) in a lib directory like
${prefix}/lib, /usr/lib, /lib, some Framework
directories, and those found in environment variables like DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH.
path dependencies,
<filespec> is the complete absolute path
to the file, or more usually, when the file is inside
${prefix}, it is specified relative to
path dependencies are the only ones which would find
files only in an absolute path or a path inside
they are - in cases when a port needs to be more restrictive - often used
instead of
bin and
lib dependencies .
Note that the
<port> specified is
only installed if the specified library, binary, or file is not found. See
the examples below:
depends_lib lib:libX11.6:xorg depends_build bin:glibtool:libtool depends_run path:lib/libltdl.a:libtool
MacPorts variants are conditional modifications of port installation behavior during port installation. There are two types of variants: user-selected variants and platform variants. User-selected variants are options selected by a user when a port is installed; platform variants are selected automatically by MacPorts base according to the OS or hardware platform (darwin, freebsd, linux, i386, powerpc, etc.).
User-selected variants are those that are defined so a user can
invoke them to enable port options at install time. They also allow a port
author a level of modularity and control using the keyword
default_variants (see below).
Variant names may contain only letters, numbers and underscore characters. In particular, the hyphen is not a valid character in variant names because it would conflict with the notation for deselecting a variant.
name [requires
variant1 variant2 ...] [conflicts
variant1 variant2 ...] [description
The variant declaration may contain any keywords that can be
placed in a Portfile's global section. If you wish to execute system
(shell) calls or Tcl extensions during the execution of a port
phase, you should place those statements within a
variant_isset conditional within a phase
declaration and not within the variant declaration itself.
Dependencies and conflicts with other variants in the same port can
be expressed with
requires and
conflicts options as shown below.
Default: none
variant gnome requires glib { configure.args-append --with-gnome depends_lib-append port:gnome-session }
variant apache2 conflicts apache { configure.args-append \ --with-apxs2=${prefix}/apache2/bin/apxs }
The optional
default_variants keyword is
used to specify variants that a port author wishes to have enabled
by default. This allows for Portfile modularity and also allows
users to suppress default variants if they wish.
Default: none
default_variants +ssl +tcpd
Default variants may be suppressed by preceding a variant name with a "-" as shown in this example.
port install foo -ssl
When using MacPorts on macOS, a universal variant is defined by default to configure ports with universal flags. The variant can be overridden if the default code does not work (see the Configure Universal section above), or suppressed if a universal variant does not function properly for a given port.
universal_variant no
User-selected variants ought to provide a description, which will be
displayed when using command
port variants foo. The
syntax used for the description keyword is shown below.
variant bar description {Add IMAP support} {}
Descriptions should be short but clear, and not merely repeat the name of the variant. To allow for compatibility for possible MacPorts GUI support, a good rule of thumb is to use sentence fragments for brevity, with a capitalized first letter and no trailing punctuation. Think of them as short labels such as ones you'd find next to a GUI checkbox or radio button. Thus, it would be better to write "Build with support for foo" instead of "Builds with support for foo"; "Add support for foo" would be better than "Adds support for foo".
Variant descriptions are strings, so one should take care not to put whitespace between the brackets and the beginning and end of the variant description, and also not to use unnecessary whitespace, unlike with port descriptions and long_descriptions.
Platform variants are either defined by default in MacPorts base, or defined by a port author to customize a port's installation according to OS (operating system) or hardware platform.
MacPorts allows platform-specific port options to be specified in a Portfile for handling differences between platforms and versions of the same platform.
platform darwin
can be used to handle
different tasks depending on the version of Darwin, the core
operating system underlying macOS.
version is the major version of Darwin,
and can be
18 for macOS Mojave 10.14,
17 for macOS High Sierra 10.13,
for macOS Sierra 10.12, and so on.
platform darwin 10 { configure.env-append LIBS=-lresolv }
platform darwin i386 { configure.args-append --disable-mmx }
platform darwin 8 powerpc { configure.compiler gcc-3.3 }
Though a combination of OS version and hardware platform may be
specified in a single platform statement (e.g., darwin 8 i386), it is not
possible to specify a range of platforms with a single statement. For
example, to select Darwin versions 9 and 10 while excluding all others,
you would need two statements:
platform darwin 9 and
platform darwin 10. Alternately, you could make that
behavior the port's default, and add a
platform darwin 8
block to remove it again.
A MacPorts Portfile is a Tcl script, so it may contain any arbitrary Tcl code you may learn about in the Tcl documentation. However, few authors will use arbitrary Tcl code; the vast majority will use a subset of Tcl commands and a number of Tcl extensions that are coded within MacPorts for performing the most common tasks needed for Portfiles. The list below is a list of useful Tcl commands for Portfile development and Tcl extensions provided by MacPorts base.
The standard Tcl file command can be used for
a number of operations on files, such as moving, renaming, deleting,
or creating directories, among others. For a complete list, consult
the Tcl
reference manual for the file command,
or the Tcl file manpage in the
n section of manpages
on your machine using man n file
Copy a file.
Rename a file.
Remove a file or (with
-force) a directory
and its contents.
Create a directory.
For the above operations provided by Tcl's file command, MacPorts provides the following shorthands. These should be used in preference to the Tcl commands above, as they may work around certain bugs.
Shorthand for
file copy.
Similar to
file rename but correctly handles
renames that only change the case of a file on a case-insensitive
Shorthand for
file delete -force.
Mimics the BSD touch command.
Mimics the BSD ln command.
xinstall copies files and creates directories; it is intended to be compatible with install(1).
owner] [-g
group] [-m
mode] [
file1 file2
Install the specified file(s) to a destination directory.
owner] [-g
group] [-m
mode] [-W
dir] [
file1 file2
Change to
dir and install file(s) to a
destination directory.
owner] [-g
group] [-m
mode] {*}[glob
Install the file(s) matching the glob pattern to a
destination directory. Note the use of the
operator to convert the list returned by glob
into separate arguments to xinstall.
owner] [-g
group] [-m
Create a directory including parent directories if necessary.
owner -
group -
mode -
xinstall -m 640 ${worksrcpath}/README \ ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}
xinstall -m 640 -W ${worksrcpath}/doc README INSTALL COPY \ ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}
xinstall -m 640 {*}[glob ${worksrcpath}/doc/*] \ ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}
xinstall -d ${destroot}${prefix}/share/doc/${name}
strsed can be used for string manipulations using regular expressions. It supports a small subset of the commands known from sed(1).
Replaces the first instance of
regex with
replacement. Refer to
re_format(7) for a definition of regular expression
The same as the previous format, except all instances of the pattern will be replaced, not only the first (mnemonic: 'g' is for global).
Allows text specified by a regular expression to be replaced by new text, in-place (the file will be updated itself, no need to place output into a new file and rename).
file ...
Replace text given by the regular expression portion of the command with the replacement text, in all files specified.
Use -locale to set the locale. The default locale is
For example,
-locale C will allow a non-UTF-8 file to be modified (which
may otherwise give the error "sed: RE error: illegal byte sequence"), but only operating
on ASCII characters. If you need it to work on non-ASCII characters you need to set a
locale with the correct charset for the file, e.g. "en_US.ISO8859-1".
-n is passed to sed to suppress echoing result
-W to set a common working directory for multiple files
Use -E to use the extended regular expression style (see re_format(7) for a description of the basic and extended styles)
Use -- to end option processing and allow any further dashes not to be treated as options.
reinplace -W ${worksrcpath} "s|/usr/local|${prefix}|g" configure setup.py
reinplace "s|@@PREFIX@@|${prefix}|g" ${worksrcpath}/Makefile
Add a new local user to the system with the specified uid, gid, password, real name, home directory and login shell.
Check if a local user exists. Returns the uid for the given user, or 0 if the user wasn't found. Checking for the root user is not supported because its uid is 0, and it will always exist anyway.
Returns the highest used uid plus one.
Add a new local group to the system, with the specified gid, password, real name, and with a list of users as members.
Check if a local group exists and return the corresponding gid. This can be used with adduser:
addgroup foo adduser foo gxml:id=[existsgroup foo]
Returns the highest used gid plus one.
Use only when ....
A StartupItem is a MacPorts facility to run "daemons," a Unix term for programs that run continuously in the background, rather than under the direct control of a user; for example, mail servers, network listeners, etc. Ports that use StartupItem keywords create scripts for launchd, which is the Apple facility introduced with Mac OS X 10.4 to replace xinetd for starting and managing daemons. To support launchd, a program named daemondo is provided by MacPorts base that serves as an adapter between launchd and daemons ("executable" StartupItems) or traditional Unix startup scripts that start daemons ("script" StartupItems).
There are three categories of StartupItem keywords. Those that trigger StartupItem creation and logging, those that specify attributes of "executable" StartupItems, and those that specify attributes of "script" StartupItems.
The variable
startupitem_type in
${prefix}/etc/macports/macports.conf may be set to
none to override the default value of the
option in Portfiles; this prevents StartupItems from being created.
Additionally, the
startupitem_install variable can be set
no in
macports.conf to override the default
value of the
startupitem.install option, which will prevent links
from being created under
/Library. This is useful for MacPorts
installations that are not used with root privileges.
The keywords in this section may be used with either "executable" or "script" StartupItems (see below).
