libiconv problems after urxvt upgrade

[Joerg van den Hoff]

during upgrade from urxvt8.7 to the current version I got the error message

===================================CUT========================================
Portfile changed since last build; discarding previous state.
--->  Fetching libiconv
--->  Verifying checksum(s) for libiconv
--->  Extracting libiconv
--->  Applying patches to libiconv
--->  Configuring libiconv
--->  Building libiconv with target all
--->  Staging libiconv into destroot
--->  Packaging tgz archive for libiconv 1.12_0+darwin_8
--->  Deactivating libiconv 1.11_0
Error: Deactivating libiconv 1.11_0 failed: Active version of libiconv is not 1.11_0 but 1.11_0+darwin_8.
===================================CUT========================================
after which install proceded (apparently successful).

trying to start `urxvt' now throws the error:
===================================CUT========================================
dyld: Library not loaded: /opt/local/lib/libiconv.2.dylib
Referenced from: /opt/local/lib/libXft.2.dylib
Reason: Incompatible library version: libXft.2.dylib requires version 7.0.0
or later, but libiconv.2.dylib provides version 5.0.0 Trace/BPT trap
===================================CUT========================================

trying a

`sudo port deactivate libiconv at 1.11_0+darwin_8'

yielded
===================================CUT========================================
Error: port deactivate failed: Registry error: libiconv not registered as
installed & active.
===================================CUT========================================
which seems inconsistent with the error message during urxvt install.

after a `sudo port activate libiconv at 1.12' now everything seems to work, but
the above messages seems to hint at some grade of corruption of the internal state of
port. is this the case? can I sanitize/check it somehow without purging
everything?

I also notice that many packages appear both with
`port list active' _and_ `port list inactive'. how can this be?

and a last question: the "active" ports are the only one in use or are 
"inactive" ones (especially libs) secretly used by other ports? I noted
that a tentative 

 `sudo port uninstall libiconv at 1.11_0+darwin_8'

showed me lots of ports depending on it which would need prior uninstall.
I understand that different versions of libs are needed at the same time but
why, then, is one declared "active" the others "inactive"?

so in short what's the difference between "active" and "inactive", especially
for libs?


joerg