Issue with installing port

Ryan Schmidt ryandesign at macports.org
Tue Jan 31 05:32:56 UTC 2023


On Jan 26, 2023, at 09:07, Will Senn wrote:

> On 1/26/23 1:43 AM, Joshua Root wrote:
>>> I'm trying to get pandoc to install.
>> The ticket for this is <https://trac.macports.org/ticket/66764>, FWIW.
> 
> I promise you I did search :). Thanks for the link though, it confirms it's not just me!
> 
> `sudo port install pandoc -stack` works for now.
> 
> Suppose it didn't though... would I not be able to get the working version that previously existed at all?

https://trac.macports.org/wiki/howto/InstallingOlderPort

> or is this an actual bug  in the recipe for 10.x's that somebody might fix (it not working on MacOS < 11). I'm kind of clueless as to how macports works behind the scenes because it has just pretty much worked for me over the years without my having to worry about it.

The Portfile was deliberately programmed to do something different on macOS 10.x than on macOS 11 and later. Based on the build failures, that appears to have been the wrong thing to do, and the Portfile has since been changed to no longer do that.

> I remember somebody way back when telling me that over time, things might eventually stop working, but I thought that was bitrot or something, not this kind of thing.

Most MacPorts contributors test on the latest or at least a recent macOS version. Most software developers also upgrade their systems to the latest or recent versions. Thus, as time goes on and ports are updated to new versions, it becomes increasingly likely that some change is introduced in some OS version and that some software starts depending on that change, and that users who remain on old OS versions are more likely to experience problems as a result. Whenever you find a problem, report it and hopefully someone can figure out how to fix it.



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