So, you are interested in making your own port or upgrading an existing one? Great!
What follows are some guidelines for creating a new port for FreeBSD. If you want to upgrade an existing port, you should read this and then read Chapter 10, Upgrading an Individual Port.
When this document is not sufficiently detailed, you should
refer to /usr/ports/Mk/bsd.port.mk
, which
all port Makefiles include. Even if you do not hack Makefiles
daily, it is well commented, and you will still gain much
knowledge from it. Additionally, you may send specific
questions to the FreeBSD ports mailing list.
Only a fraction of the variables
(
) that can
be overridden are mentioned in this document. Most (if not
all) are documented at the start of
VAR
/usr/ports/Mk/bsd.port.mk
; the others
probably ought to be. Note that this file uses a non-standard
tab setting: Emacs and
Vim should recognize the setting on
loading the file. Both vi(1) and ex(1) can be set
to use the correct value by typing
:set tabstop=4
once the file has been
loaded.
Looking for something easy to start with? Take a look at the list of requested ports and see if you can work on one (or more).
All FreeBSD documents are available for download at http://ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/doc/
Questions that are not answered by the
documentation may be
sent to <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org>.
Send questions about this document to <freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.org>.