relationship between /usr/ports and tinderbox

[Jonathan Horne]

im trying to get my tinderbox system up and running, and id like to maintain 
the ports that i need for all my various freebsd systems (which are all 7.0, 
except on 6.3 machine).

so, im trying to understand the relationship between /usr/ports and the ports 
trees that are under tinderbox.  when i deleted the contents of /usr/ports, 
that caused a problem!  why?  are they tied together somehow, and if so, what 
the is the significance?

thanks,
-- 
Jonathan Horne
http://dfwlpiki.dfwlp.org
freebsd08 _ at _ dfwlp.com