Newbie Port Creator Questions

[Jonathan Strine]

All,

I am working on creating ports for a few applications.  I have  
created and submitted my first one just yesterday (libelf-0.8.9).  I  
am now working on my second (dynamips-0.2.7), but have a few  
questions I'm hoping someone can answer (not all relating to just  
dynamips-0.2.7).

1)  I have successfully created a variant of dynamips using pcap.   
The process was rather simple.  However, I am debating the creation  
of a third variant.  A third party developer has created a source  
code patch that extends a certain function of dynamips in a useful  
way.  Is it appropriate to include such a third party modification as  
a variant to a port?

2)  In the case above, the third party patch file is written to be  
applied from the directory above the source code (I think this would  
be called the work directory) and not from inside the dynamips-0.2.7  
directory created when the tarball is extracted.  The best I can  
figure is that the patching phase does apply the patch while in this  
source directory (dynamips-0.2.7) and not from the work directory.   
It is possible to make it apply the patch from the work directory so  
that I do not have to modify the third party patch file for this  
variant?

3)  The third party patch is licensed under the GPLv2 license.  Are  
there any general concerns that I should worry about in either case  
where I use the patch file as is or in the case where I modify it?

4)  If I cannot patch from the work directory, is it considered OK to  
modify the third party patch file to support patching from inside the  
dynamips-0.2.7 directory?

5)  What is the best practice to make sure that during all the steps  
I am only referencing libraries and dependencies from the macports  
system and not accidentally compiling against pre-installed system  
libraries?  I have run "port -d install foo" and read through the  
output, but I want to double check that I am not missing anything.

I realize the above questions may be somewhat basic, but I'm hoping  
that armed with the answers I can make some valuable contributions to  
the vast library of ports available.

Thanks!

--
Jonathan Strine
PGP Key ID:  0x0A02201C