On Thu, 22 Aug 2002, Brian Heath wrote:

> I am trying to compile a package from pkgsrc for the first time and have a
> basic question. If I'm compiling a more recent version of a program that I
> already have, do I need to uninstall the previous version before compiling
> and installing the new version? For example, I installed Perl 5.6.1nb1 a
> while back, but now need nb7. I originally installed nb1 from a precompiled
> binary. Do I need to pkg_delete the nb1 package before installing the nb7
> one?

Yes, to *install* the new package. Very few packages are broken in
such a way that you can't *build* the new package without deinstalling
the old one, and as perl is somewhat critical, it would make sense to
build before deinstalling the old perl and installing the new one.
E.g ("@->" represents your shell prompt.):

	@-> cd lang/perl5
	@-> make fetch
	@-> make
	@-> su
	Password:
	@-> make deinstall
	pkg_delete: package `perl-5.6.1nb7' is required by other  packages:
	(list here)
	@-> pkg_delete -r perl
	@-> make install
	(Now remake any other stuff that you had to delete.)

If you encounter problems,, the best place to ask for help is on the
"tech-pkg" mailing list. This mailing list is supposed to be for
mac68k port specific issues, and "tech-pkg" isn't quite as technical
as the other "tech-" lists.

Frederick