Where should non-macports sw be installed? (Was: Problem with Macports, homebrew, and ghostscript

[Arno Hautala]

On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 10:04 AM, Gregory Shenaut <gkshenaut at ucdavis.edu> wrote:
> I understand why installing in /usr/local can mess up macports, but macports doesn't have everything, and most third-party software wants to go into /usr/local. Where should this stuff go, if not /usr/local?

I install everything into my home folder.

> ./configure --prefix=~/local/
> make && make install

If you need it available system-wide, just pick some other custom
location (ie. /custom/). In any case, just make sure you're consistent
(update your PATH) and point your configure script to the right place
if the software can't find the libraries in your path or you need to
override libraries that are in your path.

The longer answer is that I use stow
(http://www.gnu.org/software/stow/ ; and available in MacPorts) to
assemble the bin, man, etc. directories. Stow isn't required, but it
does help manage the software that isn't being managed by MacPorts.
So, I might install a piece of software with:

> ./configure --prefix=~/local/stow/foo-1.2.4
> make && make install
> cd ~/local/stow
> stow foo-1.2.4

Stow just allows you to easily add and remove versions of software by
linking a hiearchy of directories into a common location. I might have
foo-1.2.4, foo-1.2.6, bar-3.9, but only have foo-1.2.4 and bar-3.9
active. I can the upgrade to foo-1.2.6 by running:

> cd ~/local/stow
> stow -D foo-1.2.4
> stow foo-1.2.6
> rm -rf foo-1.2.4


-- 
arno  s  hautala    /-|   arno at alum.wpi.edu

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