On Nov 11, 2011, at 13:02, Peng Yu wrote:

> On ubuntu, it can prompt me what to do if a package is missing. I'm
> wondering if there is anything similar on mac.
> 
> ~$ hg
> The program 'hg' is currently not installed.  You can install it by typing:
> sudo apt-get install mercurial

Phil, I think you missed the point of the question. The question is, if a user 
knows they need a program called "hg" but they don't have it installed, what 
can they do to find out what port, if any, would install it? I happen to know 
that "hg" is provided by the port "mercurial", but someone not familiar with 
the software might not know that. The answer is that there is no feature in 
MacPorts to help you with that. "port provides" only works if you know exactly 
where the file is on disk, and if you already have the port installed. "port 
search" only works if the maintainer put the name of the program into the 
port's description. So, to find out what software package provides a given 
program, your best bet is to use an Internet search engine, e.g. Google. Then 
use "port search" to find out if MacPorts has a port for that software package.



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