# x11/nvidia-driver fails to build  from source



## forgiven_noob (Jan 9, 2020)

hi, i tried to build the nvidia driver from source, for a pascal card






don't know why the nvidia driver has to be a pain in all unix like operating systems


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## SirDice (Jan 9, 2020)

On what version of FreeBSD? If you're on 11.3 use packages for everything, including the NVidia driver. If you're on 12.1 use packages for everything _except_ the NVidia driver. At the moment the packages are still being built for 12.0. For 99% of the packages this isn't a problem but kernel modules like the NVidia driver need to be build specifically for the version you have.


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## shkhln (Jan 9, 2020)

forgiven_noob said:


> don't know why the nvidia driver has to be a pain in all unix like operating systems



It isn't. That's a meme, particularly unfun one.



SirDice said:


> If you're on 12.1 use packages for everything _except_ the NVidia driver. At the moment the packages are still being built for 12.0.



I think nvidia-driver packages should work fine. This time it's drm-kmod turn to be broken.


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## T-Daemon (Jan 9, 2020)

forgiven_noob said:


> don't know why the nvidia driver has to be a pain in all unix like operating systems



Here, in this case, a dependency is to blame. If you look closely at the error message, the build process is not interrupted at x11/nvidia-driver, but at devel/llvm80, because of lang/python27.

```
===> llvm80-8.0.1_3 needs Python 3.6 at least but 2.7 was specified.
```
This is a known hickup, see Thread llvm80-8-0-1_3-needs-python-3-6-at-least-but-2-7-was-specified.72618

If you want to build the port install llvm80 first.

If you prefere to build ports in general, then ports-mgmt/portmaster is highly recommanded, particularly the --packages-build option comes handy (portmaster(8)). Instead of building the build dependencies from source, the package is installed. That is a time saver. Ports like llvm80 take hours to build.


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