Whether to automatically load the StartupItem after activating the port.
startupitem.autostart yes
Trigger the creation of a StartupItem.
startupitem.create yes
Enable additional debug logging.
startupitem.debug yes
Whether to install a link to the StartupItem in the appropriate
subdirectory of
/Library (see
startupitem.location) so that it can
be launched automatically after rebooting.
startupitem.install no
Chooses the subdirectory in which to install the StartupItem. Also affects how it will be loaded: LaunchDaemons must be loaded as root, and only one instance will run for the whole system. LaunchAgents are loaded as a normal user, and one instance per user can run.
startupitem.location LaunchAgents
Path to a logfile for logging events about the lifetime of the StartupItem. Depending on the type of StartupItem, and the manner in which it is started, standard output from the daemon may also be directed to the logfile.
startupitem.logfile ${prefix}/var/log/mydaemon.log
Control whether or not to log events to the log file. If logevents is set, events with timestamps are logged to the logfile.
startupitem.logevents yes
Sets the name for the StartupItem. Defaults to the name of the port, so this keyword is usually unnecessary.
startupitem.name dhcpd
Cause the daemon to be restarted when a change in network state is detected.
startupitem.netchange yes
The type of the StartupItem. Supported values are
launchd for a macOS
launchd .plist, or
none for no StartupItem.
launchd if on macOS and
is true,
none otherwise
startupitem.type launchd
Used when a port needs to install more than one StartupItem, this option
consists of a list where alternating elements represent keys and values. Each
key corresponds to one of the
startupitem.* options, and the
following value is associated with it. Each StartupItem defined in the list must
specify at least a name. Each other key/value pair is associated with the
StartupItem named most recently in the list. Any keys that are not defined for
a given StartupItem will use the value of the corresponding
Default: none
startupitems name myport-system \ location LaunchDaemons \ executable ${prefix}/sbin/myportd \ name myport-session \ location LaunchAgents \ executable ${prefix}/bin/myport-agent
Daemons run continuously, so monitoring the health of daemon processes and restarting them if they die is an important StartupItems' feature. "Executable" StartupItems are preferred over "script" StartupItems because daemondo launches the daemon directly, rather than indirectly via a script, and therefore it automatically knows how to monitor a daemon process and restart it if it dies. Daemons used with "executable" StartupItems may be programs or scripts (shell, perl, python, etc.) as long as the script itself is the daemon, rather than merely what launches the daemon. In the latter case "script" StartupItems are to be used.
Since "script" and "executable" are
mutually exclusive StartupItem types, the
startupitem.executable keyword may not be used in a
Portfile that uses any keywords listed in the Script StartupItems
Specifies the name of the daemon to be run. It may have multiple arguments, but they must be appropriate for a call to exec; arbitrary shell code may not be used.
Some daemons "daemonize" by detaching themselves from the
controlling tty before sending themselves to the background, thus
making themselves a child of the original process. A daemon to be
started with
startupitem.executable must not be
allowed to do this or daemondo will think the process has died and
start multiple instances. Often daemons have a command switch to
run in the foreground, and this method should be used for daemons
that detach.
Default: none
startupitem.executable ${prefix}/sbin/vm-pop3d -d 10 -t 600
Do not wrap values in quotes if passing arguments to the daemon; "executable" StartupItem elements must be tagged individually so the spaces between arguments serve as delimiters for "string" tags. For example, this startupitem key/value pair:
startupitem.executable ${prefix}/sbin/vm-pop3d -d 10 -t 600
generates a .plist file with these tags:
<key>ProgramArguments</key> <array> <string>/opt/local/bin/daemondo</string> <string>--label=vm-pop3d</string> <string>--start-cmd</string> <string>/opt/local/sbin/vm-pop3d</string> <string>-d</string> <string>10</string> <string>-t</string> <string>600</string> <string>;</string> </array>
StartupItems of type "script" create a wrapper during port installation for daemondo that will be used to launch a daemon startup script present in an application's source distribution (MacPorts does not create daemon startup scripts) for daemons that require a script.
"Executable" StartupItems are the preferred type
since "script" StartupItems launch daemons
indirectly, and this requires that port authors use
startupitem.pidfile keyword so that
daemondo can check this pid file to see is a daemon
process has died and restart it. Any time a script (or an executable)
itself serves as a daemon, use the "executable" StartupItem
type so daemondo will launch it directly and track its health
automatically. Additionally, since "script" and
"executable" are mutually exclusive StartupItem types, the
startupitem.executable keyword may not be used in a
Portfile that uses "script" StartupItem keywords.
A typical snippet of a startup script that may be used with a "script" StartupItem is shown below. Notice that the script is not a daemon; rather the script indirectly launches the vm-pop3d daemon.
#!/bin/sh case "$1" in start) echo -n "Starting vm-pop3d: " /opt/local/sbin/vm-pop3d -d 10 -t 600 [... trimmed ...]
Specify a shell script to start, stop, and restart the daemon.
In the absence of
startupitem.restart, the daemon will
be restarted by taking the stop action, followed by the start
Default: none
startupitem.start "${prefix}/share/mysql/mysql.server start" startupitem.stop "${prefix}/share/mysql/mysql.server stop" startupitem.restart "${prefix}/share/mysql/mysql.server restart"
Wrap the stop, start, and restart values in quotes so they will be placed in the wrapper tagged as a single element.
Shell code that will be executed prior to any of the options
startupitem.stop and
Default: none
startupitem.init BIN=${prefix}/sbin/bacula-fd
This keyword must be defined properly for daemondo to be able to monitor daemons launched via "script" StartupItems and restart them if they die. It specifies two things: a process id (PID) file handling method, and a pidfile name and path.
Default: [none] |
Values [none auto manual clean]
startupitem.pidfile auto ${prefix}/var/run/${name}.pidfile
PID file handling options:
none - daemondo will not create or track
a PID file, so it won't know when a daemon dies.
auto - The started process is expected to
create a PID file that contains the PID of the running daemon;
daemondo then reads the PID from the file and tracks the
process. The started process must delete the PID file if this is
clean - The started process is expected
to create a PID file that contains the PID of the running
daemon; daemondo then reads the PID from the file and tracks the
process, and deletes the PID file if it detects the daemon has
manual - This option should only be used
if an "executable" StartupItem could be used
(daemondo launches a daemon directly) and a
port author wants a PID file written for some special use. A PID
file is not needed to detect process death for daemons launched
directly by daemondo. As with executable StartupItems, daemondo
remembers the PID of the launched process and tracks it
A port with a StartupItem places a link to a .plist file for the
port's daemon within
/Library/LaunchDaemons/. A
.plist file is an XML file; MacPorts installs .plist files tagged as
"disabled" for the sake of security. You may enable a startup
script (tag the.plist file as "enabled") and load it into
launchd with a single command as shown.
sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5.plist
You may stop a running startup script, disable it (tag the.plist file as "disabled"), and unload it from launchd with a single command as shown.
sudo launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5.plist
During port installation a MacPorts StartupItem creates a .plist
file in
${prefix}/etc/LaunchDaemons/, and places a
symbolic link to the .plist file within
/Library/LaunchDaemons/ if
${startupitem.install} is true.
For example, the StartupItem for the mysql5 port is
org.macports.mysql5.plist, and it is linked as
ls -l /Library/LaunchDaemons
org.macports.mysql5.plist -> /opt/local/etc/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5/org.macports.mysql5.plist
For "script" StartupItems, in addition to a .plist file, a wrapper is also created.
ls -l /opt/local/etc/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5/
-rwxr-xr-x 2 root wheel 475 Aug 2 14:16 mysql5.wrapper -rw-r--r-- 2 root wheel 975 Aug 2 14:16 org.macports.mysql5.plist
The wrapper manipulates the script as specified in the startupitem.start and startupitem.stop keywords. An example wrapper script snippet is shown below.
#!/bin/sh # MacPorts generated daemondo support script # Start Start() { /opt/local/share/mysql5/mysql/mysql.server start } # Stop Stop() { /opt/local/share/mysql5/mysql/mysql.server stop } [... trimmed ...]
Options livecheck and distcheck are especially useful for port maintainers, but others may also find this information valuable.
Livecheck checks to see if MacPorts can query the developer's download site to determine if a newer version of the software has become available since the port was installed.
Specify what kind of update check to perform.
Open source mirror site options are to use the project's
latest file release from
or the project's
date_updated XML tag for
freecode. These options are automatically used if
a matching
${master_sites} URL is used.
Generic download site options are to specify a
moddate (modification date of a URL resource), a
regex (retrieve the version by applying a regex to
a URL resource),
regexm (retrieve the version by
applying a multi-line regex to a URL resource),
(compares the md5 sum of a URL resource) or
(no check).
sourceforge or
googlecode if the
${master_sites} is one of these, else
livecheck.type regex livecheck.url ${homepage} livecheck.regex "Generally Available (\\d+(?:\\.\\d+)*)"
Name of the project for live checks. Is only used with freecode, sourceforge
${name} or the sourceforge,
freecode project name if it can be guessed from
livecheck.name hibernate
Name of the file release for sourceforge
checks. Use the name of the package release.
You may use this keyword without
livecheck.version if you replace the version part of
the name with "
Default: sourceforge:
livecheck.distname faad2.src
Version of the project for a check; used for regex-based checks.
livecheck.version ${name}-${version}
URL to query for a check.
${homepage} or the first hit among
the following sites:
livecheck.url https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bison/
Regular expression to parse the resource for regex checks. Be sure to use a regular expression grouping around the version component. Also remember that square brackets need to be quoted because Tcl otherwise interprets them as a procedure call.
Default: none
livecheck.regex 4th-(\[a-z0-9.\]+)-unix${extract.suffix}
md5 checksum to use for an md5 comparison.
Default: none
livecheck.md5 37e6a5b6516a680c7178b72021d3b706
Distcheck reports whether or not the distfile(s) specified in a Portfile are still available on the developer's download site. Examples are given below.
This option can be used to disable distcheck. It specifies
what kind of check should be performed on distfiles:
moddate (check if the Portfile is older than the
distfile) or
none (no check).
distcheck.check none
PortGroups are simply include files for portfiles. They can define as much or as little as a portgroup author feels is necessary to provide a set of definitions or behaviors common to a group of portfiles, in order that those portfiles can be expressed as simply as possible with minimum redundancy.
See the following folder for PortGroup definitions:
or if you prefer directly in GitHub .
