Well, it doesn't depend on the user's PATH. MacPorts internally sets the PATH to a very specific value which includes the OS directories and the MacPorts prefix. And it searches those paths only.
Also, this is not specific to the depends_build section. Any dependency (build, library or runtime) can be written in this way. On May 28, 2008, at 23:53, Tabitha McNerney wrote: > Ah, thanks, that makes sense -- in other words, if there is a build > depends that can already be satisfied by a build that the operating > system (e.g., Mac OS X) provides, then it will go ahead and use > that without complaining if, at the same time, a MacPorts-supplied > build is not available (e.g., it all depends on if the binary is in > the PATH). > > Thanks Ryan for help in understanding this! > > Best, > > T.M. > > On Wed, May 28, 2008 at 6:43 PM, Ryan Schmidt > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On May 28, 2008, at 22:38, Tabitha McNerney wrote: > > I have what might seem to be a dumb question. I noticed today that > the MacPort named "libiconv" version 1.12 has a build dependency on > another port named gperf, specifically: > > $ port deps libiconv > libiconv has build dependencies on: > gperf > > What I find very interesting about this situation, however, is that > on my MacPorts system I have not consciously built / installed the > gperf port. But I have successfully built and installed the > libiconv port. Therefore, I am wondering, how is it possible that > the libiconv port was able to build and install without the gperf > port dependency having first been built? > > Apparently libiconv requires gperf. I don't know anything about > this; that's the way the port was when I inherited it. > > The dependency is declared like this: > > depends_build \ > bin:gperf:gperf > > That means if a binary (the "bin" part) called "gperf" (the first > "gperf" part) does not exist on the computer, then install the > gperf port (the 2nd "gperf" part). > > On my Tiger system, a gperf binary is provided by Mac OS X in /usr/ > bin/gperf so the gperf port does not need to be installed. > > Usually ports depend on other ports only. In this case, the > previous maintainer of libiconv must've thought the gperf provided > by Mac OS X was sufficient. I don't even know what gperf does. > > _______________________________________________ macports-users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.macosforge.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/macports-users
