MacPorts custom installation prefix and precompiled binaries

[Steven Smith]

> You can use any prefix you want, precompiled binaries or no. Just go ahead and do it.

Well, almost. There’s this caveat:

> Options for MacPorts general operating characteristics.
> 
> prefix
> 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.
> 
> Default: /opt/local
> 


Someday, one hopes that there will be a cleanup of all the tcl code that breaks for prefix paths with spaces and non-ascii characters, but that’s aspirational, not reality.


> On Aug 7, 2022, at 07:57, Steven Smith <steve.t.smith at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> You can use any prefix you want, precompiled binaries or no. Just go ahead and do it.
> 
> It appears that you may be misinterpreting the docs. This page simply tells devs not to do stuff with installers that will conflict with existing files in /opt/local: https://guide.macports.org/#using.binaries.binary-packages
> 
> That doesn’t affect you as a user.
> 
> 
>>> On Aug 7, 2022, at 03:29, Jordan Ellis Coppard via macports-dev <macports-dev at lists.macports.org> wrote:
>>> 
>> Hello,
>> 
>> 
>> I read in the docs that if MacPorts is installed anywhere other than /opt/local that precompiled binaries can not be used. I cannot find this statement again so I am unsure if there was additional explanation for why; so.. why?
>> 
>> I'd like to be able to use MacPorts at a custom prefix but still also use precompiled binaries sometimes (particularly those using Rust) due to the incredibly long compilation times.
>> 
>> 
>> /Jordan
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