A sample listing follows:
ls -1 /opt/local/var/macports/sources/rsync.macports.org/macports/release/tarballs/ports/_resources/port1.0/group/
active_variants-1.1.tcl apache2-1.0.tcl app-1.0.tcl archcheck-1.0.tcl bitbucket-1.0.tcl cmake-1.0.tcl cmake-1.1.tcl compiler_blacklist_versions-1.0.tcl compilers-1.0.tcl conflicts_build-1.0.tcl crossbinutils-1.0.tcl crossgcc-1.0.tcl cxx11-1.0.tcl cxx11-1.1.tcl debug-1.0.tcl elisp-1.0.tcl github-1.0.tcl ...
The requirements of a minimum portfile using a portgroup varies by portgroup. The sections below devoted to each portgroup (or, for portgroups not documented there yet, the comments in the header of the portgroup file itself) should provide guidance on how each portgroup is used. Prospective MacPorts developers are also encouraged to examine existing portfiles that use these portgroups.
github portgroup allows for efficient porting of
software hosted on GitHub.
This portgroup greatly simplifies the porting of software hosted on
GitHub. Provided a GitHub repository author follows common GitHub
practices, a port can be almost fully configured simply by declaring the
repository coordinates. The
github portgroup is indeed
capable of configuring, amongst other things:
The port
The port
distfiles (if the project uses GitHub
livecheck parameters.
The main port configuration is triggered by the usage of the
github.setup keyword:
PortGroup github 1.0 github.setup author project version [tag_prefix]
By default, the port
name will be set to the GitHub project
name (
project) and
version will be set to the
GitHub project
version. The port name can be overridden by
using the
name keyword.
tag_prefix is optional, and it's used to specify a prefix
to use when constructing the tag name. If, for example, the project uses
tags such as
v1.0.0, then the
tag_prefix should
be set to
v, as in the following example:
github.setup author project version v
GitHub, and as a consequence the
github portgroup, offers
multiple mechanisms to get a distfile:
The default behaviour of the portgroup is using GitHub automatically
generated distfile from a
git commit or tag. However, the
best practice should be using a GitHub release.
The default behaviour of the
github portgroup is leveraging
GitHub's ability to create a distfile from a
git tag or
commit. In this case, the
distname is irrelevant and should
not be set.
If the project's developers do not tag their releases, they should be
encouraged to do so. Until they do, or in the case in which an untagged
development version has to be used, port maintainers have the possibility
of specifying a
git commit hash and manually set the
version field. If the project does not assign version
numbers the port maintainer has to define one. Such versions typically
format the date of the chosen commit using the
pattern. If, for example, the port maintainer decides to use a changeset
with the hash
0ff25277c3842598d919cd3c73d60768, committed on
April 1, 2014, then the following would be used:
github.setup someone someproject 0ff25277c3842598d919cd3c73d60768 version 20140401
github portgroup allows maintainers to easily configure
the distfiles when the project uses GitHub releases. A release is the
best distfile candidate, and project maintainers should be encouraged to
use them. To enable this feature, the following keyword must be used:
github.tarball_from releases
By default, the
github portgroup sets
distname ${github.project}-${github.version}
However, GitHub does not enforce any rule for release distfiles, so port
maintainers may need to override the
distname as they would
do for other ports.
Older projects use the discontinued downloads service. New GitHub downloads can no longer be created, but old ones are still available.
If the project doesn't have GitHub releases but does have GitHub downloads, they can be used using the following keyword:
github.tarball_from downloads
Since GitHub doesn't enforce any naming rules for downloads, the portgroup
can only provide a sensible default value for
distname, which
can be overridden if necessary.
Further still, many Github projects have automatically-generated archive
URLs that can be used for downloading distfiles. This can be enabled via
archive as follows:
github.tarball_from archive
If the project uses
git submodules, some projects' tag- or
commit-based distfiles will not contain all the necessary files. Once
again, the best distfile candidate (if available) is a distfile from
GitHub releases, as described in the previous sections. However, in the
case a project doesn't provide any other alternative, a project using
submodules can be successfully retrieved by fetching the sources using
git and then using a
post-fetch to initialize
the submodules:
fetch.type git post-fetch { system -W ${worksrcpath} "git submodule update --init" }
PortGroup gnustep allows for efficient porting of GNUstep-based open source software using the GNU objective-C runtime that defines options for the configuration, build, and destroot phases, and also defines some values for GNUstep-based software. A minimum Portfile using the gnustep PortGroup class need only define the fetch and the checksum phases.
Portfiles using the gnustep PortGroup allow for port authors to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile keywords.
An associative array which specifies the sub-directories relative to ${worksrcpath} and the SHARED_LD_POSTFLAGS variables to be added to GNUmakefile.preamble in those sub-directories. This helps making the patching process easier on Darwin.
Type: optional
Default: none
platform darwin { array set gnustep.post_flags { BundleSubDir "-lfoo -lbar" } }
Define the gcc compiler to use when compiling a port.
Type: optional
Default: gcc-mp-4.2
gnustep.cc gcc-mp-4.3
Many GNUstep packages include a Documentation sub-directory that is not built by default. Enabling this variant builds and installs the included documentation.
Type: optional
port install gnustep-gui +with_docs
PortGroup gnustep supports both the traditional gnustep file layout and the new fhs file layout. However, a given ported application does not necessarily support both. The Portfiles have access to many procedures to handle these two layouts:
Sets GNUSTEP_MAKEFILES according to the FilesystemLayout
Sets DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH and PATH for the gnustep FilesystemLayout
Returns true (1) if current file layout is gnustep
Sets GNUSTEP_SYSTEM_LIBRARY according to the FilesystemLayout
Sets GNUSTEP_LOCAL_LIBRARY according to the FilesystemLayout
Portfiles using PortGroup gnustep do not need to define the following variables:
Default: gnustep
Default: http://www.gnustep.org/
Default: gnustep:core
Default: gnustep-core
Default: no
Default: DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH PATH
Default: CC=gcc-mp-4.2 GNUSTEP_MAKEFILES
Default: gnu
Default: DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH PATH
Default: messages=yes
Default: DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH PATH
Default: messages=yes
golang PortGroup allows for efficient porting of
Go-based open source software.
This PortGroup greatly simplifies the porting of software written in Go, especially when the software and its dependencies are hosted on GitHub or Bitbucket. Provided a project author follows common Go packaging practices, a port can be almost fully configured simply by declaring the package identifier.
In particular, Go has strict requirements relating to the arrangement of code on the filesystem (GOPATH). This PortGroup handles the construction of the GOPATH for you.
The main port configuration is triggered by the usage of the
go.setup keyword:
PortGroup golang 1.0 go.setup domain/author/project version [tag_prefix] [tag_suffix]
By default, the port
name will be set to the package name
project) and
version will be set to the project
version. The port name can be overridden by using the
name keyword.
tag_prefix and
tag_suffix are optional, and
are used to specify a prefix/suffix to use when constructing the tag name.
If, for example, the project uses tags such as
v1.0.0, then
tag_prefix should be set to
v, as in the
following example:
go.setup domain/author/project version v
When the
domain is either
github.com or
bitbucket.org, the appropriate PortGroup will be applied and
set up automatically. See those PortGroups' documentation for details.
Projects hosted elsewhere can be used, but require additional manual setup.
The PortGroup provides a keyword to facilitate listing dependencies:
go.vendors. Supply a list of vendor package IDs, their
versions (git commit hashes, labeled "lock" as in "lockfile"), and their
checksums as follows. The packages and their versions can usually be
found in a lockfile (e.g.
glide.lock) in the upstream code. All checksum types
supported by the
checksums keyword are
supported here as well.
go.vendors example.com/dep1/foo \ lock abcdef123456... \ rmd160 fedcba654321... \ sha256 bdface246135... \ size 1234 \ example.com/dep2/bar \ lock abcdef123456... \ rmd160 fedcba654321... \ sha256 bdface246135... \ size 4321
Note that
go.vendors cannot be used with dependencies hosted
outside of GitHub and Bitbucket. Such dependencies must be handled
After the extraction phase, the vendor packages will be placed alongside the main port code as appropriate in the GOPATH.
By default this PortGroup runs
go build from the
${worksrcpath}. Assuming this results in a binary with
the same name as the project, and that there are no other files to
install, the following is sufficient for the destroot phase:
destroot { xinstall -m 755 ${worksrcpath}/${name} ${destroot}${prefix}/bin/ }
Please modify as appropriate for each individual port.
When the golang PortGroup is declared within a Portfile, the following variables are provided during port install.
The Go binary location.
The package identifier of the port,
The individual parts of
The location where source packages will be arranged after the extract phase.
Default: 386 or amd64, depending on
Portfiles using PortGroup golang do not need to define the following variables:
Default: see github or bitbucket PortGroups (when project hosted on GitHub or Bitbucket)
Default: port:go
Default: no
Default: darwin freebsd linux
Go can target these platforms, but individual ports should override this as necessary if only some are actually supported.
${go.bin} build
Default: ""
Default: ""
Default: GOPATH=
Default: arranges the project and vendor source files appropriately in the GOPATH.
PortGroup haskell simplifies the addition of Haskell packages.
Portfiles using the haskell PortGroup allow for port authors to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile keywords.
This keyword sets a number of port variables.
Type: required
Synopsis: the first argument is the package name, as called by hackageDB; the second is the version number
haskell.setup digest 0.0.0.2
Portfiles using PortGroup haskell do not need to define the following variables:
Default: hs-[string tolower ${package}]
Default: ${version} (from haskell.setup)
Default: devel haskell
Default: https://hackage.haskell.org
Default: ${homepage}/packages/archive/${package}/${version}
Default: ${package}-${version}
Default: ghc
Default: proper setup to run these phases
Default: creates and installs (into destroot) the register.sh and unregister.sh scripts
Default: runs the register.sh scripts
Default: runs livecheck against the package's information page
PortGroup java is useful for Java packages.
