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MPORTS(7) MidnightBSD Miscellaneous Information Manual MPORTS(7)

mports — contributed applications

The Ports Collection offers a simple way for users and administrators to install applications. Each contains any patches necessary to make the original application source code compile and run on BSD. Compiling an application is as simple as typing make build in the port directory! The Makefile automatically fetches the application source code, either from a local disk or via FTP, unpacks it on your system, applies the patches, and compiles it. If all goes well, simply type make install to install the application.

It is possible to download and use ports from the repository that are newer than the installed system; however it is important to install the appropriate “Upgrade Kit” from http://www.MidnightBSD.org/ports/ first!

For more information about using mports, see “Packages and Ports” in The FreeBSD Handbook, (file:/usr/share/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/ports.html or http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/ports.html). For information about creating new ports, see The Porter's Handbook (file:/usr/share/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/porters-handbook/index.html or http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/porters-handbook/).

Some of the targets work recursively through subdirectories. This lets you, for example, install all of the “biology” ports. The targets that do this are build, checksum, clean, configure, depends, extract, fetch, install, and package.

The following targets will be run automatically by each proceeding target in order. That is, build will be run (if necessary) by install, and so on all the way to fetch. Usually, you will only use the install target.

Configure OPTIONS for this port using dialog(1).
Configure OPTIONS for this port and all its dependencies using dialog(1).
Fetch all of the files needed to build this port from the sites listed in MASTER_SITES and PATCH_SITES. See FETCH_CMD, MASTER_SITE_OVERRIDE and MASTER_SITE_BACKUP.
Verify that the fetched distfile's checksum matches the one the port was tested against. Defining NO_CHECKSUM will skip this step.
Install (or compile if only compilation is necessary) any dependencies of the current port. When called by the extract or fetch targets, this is run in piecemeal as fetch-depends, build-depends, etc. Defining NO_DEPENDS will skip this step.
Expand the distfile into a work directory.
Apply any patches that are necessary for the port.
Configure the port. Some mports will ask you questions during this stage. See INTERACTIVE and BATCH.
Build the port. This is the same as calling the all target.
Install the port and register it with the package system. This is all you really need to do.

The following targets are not run during the normal install process.

Display OPTIONS config for this port.
Display OPTIONS config for this port and all its dependencies.
Remove OPTIONS config for this port.
Remove OPTIONS config for this port and all its dependencies.
Skip the mports which have already had their OPTIONS configured.
Show list of files to be fetched in order to build the port.
Fetch the distfiles of the port and all its dependencies.
Show list of files that would be retrieved by fetch-recursive.
, pretty-print-build-depends-list
Print a list of all the compile and run dependencies, and dependencies of those dependencies.
Remove the expanded source code. This recurses to dependencies unless NOCLEANDEPENDS is defined.
Remove the port's distfiles and perform the clean target. The clean portion recurses to dependencies unless NOCLEANDEPENDS is defined, but the distclean portion never recurses (this is perhaps a bug).
Use this to restore a port after using mport(1) delete when you should have used deinstall.
Remove an installed port from the system, similar to mport(1) delete.
Remove all installed mports with the same PKGORIGIN from the system.
Make a binary package for the port. The port will be installed if it has not already been. The package is a .mport file that you can use to install the port on other machines with mport(1). If the directory specified by PACKAGES does not exist, the package will be put into the current directory. See PKGREPOSITORY and PKGFILE.
Like package, but makes a package for each depending port as well.
Create a port's README.html. This can be used from /usr/mports to create a browsable web of all ports on your system!
Search the INDEX file for the pattern specified by the key (searches the port name, comment, and dependencies), name (searches the port name only), path (searches the port path), info (searches the port info), maint (searches the port maintainer), cat (searches the port category), bdeps (searches the port build-time dependency), rdeps (searches the port run-time dependency) make(1) variables, and their exclusion counterparts: xname, xkey etc. For example, one would type:

cd /usr/mports && make search name=query

to find all mports whose name matches “query”. Results include the matching mports' path, comment, maintainer, build dependencies, and run dependencies.

