The FreeBSD ports system is powerful, but many of the make targets most useful for ordinary sysadmins and PC owners are documented only in a Makefile obscure and largely invisible to those not building their own ports: /usr/ports/Mk/bsd.port.mk.

If you're authoring a port (or updating or patching a port), refer to the file on your own system for both names and descriptions, as well as the FreeBSD Porter's Handbook. I'm winging it and trying to simplify the descriptions here for non-author port users like myself.

Documented here are the default and sometimes useful make targets in the ports tree. First, cd into the port you want to do something with, then make <target> where "<target>" is one of these based on what you want to do with the port. They are listed here in order of my personal preference, more or less most useful to me first.

Running make or make all has the same effect as running:

make check-sanity fetch checksum extract patch configure build

The make command I personally like to use to (re)configure, build afresh, (re)install, and clean up a port is:

make clean config build deinstall install clean

Yes, I like to run the clean target twice, and I know this forces a port to be fully recompiled even if a previous run compiled successfully and I haven't changed anything since. Except for bloatware ports that take a geologic age to compile, such as modern GUI Web browsers and office productivity suites, the muscle memory is often worth the time lost rebuilding a port.

The ports system is well-designed and robust. Attempting to make a target without its prerequisites met, such as make install on a port that hasn't been built, configured, or downloaded yet, will cause the ports system to run those dependent make targets first.

The make targets most useful to me

fetch

Download the distribution and patch files needed to build this port.

fetch-recursive

Like fetch, download the distribution and patch files needed for this port, but also download the files needed for the ports this one depends on.

extract

Unpack the port's distribution files into its work directory.

patch

Apply any provided patches to the source files in the work directory.

config

Interactively configure this port's options through a series of dialog boxes.

showconfig

Print this port's currently configured options.

configure

Run the port's configure script. This is the step usually given as ./configure in many open source projects' source-based installation directions. The actual scripts or programs run varies from port to port.

build

Build the port by compiling its source code. This is the step usually given as make in many open source projects' source-based installation directions.

test

Run the port's test suite, if it has one.

deinstall

Remove (uninstall) the package corresponding to this port, but do not remove its dependencies. This is useful when attempting to make install an already-installed port or package.

install

Install the package made from this port.

clean

Remove the work directory and any other temporary files left from extracting, patching, and building this port.

Other make targets that might one day be useful

fetch-list

Instead of downloading any files, print out all the shell commands that would be run if make fetch was typed.

fetch-recursive-list

Instead of downloading any files, print out all the shell commands that would be run if make fetch-recursive was typed.

fetch-required

The description is the same as for make fetch-recursive.

fetch-required-list

The description is the same as for make fetch-recursive-list.

fetch-url-list

Print out the URLs of distribution and patch files needed to build this port, one URL per line.

fetch-urlall-list

Print out the URLs of distribution and patch files needed to build this port, as well as the files needed for the ports this one depends on, one URL per line.

all-depends-list

Print out the directories of ports that this port depends on.

build-depends-list

Print out the directories of ports that this port depends on in order to build this port into a package, one directory per line.

package-depends-list

Print out the names of the packages that this port depends on. This is based on the dependency tree as recorded in each dependent port's Makefile, not as recorded in the currently installed ports.

The names printed are the names with version numbers, their root directories within the ports tree, and their packagen names in "category/name" format.

actual-package-depends

Print out the names of packages as in make package-depends-list, but based on the dependencies of currently installed ports instead.

Each line of the output is in the form of:

"package-name": {origin: "category/package-name", version "1.0"}

run-depends-list

Print out the directories of ports that this port depends on in order for the program built from it to run, one directory per line.

test-depends-list

Print out the directories of ports that this port depends on in order for its post-build tests to run, one directory per line.

reinstall

Install the results of a build, like make install, but ignore its already-installed state. This does not remove an already-installed package first (see "deinstall" for that), but it does re-run make install if the ports system thinks the results of the most recent build run are already installed if they really aren't (or aren't installed properly).

deinstall-all

Remove (uninstall) all installations with the same package origin.

package

Create a package from the installed build of this port. (This does not create a package from a build of this port awaiting installation.)

package-recursive

Like make package, but create a package for this port and all of its dependencies.

clean-depends

Like make clean, but on this port and every port this one depends on.

config-recursive

Like make config, but configure options for this port and every port this one depends on.

showconfig-recursive

Like make showconfig, but print the configuration options for this port and every port this one depends on.

rmconfig

Remove the configuration options for this port, resetting them to default.

rmconfig-recursive

Like make rmconfig, but remove the configuration options for this port and every port this one depends on, resetting them to default for every port affected.

Other make targets that seem intended for port authors only

describe

Try to generate a one-line description for each port for use in INDEX files and the like.

check-plist

Checks for files missing from the plist, and files in the plist that are not installed by the port.

check-sanity

Perform some basic checks of the port layout.

checkpatch

Do a "patch -C" instead of a "patch". Note that it may give incorrect results if multiple patches deal with the same file.

checksum

Use distinfo to ensure that your distfiles are valid.

checksum-recursive

Run checksum in this port and all dependencies.

makesum

Generate distinfo (only do this for your own ports!).