Portfiles using the java PortGroup allow for port authors to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile keywords.
This keyword indicates that the port requires a Java installation of the specified version. If no such installation can be located, and no fallback option is specified (see below), the port will fail at the pre-fetch phase.
The version string can indicate a specific version or a range with wildcards "+" and "*". Note that Java 8 and earlier are "1.8", etc., while Java 9 and later are "9", etc.
Type: optional
java.version 1.8+
This keyword indicates an (optional) port dependency that will be added to the ports 'depends-lib' list in the case a prior installation of Java satisfying the requested version can not be found.
Type: optional
java.fallback openjdk10
Portfiles using PortGroup java do not need to define the following variables:
Default: JAVA_HOME=(detected value)
PortGroup perl5 allows for efficient porting of perl modules and other perl open source software.
Portfiles using the perl5 PortGroup allow for port authors to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile keywords.
This keyword sets the ${distfile} and ${version}.
Type: required
perl5.setup Net-Telnet 3.03
Perl modules are ordinarily assumed to be built with ExtUtils::MakeMaker. Use this keyword if a module must be built using Module::Build instead.
Type: optional
Portfiles using PortGroup perl5 do not need to define the following variables:
Default: perl
Default: perl_cpan:${perl5.cpandir}
Default: perl5.26
Default: no
When the perl5 PortGroup is declared within a Portfile, the following variables are provided during port install.
The MacPorts Perl version.
The Perl binary path (i.e.,
Path to the Perl vendor directory.
Path to the Perl architecture-dependent modules directory.
PortGroup python allows for efficient porting of python-based open source software.
Portfiles using the python PortGroup allow for port authors to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile keywords.
Defines the python versions supported by this port. If the
port name starts with "py-", then a subport will be defined for each
version in the list. For example, if a port named "py-foo" declares
python.versions 26 27, subports "py26-foo" and "py27-foo" will be
created, and will depend on python26 and python27 respectively.
If the port name does not start with "py-", it is interpreted
as an application written in python rather than a python module. In
this case, no subports are defined, and
python.versions defaults to
the value of
python.default_version, which must be set. For example,
if a port named "mercurial" sets
python.default_version 27, then
python.versions will automatically be set to "27", and a dependency
on python27 will be added.
Type: required for modules, optional for apps
python.versions 25 26 27
For modules (i.e., name starts with "py-"), this sets the
subport that will be installed if the user asks to install "py-foo"
rather than, e.g., "py26-foo" or "py27-foo". If not explicitly set, a
reasonable default is chosen from the list in
For applications (i.e., name does not start with "py-"), this chooses which version of python to use, and must be set. It can be changed in variants if desired.
Type: required for apps, optional for modules
python.default_version 32
When "yes" (the default), tells the PortGroup to automatically
link any executable binaries installed in the bin/ directory within
the framework into
Type: optional
python.link_binaries no
Suffix to add to the names of the links created in
${prefix}/bin when
is enabled. Can be cleared if no suffix is desired.
Type: optional
Default: -
When yes (the default), the PortGroup will automatically
try to pass the correct arch-specific flags during build time
(via the standard CFLAGS, LDFLAGS, etc environment variables).
Set this to "no" and set up those variables in
build.env manually
if the default does not work.
Type: optional
python.add_archflags no
When the python PortGroup is declared within a Portfile, the following variables are provided.
The python version in use in the current subport. This will be
one of the versions listed in
The python version in use in the current subport, in normal
dotted notation. For example, if
python.version is "26",
python.branch will be "2.6".
The prefix in which the current python version is installed.
For framework builds, this is
whereas for non-framework builds, it is the same as
The path to the MacPorts Python executable.
The Python dynamic library path, i.e.,
${python.prefix}/Python (framework builds) or
${prefix}/lib/libpython2.4.dylib (python24).
The path to python's lib directory, i.e.,
Path to the Python include directory.
Path to the Python site-packages directory. (i.e.,
Portfiles using PortGroup python do not need to define the following variables:
Default: python
Default: port:python
Default: no
${python.bin} setup.py --no-user-cfg
Default: build
${python.bin} setup.py --no-user-cfg
Default: --prefix=
${python.prefix} --root=
Default: creates directory
PortGroup ruby allows for efficient porting of ruby-based open source software.
When the ruby PortGroup is declared within a Portfile, the following variables are provided during port install.
The MacPorts Ruby version.
The Ruby binary location.
Path to the Ruby vendorlibdir directory (i.e.,
The name for the Ruby architecture-dependent directory name
Path to the Ruby vendor archdir (i.e.,
PortGroup xcode allows for efficient porting of
Xcode-based opensource software. A minimum Portfile for
xcode uses defaults for the configuration, build, and destroot
phases. It also defines some values for Xcode-based software.
PortGroup xcode is a way to make your port able to
tolerate Xcode version updates because the PortGroup is tested against all
supported macOS and Xcode versions.
Portfiles using
PortGroup xcode allow for port authors
to set the following keywords in addition to the general Portfile
The path relative to
${build.dir} and
${destroot.dir} of the Xcode project. If unset,
Xcode Tools should be able to determine it automatically. It usually
succeeds if there is only a single project in the directory.
Type: optional
Default: none
xcode.project ${name}.xcode
Project configuration/buildstyle to use.
Type: optional
xcode.configuration Main
If present, it overrides
build.target and
Type: optional
Default: none
xcode.target ${name}
Additional settings passed to the xcodebuild tool during the build phase. These settings should be in the X=Y form.
Type: optional
Default: none
xcode.build.settings FRAMEWORK_SEARCH_PATHS=${frameworks_dir}
Type of project that will be installed. This tells the
PortGroup xcode how to destroot the project. Correct values are
application and
Type: optional
xcode.destroot.type framework
Where to install the build product.
Type: optional
${applications_dir} depending on
Additional settings passed to the xcodebuild tool during the destroot phase. These settings should be in the X=Y form.
Type: optional
Default: none
xcode.destroot.settings SKIP_INSTALL=NO
Settings passed to the xcodebuild tool when the +universal variant is selected. These settings should be in the X=Y form.
Type: optional
SDK to use when the +universal variant is selected. The argument may be an absolute path to an SDK, or the canonical name of an SDK.
Type: optional
Portfiles using the PortGroup xcode do not need to define the following variables:
Default: aqua
Default: macosx
Default: no
The following Portfile phase keywords affect the PortGroup xcode in a unique way. In most cases, you will not need to set any of these keywords in the Portfile. See portfile-phase(7)
Default: ""
This variable will be ignored if
xcode.target is set.
Default: ""
This variable will be ignored if
xcode.target is set.
This chapter contains information about the MacPorts file layout, configuration files, a few fundamental port installation concepts, and the MacPorts APIs.
porthier — layout of the ports filesystems
A map of the filesystem hierarchy used by MacPorts and the ports it installs. Much of it is based on hier(7).
The base of the MacPorts filesystem hierarchy.
Common utilities, programming tools, and applications.
System configuration files and scripts.
Standard C include files.
Archive libraries.
System daemons and system utilities (executed by other programs).
Native macOS frameworks.
System programs and administration utilities.
Architecture-independent files.
Miscellaneous documentation.
Examples for users and programmers.
GNU Info hypertext system.
Localization files.
Manual pages.
Miscellaneous system-wide ASCII text files.
Source code.
Multi-purpose log, temporary, transient and spool files.
Miscellaneous automatically generated system-specific database files.
MacPorts package building topdir.
Where ports are built and destrooted.
Storage location for the distfiles of fetched ports.
Obsolete. Formerly contained archives (packages) of installed ports.
Obsolete. Formerly contained the registry information and receipts for installed ports, in flat-file format.
Contains the registry database in sqlite format.
The files for each installed port are stored here.
Holds the sources for the ports tree (the Portfiles) and also MacPorts base.
Directory containing output spool files.
Miscellaneous system log files.
System information files describing various information about the system since it was booted.
Files to be served by an http server.
Directory for cgi executables.
Native macOS applications.
Felix Kroniage
Juan Manuel Palacios
The MacPorts configuration files often do not need to be modified for the general end user. They contain options that may be of use to advanced users and port developers. Some automatically configured options may need to be updated when migrating to a new CPU architecture or a new OS version.
There are three MacPorts configuration files that define important
variables used by the MacPorts system:
sources.conf, and
All MacPorts configurations files are located in
MacPorts configuration file format is a simple key/value pair separated by either a space or a tab. Lines beginning with '#' are comments, empty lines are ignored.
macports.conf is the configuration file used to bootstrap the MacPorts system. This file is read by the port command and determines how it behaves.
Options locating other .conf files.
Where to find the sources list.
Where to find global variants definition file (optional).
Options for MacPorts general operating characteristics.
Sets the directory where ports are installed. Any path may be used but those with spaces and/or non-ASCII characters should be avoided because it can break some ports.
Directory where MacPorts keeps working data such as downloaded sources, installed port receipts, and the main registry. Same path restrictions apply as for '${prefix}'.
Default: ${prefix}/var/macports
Formerly selected the storage type to use for the MacPorts registry: flat or sqlite. Currently, only sqlite can be used.
The machine architecture for which to build in normal use. Options include: ppc, i386, ppc64, x86_64
(Snow Leopard and later)
x86_64 or
i386 depending on hardware
i386 or
ppc depending on hardware
Directory in which ports will install native macOS application bundles.
Directory in which ports will install native macOS frameworks.
Directory where Xcode is installed.
Controls whether ports are built from source or downloaded as pre-built archives. Setting to 'always' will never use archives, 'never' will always try to use an archive and fail if one is not available. 'ifneeded' will try to fetch an archive and fall back to building from source if that isn't possible.
