What is MacPorts?

MacPorts provides an infrastructure for building, installing, and packaging open source software.  It is designed to match the functionality of the FreeBSD Ports system and to be extensible for future enhancements.

System Requirements:

This disk image is built for Mac OS X __XVERS__.x (Darwin __DVERS__.x) and requires valid TCL, curl and OpenSSL installations to function - all present by default within Mac OS X. Also required is the installation of Apple's XCode (available as a separate install from your OS X CDs or DVD, or preferably the latest version from Apple's Developer site: http://developer.apple.com/).

Shell Environment Requirements:

A file named ~./profile is created during the binary file install of MacPorts.  It contains the path statements to append the MacPorts' binary paths to your environment within /opt/local/ so MacPorts will be available to you for subsequent terminal sessions. You may have to quit and restart your terminal application for this change to take effect.

Install Location:

When MacPorts is installed using the .dmg file binary, the install location for MacPorts is /opt/local/. If you wish to install to a path other than /opt/local, you must install MacPorts by using the source code.  See Installing MacPorts on the MacPorts Wiki for instructions.

Usage:

1) Access the MacPorts' port command via the command line.

or

2) Access MacPorts by purchasing the Port Authority GUI application.

* DISCLAIMER: The Port Authority application is not supported by the MacPorts project. 

What is Installed:

Aside from a few MacPorts executable commands in /opt/local/bin, most MacPorts files are installed in "/opt/local/var/db/dports".  Within these directories you will find a "sources" directory, which is kept up-to-date through the sync and selfupdate targets of the port command. Please read the port(1) man page for more information.

Documentation:

The MacPorts Wiki is available at: http://trac.macosforge.org/projects/macports/wiki/ and should be consulted for further documentation and support. Also provided are man pages for port, ports.conf, portfile, portgroup, portstyle, and porthier. These can be invoked by typing: "man" followed by the name of the command or file (e.g. "man port" or "man ports.conf").

Using the Port Command

The first thing you should do after install is to update MacPorts to the latest point release and download the latest ports as the Unix superuser.

	sudo port selfupdate 

This terminal command builds and installs a port as the Unix superuser:

	sudo port install <portname> 

To find a specific port:

	port search <portname>

where <portname> is the port you wish to install or for which you are searching.  You may use partial port names for searching.

Please consult the port(1) man page for complete documentation of this command.

Creating New Ports:

If you are interested in developing your own ports for private usage, or would like to submit your ports for inclusion within the MacPorts software repository, please consult the documentation provided on our website. MacPorts depends on a community of active participants, and we welcome your contributions!

Thank you for your interest in MacPorts!