please explain the need to 'touch Portfile'

[aips@…]

When repeating a step in the build & install process explained in Ch4, I think it would be helpful to explain that when one of the steps does not do what you want, and you want to repeat it after tweaking something, you need to run the command

$ touch Portfile

to ensure that the step is actually done and not skipped. A subsection right at the end with about three lines of text would do the trick. Maybe more if you want to explain how the state is maintained.

A side question: the manual says -d implies -v (at least as of opendarwin8), so why have both in the examples? Further, the order is not consistent ('port -d -v extract'; 'port build -d -v'). Is the order important?

[jmpp@…]

Another documentation request for you Joe ;-)

-jmpp

[olegb@…]

rtfm port(1)

-o honor state files older than Portfile

What you describe isnt needed.