Format of archives in which to store port images. This controls both the type of archive created locally after building from source, and the type to request from remote servers. Changing this will not affect the usability of already installed archives; they can be of any supported type. Supported types are: tgz, tar, tbz, tbz2, tlz, txz, xar, zip, cpgz, cpio
Use ccache (C/C++ compiler cache) - see https://ccache.samba.org/
Use distcc (distributed compiler) - see https://distcc.samba.org/
Use pipes rather than intermediate files when compiling C/C++/etc
Lowered scheduling priority (0-20) to use for make when building ports.
Default: 0
Number of simultaneous make jobs (commands) to use when building ports. Using "0" will cause a runtime autodetection to use all available processor cores.
Default: 0
Set whether to automatically execute "clean" after "install" of ports.
Rsync server from which to fetch MacPorts sources.
Default: rsync.macports.org
Rsync directory from which to pull the base/ component (infrastructure) of MacPorts.
Rsync options
Default: -rtzv --delete-after
Umask value to use during the destrooting of a port.
Default: 022
Sets env(PATH), the directory search path for locating system executables (rsync, tar, etc.) during port installation. Only applications in these directories are available while ports are being installed even if other paths are specified by $PATH in a user's environment.
Default: ${prefix}/bin:${prefix}/sbin:/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin
The binpath is implicitly defined, but it may be overwritten by defining the variable in macports.conf. However, using a non-default binpath is discouraged and should only be performed by advanced users.
Space-separated list of download hosts that should not be used.
Default: none
This feature is especially useful if a host turns out to be consistently slow and therefore should be excluded for MacPorts' actions.
Space-separated list of download hosts that should be used preferentially.
Default: none
Controls whether the rev-upgrade action will be run automatically after upgrading ports.
Default: yes
Controls the rev-upgrade functionality which checks for broken linking and can rebuild ports to fix it. 'rebuild' means ports will automatically be rebuilt when broken linking is detected in their files, while 'report' means broken files will be scanned for and reported but the ports will not be rebuilt.
Default: rebuild
Options for MacPorts Universal Binaries (+universal variant)
The machine architectures to use for +universal variant (multiple entries must be space delimited). Options include: ppc, i386, ppc64, x86_64
x86_64 i386 (
i386 for 10.5 and earlier)
Options for StartupItems
Options for generated startup items, though this may be
overridden by the
startupitem.type Portfile key. Options
are "default" option, "SystemStarter",
"launchd", or "none". For an empty or
"default" option, a startupitem type appropriate to the
platform is used; if "none", no port startupitems are
Create system-level symlinks to generated StartupItems. If set
to "no", symlinks will not be created; otherwise, symlinks will be
placed in
/Library/LaunchDaemons or
/Library/LaunchAgents as appropriate. This
setting only applies when building ports from
Other options
Extra environment variables to keep. Any variables listed here are added to the list of variables that are not removed from the environment used while processing ports.
Default: none
Set whether to place a symlink named "work" from your ports tree to the build directory of a port, when the port is being built. This is convenient, but may not be ideal if you care about the structure of your ports tree. For example, some developers keep their ports tree synchronized across multiple computers, and don't want to also synch build directories.
Default: yes
This file enables rsync synchronization of the default ports tree with the MacPorts rsync server when either of the commands port selfupdate or port sync are run.
rsync://rsync.macports.org/macports/release/tarballs/ports.tar [default]
Optional local repositories are enabled using a file url:
This optional file specifies any variants you'd like to be invoked globally. If a variant specified in this file is not supported by a given Portfile, the variant is simply ignored.
Default: none
MacPorts has a unique ability to allow multiple versions, revisions, and variants of the same port to be installed at the same time, so you may test new port versions without uninstalling a previous working version.
This capability derives from the fact that a MacPorts port by default
is not installed into its final or "activated" location, but
rather to an intermediate location that is only made available to other
ports and end-users after an activation phase that extracts all its files
from the image repository. Deactivating a port only removes the files from
their activated locations (usually under
deactivated port's image is not disturbed.
The location of an installed port's image can be seen by running:
port location PORTNAME
The MacPorts system is composed of three Tcl libraries:
MacPorts API - MacPorts public API for handling Portfiles, dependencies, and registry
Ports API - API for Portfile parsing and execution
pextlib - C extensions to Tcl
The code for the Port API is located in
base/src/port1.0. The Port API provides all the
primitives required for a Portfile to be parsed, queried, and executed.
It also provides a single procedure call that the MacPorts API uses to
kick off execution:
eval_targets. The port Tcl library supplies these
procedures, all of which are generated at run-time using the
options procedure in portutil.tcl.
The macports Tcl library loads the Portfile into a sub-interpreter, within which all port-specific code is run. This process ensures that there will never be pollution of the Tcl space of other ports, nor the MacPorts libraries, nor the calling application.
Portfiles are executed in a Tcl interpreter as Tcl code (and not truly parsed strictly speaking), so every Portfile option must be a Tcl procedure.
The Ports API performs the following functions:
Manages target registrations. All targets register themselves with the Port API. Accordingly, the Port API creates pre-/post-/main overrides for each of the targets.
Option/Default handling. All Portfile options (name, version, revision ...) are registered by targets. The Port API creates procedures for these options, and sets up the complex variable traces necessary to support option defaults.
Executes target procedures, including the pre/post/main routines.
Manages a state file containing information about what variants were specified and what targets have run successfully.
Provides essential Portfile Tcl extensions (reinplace, xinstall, etc).
Provides simple access to the ui_event mechanism by providing the various ui_ procedures (i.e., ui_msg, ui_error).
The code for the MacPorts API is located in
base/src/macports1.0. The MacPorts API provides a
public API into the MacPorts system by providing simple primitives for
handling Portfiles, dependencies, and registry operations, and exports
the MacPorts API for the port command line utility,
or any other. The API has very little information about the contents
Portfiles; instead, it relies entirely upon the port
Tcl library. By keeping the high level API simple and generic, revisions
to the underlying ports system will not necessarily require a revision
of the high level MacPorts API.
The MacPorts API is also responsible for loading user specified
options into a sub-interpreter to be evaluated by the ports API. In that
case it sets the variable name in the sub-interpreter and adds the
option to the sub-interpreter's global array user_options(). User
options are passed as part of the call to
The MacPorts API performs the following functions:
Dependency support.
This is implemented in a highly generic fashion, and is used throughout the system. The dependency functions are exported to the Port API, and the Port API uses them to execute targets in the correct order.
Dependency processing.
Software dependencies are handled at this layer using the dependency support layer.
UI abstractions.
UI Abstractions are handled at this layer. Each port action is provided a context, and a mechanism for posting user interface events is exported to the Port API (ui_event).
Registry management routines.
Manages the SQLite port registry in
${prefix}/var/macports/registry/. See also
Section 6.5, "The MacPorts Registry".
Exports the MacPorts API for use by client applications.
The following routines are defined.
mportinit: Initializes the MacPorts system.
Should be called before trying to use any other
mportsearch: Given a regexp, searches the
PortIndex for ports with matching
mportopen: Given a URI to a port, opens a
Portfile and returns an opaque handle to it.
mportclose: Given a port handle, closes a
mportexec: Given a port handle, executes a
target (e.g., install).
mportinfo: Given a port handle, this returns
the PortInfo array (as a flat list of array elements). This is a
little tricky and unstable and only used by
mportdepends: Given a port handle, returns a
list of ports upon which the specified port depends.
For an example of the MacPorts API, when one executes port search cm3, the port utility:
Calls the
mportsearch function to find all ports
containing "cm3".
Returns Tcl array(s) containing data from the
PortIndex: port name, version, revision,
variants, etc.
Formats the list of arrays in the standard viewing format.
For another MacPorts API example, when one executes port install cm3, the port utility:
Calls the
mportsearch function to find the first
port that matches the name "cm3".
Calls the
mportopen function to open the
Calls the
mportexec function to execute the
install target in the port.
Calls the
mportclose function to close the
The pextlib Tcl library provides a variety of C extensions to add capabilities to Tcl procedures; for example, an interface to flock(2) and mkstemp(3).
This chapter provides an overview of the MacPorts registry and its API. The registry is queried by MacPorts utilities for information about installed ports related to dependencies, port images, and simple user information about what is installed. It provides abstraction over a modular receipt storage layer; where the default format is a SQLite database.
The registry allows MacPorts utilities to:
Modify receipts to reflect changes made to installed ports being maintained by MacPorts.
Query the global file and dependency databases for file conflicts between a port being installed and a port already installed.
Maintain dependency trees of installed ports.
The SQLite registry used by default is located at
${portdbpath}/registry, which by default would
${prefix}/var/macports/registry. All data is
stored in a single file named
registry.db, although
the additional directory
portfiles is used
temporarily for extracting stored Portfiles from the registry.
Furthermore, access to the registry may be locked using
.registry.lock with the
registry::exclusive_lock and
registry::exclusive_unlock APIs.
The legacy flat file registry files are
contained in
${portdbpath}/receipts, which by
default is location
${prefix}/var/macports/receipts. File mappings and
dependency mappings are tracked in the flat file registry by
file_map.db and
If found, these will be automatically converted to the new SQLite registry.
The MacPorts registry provides a public API in the registry1.0 Tcl
package. Using this API listed below you can access the MacPorts
Registry using the default receipt storage mechanism chosen in
registry::new_entry {name version {revision 0}
{variants ""}}
Begin the creation of a new registry entry for the given port. Returns a reference ID to the registry entry created.
registry::open_entry {name {version 0}
{revision 0} {variants ""}}
Opens an existing registry entry. Returns a reference ID to the registry entry that was opened.
registry::entry_exists {name version {revision
0} {variants ""}}
Checks to see if a port exists in the registry. Returns 1 if the entry exists, 0 if not.
Writes the receipt associated with the given reference.
