Question

When I run the command sudo port upgrade outdated on my os x (lion) system, I get the following output.

--->  Computing dependencies for gettext
--->  Dependencies to be installed: ncurses
--->  Activating ncurses @5.9_1
Error: org.macports.activate for port ncurses returned: Image error: /opt/local/bin/captoinfo is being used by the active ncursesw port.  Please deactivate this port first, or use 'port -f activate ncurses' to force the activation.
Error: Failed to install ncurses
Please see the log file for port ncurses for details:
    /opt/local/var/macports/logs/_opt_local_var_macports_sources_rsync.macports.org_release_ports_devel_ncurses/ncurses/main.log
Error: The following dependencies were not installed: ncurses
Error: Unable to upgrade port: 1
To report a bug, follow the instructions in the guide:
    http://guide.macports.org/#project.tickets

What should I do the be able to update? I have tried to force the activation but it did not work.

Answer 1

Just had something similar myself – not sure if it’s related. See this (source):

ncursesw was replaced by ncurses a long time ago. You must not have updated this MacPorts installation in
over a year; if you had upgraded sooner, this should have been handled more automatically for you but we’ve
already removed those upgrade paths since it was so long ago and we thought everybody would have upgraded
by now. You can just force ncursesw to uninstall since it’s no longer needed:
sudo port -f uninstall ncursesw

also be sure to run

sudo port selfupdate

beforehand. That may have caused my issue – installing macports doesn’t bring the latest package tree with it.