Standardizing a MacPorts system

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Jan 3, 2008, at 14:17, Tabitha McNerney wrote:

> I would like to build, from source, on an Xserve running Leopard  
> Server, a "standard" MacPorts system that could be deployed, in an  
> organization, on numerous other Apple servers running the same  
> version of the OS ( e.g. Leopard Server). In doing so I would use  
> Apple's command-line tools (such as hdiutil and asr) create a  
> restorable disk image (.dmg) file of a disc volume that hangs off  
> an external disk on my original Xserve which houses the MacPorts  
> prefix ( e.g., /opt/local). I would then restore from this disc  
> image to the additional machines slated to be the recipients of the  
> original standard.
>
> I don't see any immediate problems in doing so, however I have  
> noticed when installing some ports (when I have occasionally  
> enabled verbose mode "-v" during the install), depending on the  
> port, some ports seem to take into consideration the Hostname of  
> the Xserve I'm running it on. On my Xserve running Leopard Server,  
> the Hostname is very importantly tied to the DNS name because I am  
> running Apple's DNS server that is buncled with Leopard Server  
> since I need it for other services on the machine which are not  
> directly related to MacPorts such as running an OpenDirectory  
> Master. The problem is, with hundreds of MacPorts tied together and  
> with complex dependency chains, how can anyone determine when a  
> specific MacPort reads the hostname and uses the hostname of the  
> machine during the configuration process (unless a sys admin such  
> as myself builds each and every port with verbose mode and analysis  
> the output grepping for the hostname)? It might be problematic if  
> the hostname of any given MacPort somehow becomes "hard wired" into  
> the port itself during the configuration / install processing. Then  
> again, I might be making a mountain out of a mole hill.
>
> Has anyone else built a Standardized MacPorts system that is cloned  
> to multiple Macs?

I wasn't aware that any ports tied themselves to the build system's  
hostname. That would be problematic as well if we started to  
distribute binaries of ports. Then again, I'm only familiar with a  
small minority of our ports collection.

With which ports have you observed this problem?