Deletes the receipt associated with the given reference.
registry::property_store {ref property
Store the given value with the property name in the receipt associated with the given reference.
registry::property_retrieve {ref
Retrieve the property name from the receipt associated with the given reference. Returns the value of the property, if the property exists.
registry::installed {{name ""} {version
Get all installed ports, optionally all installed ports matching the given name, or the given name and version. Returns a list of the installed ports.
registry::location {portname
Returns the physical location the port is installed in on the disk. This is primarily useful for finding out where a port image is installed.
Opens the file map that contains file-port relationships.
Returns the name of the port that owns the given file, if the file is registered as installed, and 0 otherwise.
Returns a list of all files associated with the given port if that port is installed, and 0 otherwise.
registry::register_file {file
Registers the given file in the file map as belonging to the given port.
Removes the file from the file map.
Write the changes to the file map.
Opens the dependency map that contains port dependency relationships.
Returns a list for the given file name representing all data currently known about the file. This is a 6-tuple in the form of:
file path
md5 checksum
Returns a list of information concerning each file in the given file list, if that file exists in the registry. The information if obtained through registry::fileinfo_for_file
Returns a list of all the ports that given port name depends on.
Returns a list of all the ports that depend on the given port name.
registry::register_dep {dep type
Registers the given dependency as the given type of dependency with the given port.
registry::unregister_dep {dep type
Unregister the given dependency of the given type as a dependency of the given port.
Write changes to the dependency map.
The MacPorts testing framework uses tcltest for its unit tests as well as regression tests. The framework was developed during Google Summer of Code 2013 by Marius Coțofană (marius@).
To keep things simple, each module of MacPorts (
) has its own
tests/ directory. Each Tcl script in a module (e.g.
has its own test script located in the
tests directory, with the same name and the '.test' extension (e.g.
Every proc in a script (e.g.
proc macports::findBinary) should have its own test proc
test findBinary) in the corresponding test file. Test procs should maintain the order in the
original script and should be independent of one another.
Tests can be run only on an installed version of MacPorts (so make sure you have run sudo make install).
The easiest way to run all the tests, is to use the target in the Makefile.
make test
tests/ directory has a
test.tcl file, used by the make target to
run all tests and format the output, making it easy to read. The script just runs the tests individually,
printing the test file name, the total number of tests, number of passed, skipped, failed as well as constraints
or errors of failed tests. This is one possible output when running
Total:31 Passed:31 Failed:0 Skipped:0 macports.test
Many tests need root privileges to run correctly, but will be auto skipped in the other case. Constraints are printed just below the final result, together with the number of test cases that require it, as so:
Total:31 Passed:24 Failed:0 Skipped:7 macports.test Constraint: 7 root
The stack trace of an error that occurs during a test is printed below the constraints (if any).
The file can be used also to:
run all tests:
tclsh test.tcl
get debug info:
tclsh test.tcl -debug \[0-3\]
list individual test files:
tclsh test.tcl -l
run specific test files:
tclsh test.tcl -t macports.test
print help message:
tclsh test.tcl -h
Specific test cases can be run using the '-match' argument for the file that contains the test, from its parent directory.
tclsh macports.test -match mportclose
Regression tests can be found in tests/test/ and can be run just as unit tests, using make test from the parent directory.
regression tests have their own directory, found in trunk/base/tests/test
each module of MacPorts (port1.0, macports1.0, package1.0) has its own 'tests/' directory where the test files are located and also additional files needed (Portfile, test.tcl)
each file in a module has a corresponding test file (.test extension) in the 'tests/' directory
each proc in a file has a corresponding test case (test proc_name) in the
each test case must be independent from each other, so they can be run individually if needed
each test must clean all auxiliary files or directories it creates and revert all ports it installs
use a single test procedure for each tested proc; sub-test cases should be included in the same body
when adding new regression tests, make sure to specify its name in the test_suite list of 'trunk/base/tests/test.tcl'
variables used in tests can be set at install-time using the '[module]_test_autoconf.tcl.in' file in each module (macports_autoconf.tcl.in, port_autoconf.tcl.in)
for some tests in package1.0, an update of the ports tree is required; this is done automatically if they are run using the 'test' target in the Makefile, with root privileges
# include required tcltest package and set namespace package require tcltest 2 namespace import tcltest::* # get absolute path to current 'tests/' directory set pwd [file normalize $argv0] set pwd [eval file join {*}[lrange [file split $pwd] 0 end-1]] # the macports_fastload.tcl file needs to be sourced so we # can directly require packages later on; we can use the autoconf # file to get the path to the file source ../port_test_autoconf.tcl source $macports::autoconf::macports_tcl_dir/macports1.0/macports_fastload.tcl package require macports 1.0 # source/require tested/needed files # source ../../port1.0/portutil.tcl package require portutil 1.0 # use custom macports.conf and sources.conf # you need to provide the sources.conf (see additional files) file makeDirectory $pwd/tmpdir makeDirectory $pwd/tmpdir/share makeDirectory $pwd/tmpdir/var/macports/registry set fd [open $pwd/tmpdir/macports.conf w+] puts $fd "portdbpath $pwd/tmpdir/var/macports" puts $fd "prefix $pwd/tmpdir" puts $fd "variants_conf $pwd/tmpdir/variants.conf" puts $fd "sources_conf $pwd/sources.conf" puts $fd "applications_dir $pwd/tmpdir/Applications" puts $fd "frameworks_dir $pwd/tmpdir/Library/Frameworks" close $fd set env(PORTSRC) $pwd/tmpdir/macports.conf file link -symbolic $pwd/tmpdir/share/macports $macports::autoconf::prefix/share/macports close [open $pwd/tmpdir/variants.conf w+] # debug options # ports_debug and ports_verbose are commented out as default # need to be set before 'mportinit' array set ui_options {} #set ui_options(ports_debug) yes #set ui_options(ports_verbose) yes mportinit ui_options # if you need to use procs from macports namespace, that are just aliases, you can # always source library.tcl (see additional files) which provides a copy macports::worker_init # without sub-interpreters; it also sets some important environment variables like # os.platform, os.major, os.arch, workpath, destpath, portpath # some other option would be to get the $workername from a $mport and use it directly # additional procs needed for testing go before the actual test cases # test case example # the test name must reflect the tested proc (remove namespaces if any) # the test description should list specific values from the tested proc on which it depends # or the partial cases it tests test mportclose { Mport close unit test. # this branch is optional and you can use other constraints too } -constraints { root # the setup branch is optional } -setup { set mport [mportopen file://.] # please make output as useful as possible (even error cases) # all sub-test cases should be part of the body branch } -body { if {[catch {mportclose $mport}] != 0} { return "FAIL: cannot run mportclose" } return "Mport close successful." # the cleanup branch is optional } -cleanup { file delete -force $pwd/work } -result "Mport close successful." # print test results cleanupTests
In all tests we use this Portfile.
This is the test.tcl file used to run and parse the output of all the tests in a module.
A worker_init copy, without using sub-interpreters library.tcl.
Example of sources.conf.
An example of a test file macports.test.
A library.tcl of useful procs in regression testing.
The MacPorts Project uses a system called Trac to file tickets to report bugs and enhancement requests. Though anyone may search Trac for tickets, you must have a GitHub account in order to login to Trac to create tickets.
Clean and try again
If a build fails or is otherwise interrupted, and you try again,
MacPorts tries to pick up where it left off. Sometimes this causes
new problems, and even if it doesn't, it means that log messages
from earlier steps, which can be essential for figuring out why a
build failed, are not included in the new log; MacPorts prints
"Skipping completed" in the log for each
previously-completed phase that was skipped. Before filing a
sudo port clean the port that
failed, then try again.
Check the problem hotlist
The Problem Hotlist contains possible solutions to problems that affect many MacPorts users. If a solution to your problem listed there works, don't file a ticket.
Search to see if a Trac ticket has already been filed
Avoid filing duplicate bugs. Search for duplicates by:
using the search bar that appears on each page
using the search page
browsing the list of categorized reports
making an advanced search by constructing a custom query
Is the problem an application error and not related to compiling and installing?
In general, application bugs should be reported to the developers of the app ("upstream"), not MacPorts. An application bug that affects a large number of MacPorts users might merit a MacPorts bug for informational purposes only, but this should be done sparingly.
Is the problem with a 'port upgrade' operation?
If so, try a 'port uninstall
foo' and
then reinstall. You might also want to run 'port -nR upgrade --force
foo' to rebuild ports depending upon
Note that it is safest and recommended that most users always upgrade
with 'port upgrade outdated' to update all ports at once. Upgrading a
single port can lead to software errors in other ports that have not
yet been upgraded.
Once you are logged into Trac, you may click New Ticket and you will be presented with a new ticket window shown in the graphic below. Follow the Trac ticket guidelines below to fill out the form. If you are reporting a failed port install and a log was mentioned in the error, please use the I have files to attach to this ticket checkbox to add that log file to the ticket.
This is a short overview of the guidelines for Trac tickets. Please see below for longer and more detailed explanations.
Example: openssl @1.0.1e_1+universal: DTLS handshake error messages with openconnect
Describe your problem. Preformatted text (such as terminal
output) should be put in
{{{. Please attach large
amounts of output rather than pasting. Use the preview
|Use normal or low. High is reserved for MacPorts developers.
|Leave empty.
|The version of MacPorts you are running.
maintainer if you are the port's
haspatch if you are attaching
a patch. Full
|The name of the port affected by this ticket. Separate multiple using spaces. Leave empty for non-port tickets.
|Full email address or GitHub username of the port's
maintainer. Run port info --maintainer
<portname> to
look this up. Do not add
<email@example.com> or
<email@example.com>. For ports with
multiple maintainers, only put the first maintainer into the
Owner field and all others in the
Cc field. You do not need to Cc
There are certain conventions used to ensure that Trac tickets convey as much accurate information as possible so problems and contributions may be acted upon efficiently.
