> Exactly. I'd like to have a simple way to ask the following questions about
> a package all at once:
> 
> 1) What versions are installed, if any, and which is active?
> 2) What version is available to install from a binary, if any?
> 3) What version is available to install from source?
> 4) What versions are sitting in my portarchivepath? (is that meaningful?)
> 
> Even better would be asking those questions about anything outdated all at
> once. And, of course, the output should be both human readable and
> reasonably easy to manipulate if piped to a script (i.e. machine-readable).
> 
> I take it such a thing does not currently exist. Anyone feeling up to the
> challenge?

Well, 1 can be done with `port installed x`.

The rest (2,3,4) seem like something that can be calculated outside of 
MacPorts, since it only knows the current versions---nothing more. If you place 
your own Portfile somewhere and ask MacPorts to use it (`port archivefetch` or 
`port -b install x`) you'll be able to find out if the version in that Portfile 
exists as a binary.

In the outdated situation, just use `port -p archivefetch outdated`: it'll 
fetch what it can and your scripts can review the errors.

The easy approach? I'd say always stick with binary-only mode unless you have 
time to do compiles; then let it go with a normal install/upgrade where it uses 
both binary and source as available.

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