portmaster always re-installs some ports

[b. f.]

>A while back I aborted a recursive update (bad idea, I know now) and
>must have messed up something in whatever info portmaster uses to decide
>whether to re-install a port.  Now, whenever I use portmaster -a, it
>re-installs py26-imaging, py26-reportlab and py26-xml.

>From portmaster(8):

"/var/db/pkg/*/PM_UPGRADE_DONE_FLAG
           Indicates to a subsequent -a, -f, or -r run which includes the -R
           option that a port has already been rebuilt, so it can be safely
           ignored if it is up to date."

Are there any of the above files left in your PKG_DBDIR (/var/db/pkg,
by default)?  If so, delete them, and try again.  If there aren't,
check your ports tree, build environment, local Makefiles (if any) and
PKG_DBDIR.  If they're okay, then it looks like a bug in portmaster.
In that case, you'll have to provide a build transcript so that the
problem can be diagnosed.  Run portmaster verbosely -- you could use
script(1) and execute portmaster via sh -x `which portmaster` ..., for
example.

b.