Example: "rrdtool @1.2.23 +python Configure error - build failure"
Description: All details that might
be relevant to someone reading the ticket. Be sure to mention
the versions of your operating system and Xcode install. Wiki
formatting should be used to ensure that text is formatted
correctly. Use the Preview button before submitting. If you want to
post preformatted text such as a log or terminal output, make sure
you use
around the text or it could break the page layout. Example:
your error message here
Submitters are advised to trim inline pastes and logs to what's really relevant to the report, as otherwise overly large ticket pages can become unmanageable. Long output, such as the full log from a port build, should be added as an attachment, not pasted inline. See I have files to attach to this ticket below.
Type: There are five types of tickets.
defect - The default; any port/MacPorts build/runtime failures and/or documentation corrections.
enhancement - Tickets, with or without patches, created to enhance something that isn't failing its intended purpose.
update - Tickets, with or without patches, involving updating a port to a newer upstream version.
submission - Tickets created to submit Portfiles for software not currently available in MacPorts.
request - Tickets created to request the creation of a new port.
Priority: Assign a priority level to the ticket.
High - Reserved for the use of MacPorts team members, as they are the best fit to determine which reports warrant a higher priority over others.
Normal - The default. For normal port failures, non-critical enhancement requests, non-critical port failures.
Low - For mostly cosmetic improvements, documentation corrections/improvements, etc.
Not set - Anything that doesn't fit the categories high, normal, or low.
Milestone: Leave this blank. MacPorts developers will set this to the version of MacPorts that contains a fix for the ticket when they commit a change. Note that this is only meaningful for changes in MacPorts itself, since changes to ports are continuously provided to users. If the milestone is MacPorts Future no version of MacPorts with the fix has been released yet.
Component: Set what part of the MacPorts Project the ticket is to be filed against.
base - Tickets related to MacPorts base code.
guide - Documentation enhancements and error corrections, or patches to the MacPorts Guide.
ports - Tickets related to ports.
server/hosting - For MacPorts hosting & server-side issues.
website - MacPorts website enhancements and error corrections.
wiki - MacPorts Wiki enhancements and error corrections.
Version: Select the MacPorts version you are using when it is applicable.
Keywords: Type any keywords that might help when searching for tickets. It is not useful to list words here that already appear elsewhere in the ticket. Keywords also serve as tags; for example, use "tiger" if reporting a bug that only affects Mac OS X 10.4, "haspatch" if a fix is attached to the ticket, "maintainer" if you are the port's maintainer, or "LP64" if reporting an issue that only affects 64-bit platforms.
See the TicketsKeywordGuidelines wiki page for a clickable list of all keywords.
Cc: Anyone else besides the ticket reporter
and assignee who would like to be kept involved in the development
of the ticket. Multiple email addresses or GitHub usernames should
be separated with a comma and a space (e.g.,
firstname.lastname@example.com, email@example.com).
When reporting port-related tickets, make sure you add the port
maintainers email address or GitHub username to the
Cc: field so they are notified of the ticket
(unless you have commit access, then see Assign
To: below). You can obtain the email address or GitHub
username of the port maintainer by running port info
Assign To:
For tickets on ports, enter the email address or GitHub username of
the port's maintainer (use port info
[port] to find this). If
multiple maintainers are listed, enter the first maintainer's email
address or GitHub username here and enter the remaining
maintainers' email addresses or GitHub usernames in the
Cc field. Exclude the email address
<firstname.lastname@example.com> if it appears. If the
maintainer's email address is
<email@example.com>, leave the field
Only project members and the reporter of a ticket can edit this field.
Port: For tickets on ports, enter the name of the port (or ports, space-separated, when multiple are affected).
I have files to attach to this ticket: Use this checkbox to attach files to the ticket immediately after you create it. Or you can attach files later using the Attach File button.
If the file you are attaching is larger than 256 KiB, please compress it with bzip2 or gzip first to save space on the server and bandwidth for those downloading it, as Trac will not preview files above that size anyway.
The MacPorts project uses the Git distributed version control system to manage the code for the entire project. Our master repositories are hosted on GitHub.
We maintain public repositories for almost all our project code and documentation, including a GitHub repository for the MacPorts system itself, for the MacPorts ports, and even for the guide you are reading right now.
If you're not familiar with Git and need an introduction, we recommend the book Pro Git, by Scott Chacon and Ben Straub. The book is available for free online, and is published under a Creative Commons license.
You should feel free to fork any of our code repositories, make improvements to the code, and contribute them back to us via a GitHub pull request. We are grateful for improvements to absolutely everything, including new ports, fixes to ports, improvements to our base software, improvements to our documentation and our web site, or anything else you see.
The main steps for submitting a pull request are:
Make your changes in your own Git repository:
Fork the appropriate repository, say macports-ports.
Create a branch for your changes.
Make your changes.
For changes to ports and code, please follow the information elsewhere in this guide, and test your changes carefully.
Changes to Portfiles should also pass port lint.
Commit your changes to your branch, making sure to follow the MacPorts standard for commit messages.
Be sure to rebase your changes so as to minimize the number of commits. Ideally, you should have just one.
(There are exceptions. If you have several unrelated fixes, or you're changing multiple packages, etc., you might need more than one commit. The point is to minimize them, ideally with one commit per logical change.)
Push the change branch to your own GitHub repository.
Make a pull request from your branch in your own git repository to the appropriate MacPorts repository.
You can do this on the appropriate GitHub page. For example, you can request a pull of a Portfile on the macports-ports repository pull request page.
Go through the process of waiting for the CI system to build your new port, receiving feedback from our team, possibly being asked to make changes to your requested pull, and making those changes. (If you are asked for additional changes, please squash them to avoid unnecessary commits.)
We try to process pull requests very quickly. If you do not
see activity on your request within a few days, please feel free
to get in touch with us on the
<email@example.com> mailing list to
request a review and/or commit. Please include a link to the pull
request in your email.
You may contribute new ports and enhancements of any kind to already existing ports using Trac tickets. However, we prefer that you open a pull request on GitHub, in which case no Trac ticket is required.
The GitHub pull request method is strongly preferred over submitting Trac tickets. Submitting a Pull Request will likely result in your contribution being merged into MacPorts much faster, as the workflow is much easier for the maintainers.
Ports are contributed by following these steps. See the Ticket Submission Guidelines for a description of all fields.
Please run
port lint --nitpick $portname
$portname is the name of the port you
are submitting. Please fix any warnings and errors.
Either submit the new port through a pull request on GitHub...
...or create a Trac ticket.
Set the type to submission.
Set the component to ports.
Set the port field to the name of the new port.
Attach the
Portfile and any required
patchfiles to the ticket.
If your ticket or pull request doesn't receive any attention within a few days
you may send an email to
<firstname.lastname@example.com> and request a
review and/or commit. Please include a link to the ticket or pull request.
Enhancements to existing ports may comprise new functionality for
a given port, bug fixes or even simple version updates. They should
always be contributed as patches against the current
Portfile. See the Ticket Submission Guidelines for
a description of all fields.
Create a
Portfile patch with your changes.
See Portfile Development for
more information on how to edit Portfiles.
Please run
port lint --nitpick $portname
$portname is the name of the port you
modified. Please fix any warnings and errors before submitting your
Either submit the port update through a pull request on GitHub...
...or create a Trac ticket.
Set the type to enhancement for miscellaneous enhancements, to defect for bug fixes, or to update for version updates.
Set the component to ports.
Set the port field to the name of the port you want to change.
Put the maintainer's email address or GitHub username into the Cc field. You can use
port info --maintainer $portname
$portname is the name of the port you
want to modify. Note that
<email@example.com> and
<firstname.lastname@example.com> are not real people and should thus not be Cc'd.
Attach your Portfile patch file and any new or changed patch files to the ticket.
If your ticket or pull request doesn't receive any attention within a few days
you may send an email to
<email@example.com> and request a
review and/or commit. Please include a link to the ticket or pull request.
MacPorts is always looking for people that want to take care of a certain package. If you notice an outdated port, a bug in a port or simply a port without maintainer that you are interested in, feel free to volunteer as maintainer. To become a maintainer you need:
An email address and a GitHub account.
A copy of the
Portfile. Do not worry if
you don't know where to find one yet. There's more documentation
on that below.
An account in the MacPorts Trac, (you'll log in with your GitHub account).
Interest in the software you want to maintain and some time.
You do not need:
Commit access to the MacPorts repository. Instead, you open pull requests in GitHub (or create patches and open tickets in Trac.) You can, however, apply for commit access once you have some experience in maintaining ports. In fact, we would like to encourage you to apply after a few months.
Expert knowledge of the software you want to maintain or
experience in
Portfile programming. You can
pick those up along the way. Your knowledge about the software
you want to maintain is probably more than what most other
MacPorts developers have, given the number of ports MacPorts has.
Consult Chapter 4, Portfile Development chapter and Chapter 5, Portfile Reference on how to write
Portfile. If your questions are not
answered there, please ask on the
<email@example.com> mailing
To become the maintainer of a port, first check whether the port already has a maintainer. Run
port info --maintainer $portname
$portname is the name of the port you want
to maintain. If the output is
the port is unmaintained and you are more than welcome to take it over. If the output lists a different email address, you can still co-maintain the port, but you should contact the existing maintainer(s) first.
Once you have verified that a port is unmaintained or the existing maintainer has invited you to co-maintain the port of your choice, follow these steps to become a maintainer:
Locate the port's directory and make a copy. MacPorts can help
you locate the directory that contains the
Portfile by running
port dir
$portname. Copy this directory to a separate location
(so you can easily generate a patch later) that is readable by the
macports user. In general, your home directory does not fulfill
that requirement, but
/var/tmp does.
cp -r $(port dir $portname) /var/tmp
/var/tmp for the new directory. In most
cases, its name should be equal to the name of the port you want to
maintain. In those few cases where it is not (i.e., the so-called
subports feature is used), check the output of
port dir $portname for the correct name.
