error installing cogito

[Ryan Schmidt]

On Apr 20, 2008, at 7:09 PM, Bryan Blackburn wrote:

[about the Leopard problem where some ports fail to install properly  
with a seemingly endless variety of bizarre error messages if  
installing them causes a dependency to be installed first, but the  
port succeeds if you try the install a second time (because now it  
has no dependencies to install)]

> Actually, it has something to do with the way the environment is  
> setup and cleaned between stages within MacPorts.  I've been trying  
> to figure out whether this is a tcl bug, or something specific to  
> the Mac OS X install of 8.4.7 (as of 10.5.2), since I can't make it  
> happen with 8.5.2.
>
> The basic issue is best demonstrated with a bit of code (first with  
> the Mac-default 8.4.7):
>
> % puts $env(CC)
> can't read "env(CC)": no such variable
> % set env(CC) "gcc"
> gcc
> % puts $env(CC)
> gcc
> % array unset env *
> % puts $env(CC)
>
> % puts [array get env]
> ... CC {} ...
>
> Note how CC in the environment is now blank, but still exists,  
> after the 'array unset env *' (and if you run this yourself, you'll  
> see all the environment variables in that last command are {}).

Confirmed with Apple-provided tcl 8.4.7 on 10.5.2.

> What it should do, and did (I believe) on 10.4 and does with 8.5.2:
>
> % puts $env(CC)
> can't read "env(CC)": no such variable
> % set env(CC) "gcc"
> gcc
> % puts $env(CC)
> gcc
> % array unset env *
> % puts $env(CC)
> can't read "env(CC)": no such variable
> % puts [array get env]
>
> Here, after 'array unset env *' CC is no longer set in the  
> environment.  Which is how it should work.  Note also, the last  
> command doesn't show all env vars as empty but nothing there.

Confirmed with Apple-provided tcl 8.4.7 on 10.4.11.
Confirmed with MacPorts tcl 8.5.2 on 10.4.11.
Confirmed with MacPorts tcl 8.5.2 on 10.5.2.

> We can't use 'array unset env' as that is documented to disconnect  
> Tcl from the environment, and some messing around hasn't shown a  
> clean way to work around this.  Maybe a Tcl expert is needed, and  
> determining if this is Mac-specific or 8.4.7; of course, either  
> way, we have to deal with it.
>
> FYI, this is done in portutil.tcl (base/src/port1.0/) in proc  
> command_exec.

Thanks for the analysis! I added a link to your explanation to http:// 
trac.macports.org/wiki/LeopardProblems

Do we really not have a macports base ticket for this issue yet? I  
couldn't find one but maybe I'm searching wrong. We need one so that  
we can mark all the other port bugs that are cropping up as  
duplicates of it.