port variants or different port

[Lawrence Velázquez]

On Jan 2, 2012, at 2:38 p.m., Shiyuan wrote:

>    1. I want to write a portfile for install the package auctex for emacs.

There's already a port called "auctex", if you haven't seen it already.

> I have two emacs installed, one is Emacs.app(Cocoa), the other is emacs(for non-graphical command line). Accordingly, I need to specify different configuration for auctex, i.e., set -with-emacs -with-lisp-dir  to different locations.  I want both Emacs.app and emacs can find the package auctex. In this case, should I write two different port files and give the port different names (auctex and auctex-app, for example) or should I make one portfile with two different variants? I try the latter, but it seems that only one variant is activated, that is, the lisp files only exist in one lisp-dir. Are there any other options I can use to make two variants activated at the same time?

Variants are not mutually exclusive unless you define them to be. In this case, AUCTeX's configure script might only accept one "--with-lisp-dir" argument and one "--with-emacs" argument. Your best bet might be separate ports, or maybe subports. I'm not familiar with what AUCTeX installs, so I can't say whether separate ports would step on each other's toes by trying to install the same files.

>  2. How can I see the the definition of Portfiles for a particular port return by "port search xxport"? 

You can print a portfile to stdout by using "port cat <portname>" or open it in your default ${EDITOR} with "port edit <portname>". For instance, to open the portfile for emacs-app, use "port edit emacs-app". Throw in an option to pick your editor/viewer: "port edit --editor vim emacs-app".

vq