Change to the new directory and run
info to make sure everything went right. Note that
running any port command without a port name tries to use the
Portfile in the current directory. This is
very helpful when testing modifications or new ports, so keep this
in mind.
cd /var/tmp/$portname
port info
If you don't see info output for the port, but an error message instead, it will usually be in the following form:
Can't map the URL 'file://.' to a port description file ("couldn't read file "Portfile": permission denied"). Please verify that the directory and portfile syntax are correct. To use the current port, you must be in a port's directory.
Pay attention to the part in the brackets in the first line. It
will either contain a permission problem (in which case you need to
adjust the permissions of your
Portfile and
the folders leading up to it), or a Tcl error message, in case of
syntax errors in the
Portfile. Also check that
the copy of the working directory is in fact the current working
directory in your shell.
Open the
Portfile in your favorite editor
and look for the line that starts with
nomaintainer from the line if it exists and
add your own email address and GitHub username, grouped together
with curly braces. Email addresses should be written in the form
domain.tld:localpart. (The address is
obfuscated to prevent email harvesters from automatically grabbing
your address.) For GitHub usernames, prefix your username with an
@ sign. For example, if your email address is
email@example.com and your GitHub username
jverne, your entry on the
maintainers line should read
{example.org:julesverne @jverne}.
At this point, please read Section 7.4.1, "Non-Maintainer Port Updates" and
familiarize yourself with the meaning of
openmaintainer. Consider adding
openmaintainer to speed up and simplify small
updates of your port. If you decided to allow minor updates without
consultation, add
openmaintainer, separated
with a space, to the
maintainer line of the
Once you are done, save the file and verify the
Portfile structure using MacPorts' builtin
lint check:
port lint --nitpick
You will likely see at least one error:
Error: Portfile parent directory tmp does not match primary category $XYZ
You can safely ignore this message. It is
printed because the copy of the port's directory is not in
a directory named after the port's primary category, but in
/var/tmp instead. Please try to address all
other warnings and error messages, though. If you need help, feel
free to continue and add a note to the ticket you will
create asking for instructions.
Finally, run
port info again. The
maintainers line in the output should now contain your email
address or GitHub username.
If you made changes other than the maintainer line, you might
want to test build and installation as well. To do that, run
sudo port destroot in the port's
directory. If you see
Error: Unable to execute port: Could not open file: /private/var/tmp/somewhere/Portfile
check the permissions of the
Portfile and
all folders above it. They must be readable by the
macports user. The easiest way to ensure this is to run
chmod -R go+rX /var/tmp/$portname
If the port fails to build, see the
main.log referenced in the error message for
details. If the build completes successfully, run
port clean to clean up all leftovers.
Create a patch from the changes you made to the
Portfile and possible related files. To do that, run
diff -ru $(port dir $portname) . > change-$portname-maintainer.diff
in the directory where you edited the
Portfile. You can inspect the generated
unified diff in
change-$portname-maintainer.diff if you
If you are only changing the maintainer, file a pull request on GitHub.
You may also
file a new ticket in
Trac to change the maintainer, though GitHub pull requests are preferred.
Set type to
enhancement. Leave the
milestone field empty. If you added yourself
as co-maintainer, add the other maintainers in the
Cc field. Finally, fill in the
port field, set keywords
haspatch (because you are attaching
a patch), check the box that you want to attach files to the ticket
and submit. After submission, attach the patch you created in the
previous step.
If you are also fixing a bug, make a separate commit
for that in your pull request, or attach a separate patch for that
change to the same ticket. If you are fixing a bug that already has
a ticket, attach a patch fixing the bug there and file the
maintainer change in a separate ticket (with a separate patch) as
discussed above. In general, please create a separate patch for
each semantic change. Doing so simplifies reviewing. It enables
each independent change to be accepted without worries about
conflicts that sometimes arise when several changes are rolled into
one patch. Do not worry that you cannot change the
keywords to
haspatch on
existing tickets.
If your pull request or ticket doesn't receive any attention within a few days
you may send an email to
<firstname.lastname@example.com> and request
a review and/or commit. Please include a link to the pull
request or ticket.
Once you are the maintainer for a port, all new pull requests
and tickets for this port will be assigned to you.
You are expected to take a look at these pull requests and
tickets, give advice and try to debug problems. If you are stuck, do
not hesitate to ask on the
<firstname.lastname@example.com> list.
Port maintainers normally are given commit privileges to the Git repository so they can make updates to their own ports as described in Section 7.6, "MacPorts Membership". However, The MacPorts Project does not restrict commit privileges for maintainers, so before a person other than a port's maintainer updates a port it is a good practice to inform a port's maintainer. See details below.
If you have a port update or bugfix for a port you do not maintain, to respect the rights of the port maintainer you should follow the following guidelines:
If a port's maintainer is
<firstname.lastname@example.com>, you may feel free to make
updates and/or take maintainership of the port.
If a port's maintainer contains the address
<firstname.lastname@example.com>, this means that the
author allows minor updates to the port by other committers without
contacting them
first. But permission should still be sought for major
Committers are expected to investigate as thoroughly as necessary to confirm that an update is in fact minor. Some projects have made quite major changes with only a tiny change to the version number. And of course a committer should always verify that a port not only builds but works correctly after a change, before pushing it.
Pull requests for maintained ports should not be merged by anyone other than their creator or the port maintainer until the 72-hour timeout period has passed, even if the port is openmaintainer. This is because the change is either from a non-committer, or from a committer who could have just pushed the change directly, and by opening a PR is signalling a desire to have the change reviewed by the maintainer.
Create patch file(s) as necessary, attach them to a Trac ticket, and assign the ticket to the maintainer (or Cc the maintainer, if you are unable to assign tickets).
Wait for a response from the maintainer. The maintainer should apply the patches and close the ticket within 72 hours.
However, for maintained ports without
<firstname.lastname@example.com>, there are some conditions
under which maintainer permission may be waived:
If the maintainer does not respond within 72 hours, you or
another committer may review the patches and update the port. The log
message of this commit must explain that you are taking advantage of
maintainer timeout and include a reference to the ticket. If you are
not a committer you may send an email to
<email@example.com> and request the
updates be committed.
A port is abandoned by its current maintainer. A port against which a Port Abandoned ticket has been filed (see below) can be updated without contacting the maintainer.
A critical port is broken that affects many users.
A port may be considered abandoned if any of the following apply:
A bug has not been acknowledged for more than three weeks after a ticket is filed.
All tickets filed against the port have been resolved with no input from the maintainer, after the 72-hour timeout, for a significant period of time (at least three weeks). This needs to involve a reasonable number of tickets; one timeout doesn't make a port abandoned.
The listed maintainer address bounces, and no alternate way of contacting the maintainer is known.
If you wish to initiate the Port Abandonment protocol and optionally volunteer as the new maintainer:
File a new Trac ticket with the summary line: [Port Abandoned] portname.
The ticket should be assigned to the maintainer. Non-macports team members should Cc the maintainer.
Set the ticket Type to Defect.
In the Description field, refer to any unacknowledged ticket(s).
In the Port field, indicate which port is abandoned.
The Port Abandoned ticket may be closed when the new maintainer is assigned, and the original ticket(s) with the updates may be resolved as usual. The former maintainer should be removed from all other tickets on which they were assigned as owner. The Port Abandoned ticket should stay open for the usual 72-hour timeout period, to give the maintainer one last chance to indicate that they have not actually abandoned the port.
The sources for this guide are kept in a Git repository on GitHub. If you spot any error or outdated information, you are encouraged to submit a pull request following the steps outlined below.
git clone https://github.com/macports/macports-guide.git
cd macports-guide
git remote add
Install the required ports:
sudo port install libxslt docbook-xsl
For each change you want to make:
Make your changes to the file in the
guide/xml/ directory that corresponds to the
section you want to make changes to.
$EDITOR guide/xml/
Verify your changes are still valid XML. If the make validate command reports errors, fix the XML sources until you see no more error messages
make validate
Convert the guide to HTML and view the new version in your browser.
make guide
open guide/html/index.html
Commit your changes to the local branch and describe your changes in the commit message. See also our wiki page CommitMessages that explains how to write good commit messages.
git commit -a
A requirement for a person to become a MacPorts committer is to first become involved and contribute to the project. This may be done by having a record of contribution to the project in several of the following ways:
Contributing new ports.
Fixing bugs in existing ports.
Volunteering as a maintainer of non-maintained ports.
Involvement on MacPorts development and/or user support mailing lists.
Contributing with documentation.
To apply for MacPorts commit rights, send a brief email to the
PortMgr team at
<firstname.lastname@example.com> entitled
"Commit access:
Your Name" with the
following contents:
a description of your application and why you think you deserve commit rights. Include evidence of contributions to MacPorts as described above; at best add direct links to Trac tickets or Trac searches that make the review easier for the PortMgr team.
your github username. This will be used as the identity the
"handle", as part of your
a real e-mail address to which you'd like your MacPorts alias to forward.
The PortMgr team will consider all applications and provide an appropriate response as soon as they get to it.
The MacPorts PortMgr team is the steering group for The MacPorts Project. Its membership is usually determined by public elections among project members; the current members of the team can be found on the MacPorts Developers wiki page.
They are responsible for matters such as:
approving new project members (i.e., granting commit rights);
setting general guidelines for the project;
dispute resolution;
managing the projects infrastructure; and
engineering releases.
This section defines a number of words which may be new to the reader. These are all defined in the context of Macports instead of as general purpose definition.
A checksum is a small piece of data, derived from an original that can be used to ensure that two files are identical.
A system for compiling, installing, and managing free and open source software comprised of an infrastructure called MacPorts base and a collection of ports. MacPorts current port collection defines the software may be installed.