migration hickup

[joerg van den hoff]

On 09.03.21 18:41, Ryan Schmidt wrote:
> 
> 
> On Mar 9, 2021, at 11:34, joerg van den hoff wrote:
> 
>> so I find this strange: seemingly everything is just fine (macports user and its home dir exists etc.) but I get that "cannot change owner: no macports user" warning nonetheless. so this looks like OSX had not a consistent view of the state of affairs across different utilities at that point? notably `dscl' knowing that user is not sufficient? what, then, is the reliable/correct way to decide whether a user account "really" exists? but whatever ...
> 
> I'm sorry, I don't know and I can't completely explain what you've observed.
> 
> 
>> understood. will try to recall the procedure in due time when doing another migration to a new machine...
> 
> No need to recall anything since it's documented in https://trac.macports.org/wiki/Migration. That document is geared toward migrating from one OS version or architecture to another, but it could be enhanced to address the case of migrating from one machine to another while keeping the same OS version and architecture. If you'd like to make those enhancements feel free; anyone can edit the wiki.

well, I might try that. at least it seems not true that for said type of migration (same OS/arch) 
one needs to first nuke the macports installation. from the current migration page: "Note: If you 
move from one Mac to another Mac using ​Migration Assistant, you have to do it ["it" meaning 
uninstall MacPorts] first."

OTOH I am not quite sure _what_ to recommend: my "strategy" was

1. migrate everything offered by Migration Assistant _except_ the macports user's account.

2. reinstall MacPorts from dmg image

so I could write something to that extent into the wiki if it helps...

but I am not at all sure what would have happened if I had done it the way you suspect to be better:

1. migrate everything offered by Migration Assistant _including_ the macports user's account (whose 
home dir than is moved apparently to /Users in the process)

2. mv macport home dir back into the /opt/local tree

open questions would be: how exactly? with what permissions? does that really yield a working 
MacPorts installation or would the same warning result I have seen ("no macports user") and which 
necessitated reinstall of MacPorts from the dmg image?

>