what configuration files are read?

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Dec 31, 2007, at 06:48, Michael Stillwell wrote:

> How does "port" figure out which configuration files to read?  Mine  
> is now trying to get configuration information from a non-existent  
> file: I have a (source-compiled) version installed in /Ports, and  
> then installed another temporary version into $HOME/scratch/ports  
> (via ./configure --prefix=$HOME/scratch/ports, to see whether a  
> dependency problem with ncursesw had been fixed).  Running /Ports/ 
> bin/port now produces an error message:
>
> boom:~$ /Ports/bin/port --help
> sources_conf must be set in /Users/mjs/scratch/ports/etc/macports/ 
> macports.conf or in your /Users/mjs/.macports/macports.conf file
>     while executing
> "mportinit ui_options global_options global_variations"
> Error: /Ports/bin/port: Failed to initialize MacPorts, sources_conf  
> must be set in /Users/mjs/scratch/ports/etc/macports/macports.conf  
> or in your /Users/mjs/.macports/macports.conf file
>
> Where is it getting the "scratch" directory from?  There's nothing  
> in $HOME/.macports except for a history file, and there's nothing  
> in my environment either.  /Ports/bin/ports itself appears to be  
> unchanged, and rgrep over the /Ports directory gives nothing as well.
>
> Also, why does "make install" require root privileges?  I tried to  
> install without "sudo" to try to prevent the temporary install from  
> making changes to my existing configuration files, but it won't  
> actually install this way.

There are two things going on here.


Issue #1: The reason why your two installations are conflicting with  
one another is that they both installed their Tcl components to / 
Library/Tcl/macports1.0, and the $HOME/scratch/ports instalation's / 
Library/Tcl/macports1.0 has overwritten the one from $HOME/Ports.

There has been discussion of moving the directory /Library/Tcl/ 
macports1.0 to ${prefix}/share/macports/Tcl:

http://lists.macosforge.org/pipermail/macports-dev/2007-August/ 
002491.html

You could bypass all the arguments and just do it yourself. You  
should reinstall both of your installations (or at least the /Ports  
one, since its /Library/Tcl/macports1.0 is gone), making sure that at  
least one, or perhaps both, of them put their Tcl directory  
elsewhere, for example:

PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/sbin ./configure \
--prefix=$HOME/Ports \
--with-tclpackage=$HOME/Ports/share/macports/Tcl

And for the other installation:

PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/sbin:/bin:/sbin ./configure \
--prefix=$HOME/scratch/ports \
--with-tclpackage=$HOME/scratch/ports/share/macports/Tcl

See this message where this question came up before:

http://lists.macosforge.org/pipermail/macports-users/2007-December/ 
007690.html

Though note that Daniel's suggested location for the Tcl directory is  
worse; ${prefix}/share/macports/Tcl already contains other MacPorts  
Tcl code, so that's the directory that should be used.


Issue #2: Issue #1 would also be a reason why you could not install  
without root. You should be able to install without root, provided  
you install to a location you control. And you are. But, even doing  
so, we get a failure, for which I have filed a bug report:

http://trac.macosforge.org/projects/macports/ticket/13766