[MacPorts] #20176: Make the macfuse port play well with other macfuse installations

[MacPorts]

#20176: Make the macfuse port play well with other macfuse installations
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 Reporter:  registrera@…          |       Owner:  dports@…           
     Type:  enhancement           |      Status:  new                
 Priority:  Normal                |   Milestone:                     
Component:  ports                 |     Version:  1.7.1              
 Keywords:                        |        Port:  macfuse            
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Changes (by dports@…):

  * owner:  dports@… => dports@…


Comment:

 I'm not sure what to about this one. Normally I would just agree with Ryan
 that

 > It's not appropriate for software installed with MacPorts to have its
 own automatic updater. MacPorts is the method by which software installed
 with MacPorts should be updated. If the port is outdated, its maintainer
 should update it.

 ...and so we should just expect people not to install MacFUSE outside of
 MacPorts. (Indeed, it's best by far if they don't.) For most ports I'd
 just leave it at that.

 I do understand why people are suggesting macfuse might be an exceptional
 case, because it installs files outside of $prefix (the kernel extension
 and a framework in /Library/Frameworks). And, besides the autoupdate
 mechanism, there are various programs that ship a copy of MacFUSE (VMware
 Fusion comes to mind).

 I'm not sure what we can do about it, if anything's even possible. It
 doesn't really make sense to have multiple installations, since they're
 going to conflict on the kernel extension if nothing else. And any user-
 space file system daemons need to be built against the right version of
 the fuse library.

 The approach the developers seem to recommend is to always have the latest
 version installed to avoid conflicts. It probably doesn't matter so much
 whether this is achieved through autoupdate or through keeping the port up
 to date. This ticket was created at a time when the macfuse port
 significantly lagged behind upstream (because 2.0 introduced a different
 build system). In that world, I could easily see problems if you had
 MacFUSE 1.x installed via MacPorts, and some fuse filesystem ports that
 depended on 1.x, and MacFUSE 2.0 and some non-port filesystems that use
 it. Now that the port is up to date, this should be less of a problem.

 I am rambling. I guess I'm really wondering if this is still a problem now
 that the port is updated to 2.0. If not, it may be best (certainly
 easiest!) to just leave things as is. Otherwise it may be worth making the
 macfuse port check for an existing installation.

-- 
Ticket URL: <http://trac.macports.org/ticket/20176#comment:14>
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