cd /usr/mports && make search name=pear- \
    xbdeps=apache

To find all mports whose names contain “pear-” and which do not have apache listed in build-time dependencies.

cd /usr/mports && make search name=pear- \
    xname='ht(tp|ml)'

To find all mports whose names contain “pear-”, but not “html” or “http”.

make search key=apache display=name,path,info keylim=1

To find mports that contain “apache” in either of the name, path, info fields, ignore the rest of the record.

Generate a one-line description of each port for use in the INDEX file.
Create /usr/mports/INDEX, which is used by the pretty-print-* and search targets. Running the index target will ensure your INDEX file is up to date with your mports tree.
Fetch the INDEX file from the FreeBSD cluster.

You can change all of these.

PORTSDIR
Location of the mports tree. This is /usr/mports on
WRKDIRPREFIX
Where to create any temporary files. Useful if PORTSDIR is read-only (perhaps mounted from a CD-ROM).
DISTDIR
Where to find/put distfiles, normally distfiles/ in PORTSDIR.
PACKAGES
Used only for the package target; the base directory for the packages tree, normally packages/ in PORTSDIR. If this directory exists, the package tree will be (partially) constructed. This directory does not have to exist; if it does not, packages will be placed into the current directory, or you can define one of
PKGREPOSITORY
Directory to put the package in.
PKGFILE
The full path to the package.
PREFIX
Where to install things in general (usually /usr/local or /usr/X11R6).
MASTER_SITES
Primary sites for distribution files if not found locally.
PATCH_SITES
Primary locations for distribution patch files if not found locally.
MASTER_SITE_FREEBSD
If set, go to the master FreeBSD site for all files.
MASTER_SITE_OVERRIDE
Try going to these sites for all files and patches, first.
MASTER_SITE_BACKUP
Try going to these sites for all files and patches, last.
MASTER_SITE_INDEX
Where to get INDEX source built on cluster (for fetchindex target). Defaults to http://www.MidnightBSD.org/ports/.
FETCHINDEX
Command to get INDEX (for fetchindex target). Defaults to “fetch -am”.
NOCLEANDEPENDS
If defined, do not let clean recurse to dependencies.
FETCH_CMD
Command to use to fetch files. Normally fetch(1).
FORCE_PKG_REGISTER
If set, overwrite any existing package registration on the system.
MOTIFLIB
Location of libXm.{a,so}.
INTERACTIVE
If defined, only operate on a port if it requires interaction.
BATCH
If defined, only operate on a port if it can be installed 100% automatically.
OPTIONS
If defined, list of what WITH_* options this port accepts. : to make OPTIONS actually work, it is necessary to include bsd.port.pre.mk before starting to test the WITH_* variables.
DISABLE_VULNERABILITIES
If defined, disable check for security vulnerabilities using portaudit(1) (ports/security/portaudit) when installing new ports.

/usr/mports
The default ports directory
/usr/mports/Mk/bsd.mport.mk
The big Kahuna.

Build and install Emacs:

cd /usr/mports/editors/emacs
make install

make(1), mport(1),

The following are part of the ports collection:

portaudit(1), portlint(1)

The FreeBSD Handbook.

http://www.FreeBSD.org/ports (searchable index of all ports)

The Ports Collection appeared in FreeBSD 1.0. It has since spread to NetBSD and OpenBSD with a major rewrite in

This manual page was originated by David O'Brien. It was rewritten for by Lucas Holt.

Ports documentation is split over five places — /usr/mports/Mk/bsd.mport.mk, The MidnightBSD website and wiki http://www.midnightbsd.org/wiki , The Porter's Handbook, the “Packages and Ports” chapter of The FreeBSD Handbook, and this manual page.

April 15, 2009 midnightbsd-3.1