reasons for `port provides` not working?

[Clemens Lang]

Hi,

----- On 10 Oct, 2016, at 15:11, René J.V. Bertin rjvbertin at gmail.com wrote:

> I've been bitten once too often by an oversight that I c/should have seen if
> `port provides` worked. It's not been working for me for a long time, and
> mostly I don't really miss it, but now I'd like to figure out if there's a way
> to get this feature online again.
> 
> Without reinstalling from scratch, of course.
> 
> What could this be related to?

IIRC the problem was that your installation mangled paths somehow, either by
making /opt/local a symlink or some other uncommon configuration.

> FWIW, I do get a proper error when a port tries to install a file already
> installed by another file, so a priori the information is all there.

You'll forgive me when I just tell you that problems caused by unsupported
modifications made by you locally are not supported by MacPorts. I won't spend
any time diagnosing this unless you can show that it's broken in a fresh
install.

-- 
Clemens Lang