[24832] trunk/base/src/port/port.tcl

[Boey Maun Suang]

>>> Why ~/.macports/.history and not ~/.macports/history (why a .file  
>>> in a .dir)?
>>>
>>
>> Well, my reasoning may have been a bit lame, but it seemed like  
>> since it's not normally a file anybody wants to read (while there  
>> are other files in ~/.macports that they do) that it was just as  
>> well to keep it hidden and out of the way.
>
> I'd just as soon have it visible. On the off chance I _did_ want to  
> look at it, I'd never have thought to look for a dot-file there.

+1 from me on the latter view; furthermore, every other program that  
I've run that made a ~/.blah directory (elinks, mplayer, gnupg,  
subversion, tor, ssh, wireshark, etc., etc.) creates all its files in  
~/.blah without a leading dot.

>>> And while I'm asking why not use ~/Library/Application Support/ 
>>> Macports instead of ~/.macports? Isn't it the Apple way to use  
>>> the Library instead of .dirs?
>>
>> Very good question. I'd be happy to hear feedback from other  
>> developers. I'd happy with either.
>
> I would say that, in an ideal world, MacPorts configuration would  
> go in Application Support instead of a dot-file. However, almost  
> everything that MacPorts installs has its configuration in dot- 
> files. It would be inconsistent to put MacPorts configuration in a  
> different place from all of these.

To me, Library/Application Support is the place where Cocoa apps put  
things, while Unixish apps, especially command-line ones, use dot- 
files and dot-directories, so I'd stick with ~/.macports.

Kind regards,


Maun Suang

-- 
Boey Maun Suang (Boey is my surname)
Email: boeyms at macports.org