Become maintainer of and update port 'ncview'

[thiagoveloso (Thiago V. dos Santos)]

Hi there,

I use ncview a lot for my work. However, I usually build it "by hand". I noticed that the macports version is pretty outdated, and it fails to install on my computer (MacPorts version 2.4.1). Sadly, it has no maintainer either.

Since I am really familiar with its dependencies and building process, I'd like to volunteer to being its maintainer (and also update the whole thing).

I have the source-code of the latest version, and I have also written a Portfile that I think should work to install it (still might need some adjustments though). I also do have a github account.

Can anyone please guide me on how to become the maintainer of this port so I can update it to the latest version?

Any direction appreciated!

[seanfarley (Sean Farley)]

The easiest way would be to send a pull request for this port. You don't have to become maintainer for that, in fact :-) I used to run ncview in the past so I could maybe take a look.

[thiagoveloso (Thiago V. dos Santos)]

Replying to seanfarley:

The easiest way would be to send a pull request for this port. You don't have to become maintainer for that, in fact :-) I used to run ncview in the past so I could maybe take a look.

Ok, thanks for the feedback. ncview's current version is 2.1.7, while macport's is still 2.1.1. The main issue I noticed is with the libpng requirement: it is necessary to create a symbolic link named "libpng.so" from macport's "libpng.dylib". Other than that, it should work if all dependencies are installed.

[seanfarley (Sean Farley)]

Well, try to get something together and I can review it.

[thiagoveloso (Thiago V. dos Santos)]

Replying to seanfarley:

Well, try to get something together and I can review it.

Ok, I've attached a tentative Portfile. What still needs to be fixed:

• not sure what revision it is
• I would still like to be the maintainer of this port :D
• I don't know how to point out the download address to the latest source code: ​ftp://cirrus.ucsd.edu/pub/ncview/ncview-2.1.7.tar.gz
• checksums should be changed accordingly
• required libpng provides library libpng.dylib, but ncview requires libpng.so. The solution for me is to create a symbolic link, but I don't know how to to that on the Portfile: sudo ln -s /opt/local/lib/libpng.dylib /opt/local/lib/libpng.so
• I am not sure if anything below the "configure.args" section is actually required (when building ncview manually I don't need any of it)

Is any of this helpful to you?

[seanfarley (Sean Farley)]

In b984688b7e293e42c290e5c2b46ce94f10ccfc43/macports-ports:

ncview: update to 2.1.7 and add maintainer

Closes: #54035

[seanfarley (Sean Farley)]

Replying to thiagoveloso:

Replying to seanfarley:

Well, try to get something together and I can review it.

Ok, I've attached a tentative Portfile. What still needs to be fixed:

• not sure what revision it is

That gets reset every time the version is updated. The revision is usually for 'revbumping': when a port needs to be updated due to a dependency changing.

• I would still like to be the maintainer of this port :D

Sure, sounds good. I added 'openmaintainer' as well so others can help out.

• I don't know how to point out the download address to the latest source code: ​ftp://cirrus.ucsd.edu/pub/ncview/ncview-2.1.7.tar.gz

If you change the version, then it will automatically download this file since master_sites already points to ftp://cirrus.ucsd.edu/pub/ncview/

• checksums should be changed accordingly

I use sudo port -v upgrade PORT which will print the new checksums.

• required libpng provides library libpng.dylib, but ncview requires libpng.so. The solution for me is to create a symbolic link, but I don't know how to to that on the Portfile: sudo ln -s /opt/local/lib/libpng.dylib /opt/local/lib/libpng.so

The patchfile patch-configure.diff had most of these changes. Just udunits2 needed to added (same pattern as in the previous patchfile, though).

• I am not sure if anything below the "configure.args" section is actually required (when building ncview manually I don't need any of it)

If you're building manually, be careful to check the environment variables being used. These configure.args are needed so that only ${prefix} is searched and linked against in MacPorts.

Is any of this helpful to you?

Yep :-) I was able to update the port. You're now the maintainer, congrats!

[thiagoveloso (Thiago V. dos Santos)]

Thanks Sean for the help and for the explanation as well.

However, ncview failed to build apparently due to an issue with dependency hdf5-18. I didn't try it by myself, but got an e-mail from Macports' buildbot.

I had removed hdf5 from the dependency list in the Portfile (depends_lib), since it is already required by netcdf. Could this possibly be the cause of the build failure?

Replying to seanfarley:

Replying to thiagoveloso:

Replying to seanfarley:

Well, try to get something together and I can review it.

Ok, I've attached a tentative Portfile. What still needs to be fixed:

• not sure what revision it is

That gets reset every time the version is updated. The revision is usually for 'revbumping': when a port needs to be updated due to a dependency changing.

• I would still like to be the maintainer of this port :D

Sure, sounds good. I added 'openmaintainer' as well so others can help out.

• I don't know how to point out the download address to the latest source code: ​ftp://cirrus.ucsd.edu/pub/ncview/ncview-2.1.7.tar.gz

If you change the version, then it will automatically download this file since master_sites already points to ftp://cirrus.ucsd.edu/pub/ncview/

• checksums should be changed accordingly

I use sudo port -v upgrade PORT which will print the new checksums.

• required libpng provides library libpng.dylib, but ncview requires libpng.so. The solution for me is to create a symbolic link, but I don't know how to to that on the Portfile: sudo ln -s /opt/local/lib/libpng.dylib /opt/local/lib/libpng.so

The patchfile patch-configure.diff had most of these changes. Just udunits2 needed to added (same pattern as in the previous patchfile, though).

• I am not sure if anything below the "configure.args" section is actually required (when building ncview manually I don't need any of it)

If you're building manually, be careful to check the environment variables being used. These configure.args are needed so that only ${prefix} is searched and linked against in MacPorts.

Is any of this helpful to you?

Yep :-) I was able to update the port. You're now the maintainer, congrats!

[seanfarley (Sean Farley)]

Replying to thiagoveloso:

Thanks Sean for the help and for the explanation as well.

However, ncview failed to build apparently due to an issue with dependency hdf5-18. I didn't try it by myself, but got an e-mail from Macports' buildbot.

I guess you mean this? ​https://build.macports.org/builders/ports-10.5_ppc_legacy-builder/builds/26194/steps/install-dependencies/logs/stdio

I had removed hdf5 from the dependency list in the Portfile (depends_lib), since it is already required by netcdf. Could this possibly be the cause of the build failure?

netcdf can technically be built without hdf5 support. The +netcdf4 (which is enabled by default) add hdf5 support. The ncview port checks for +netcdf4 which is how we check for dependency variants. I think your error is because on this ancient machine hdf5 can't be built at all. Not much you can do about that.