How to handle Case-sensitive files?

[Michael Dickens]

On Wed, 23 Jun 2010 19:47 -0500, "Ryan Schmidt"
<ryandesign at macports.org> wrote:
> > Is it possible to add a check into the code: if the file system is flat
> > & then if a file of the same name has already been added (for this port
> > being activated, or some other port), and if for this port, then print
> > out a warning about this issues & how it might effect upgrading or
> > removing the port & how to move to using sqlite?  Or, something to that
> > effect -- just some obvious warning so that I, as the end user, might
> > have a clue of the issue and what to do about it.  That would be greatly
> > useful for folks such as myself who really have no idea of the inner
> > workings of 'port' and MacPorts in general. - MLD
> 
> That's pretty specialized.
> 
> Any port that tries to install items that differ only in case is already
> broken, since most Mac users have case-insensitive filesystems. Port
> maintainers need to be fixing these problems and reporting them for
> fixing upstream.

Agreed on both fronts.  That said: I can say at least for qt4-mac that
there is no way I'd have known that there was a case-sensitivity issue
without deactivating and then reactivating it -- there are just too many
files being installed for me to look through all of them.  I'm sure
there are other ports like qt4-mac, with loads of files making it
difficult for anyone to check for case-sensitivity.  Hence, IMHO, the
need for the warning.  That said, if it's really a big deal to add the
warning, then just having a wiki page addressing the issue is better
than nothing.

Thanks for your prompt replies.  Now back to fixing the qt4-mac variety
ports to deal with those files. - MLD