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Homebrew 3.0

brew.sh

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Re: Homebrew 3.0

#111

Post by nrclark »

lucideer wrote: post #99
newscracker wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s a blog post from April 2019 on package managers on macOS. [1] The author, saagarjha (who also comments here regularly), switched from homebrew to MacPorts. A more current update to this post would probably be more helpful. In my limited experience, I’ve tried homebrew a few times, but found it a bit cumbersome with the “no sudo” requirement. [1]: https://saagarjha.com/blog/2019/04/26/thoughts-on-macos-pack...

> found it a bit cumbersome with the “no sudo” requirement This is one of the few features I do love about Homebrew. Does MacPorts have a "no sudo" mode or does it just let all packages run rampant on your system?

I'm not sure about unprivileged installs, but MacPorts is very good about sticking to /opt/local. It doesn't ever place anything (including config files) outside of /opt/local. So you get pretty good assurance that it won't trash your system too badly.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#112

Post by mikepurvis »

lucideer wrote: post #99
newscracker wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here’s a blog post from April 2019 on package managers on macOS. [1] The author, saagarjha (who also comments here regularly), switched from homebrew to MacPorts. A more current update to this post would probably be more helpful. In my limited experience, I’ve tried homebrew a few times, but found it a bit cumbersome with the “no sudo” requirement. [1]: https://saagarjha.com/blog/2019/04/26/thoughts-on-macos-pack...

> found it a bit cumbersome with the “no sudo” requirement This is one of the few features I do love about Homebrew. Does MacPorts have a "no sudo" mode or does it just let all packages run rampant on your system?

My understanding is that the whole reason for running the outer commands as sudo is so that the inner build/install commands can be run in a far more restricted environment. Because brew runs as your own user, every build has access to your entire home directory, the whole homebrew folder, etc. It's nice in principle to not have to "trust" any of homebrew with sudo, but in reality, the trust surface area is far larger. With MacPorts, you only have to trust the tooling, not the individual package definitions (though obviously the calculus does change slightly when bottles are in the picture, since then the build/install is happening elsewhere).

Relevant: https://xkcd.com/1200/

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#113

Post by peteretep »

cwxm wrote: post #3

I can’t even begin to imagine how much value Max Howell (creator of Homebrew) has added to the world. It’s the recommended package manager at every place I’ve worked at and saves so much headache. I use Linux at home and package managers like AUR are great, but macOS is where the users are.

Contrarian view here: brew fucking sucks. It’s the worst package manager I’ve used for doing random unwanted updates at odd times. Someone else would have filled the void if homebrew hadn’t shown up, and it would hopefully have been better. I hate that brew is good enough that it’s got some kind of local maximum such that there’s no replacement forthcoming. There, I said it.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#115

Post by reaperducer »

acomjean wrote: post #26
cwxm wrote: post #3

I can’t even begin to imagine how much value Max Howell (creator of Homebrew) has added to the world. It’s the recommended package manager at every place I’ve worked at and saves so much headache. I use Linux at home and package managers like AUR are great, but macOS is where the users are.

It’s Weird that Apple doesn’t do this themselves. It’s not like they don’t have a cash. And it’s important for devs to have up to date tooling. This intrepid band of volunteers are adding huge value to one of the largest corporations on earth. I appreciate the DIY effort of anyone who volunteers, though I see the donate tab on their website and sigh a little.

It’s Weird that Apple doesn’t do this themselves.

If Apple did it, HN would be awash in "Walled garden!" and "Monopoly!" hysteria.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#116

Post by OskarS »

offtop5 wrote: post #78
capableweb wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think they want to take on the responsibility for maintaining all those packages That's not how a package manager works. The people responsible for APT/AUR do not maintain all the packages within the repositories themselves. This even applies to the App Store. Apple does not maintain the apps there themselves, it's up to the people publishing the apps. So there really isn't any reasons except they can't mak…

Yes and no, Apple doesn't want the support issues going into their queue and clogging up their customer support system. When Billy Bob installs the wrong package from Homebrew now he just complains on a forum like this, or on stack overflow. He doesn't email Apple

Yeah, if Apple says "This is our official package manager, and you can use it to install OpenSSL/nginx/whatever", like or not, they are on the hook if it breaks, and they have to fix it. Like, companies are going to be like "we trusted you and now our website is broken, and we're going to sue you".

Homebrew gets away with this a little bit by basically being unofficial, implicitly saying "we're not guaranteeing anything here, this is purely for convenience". It would be much harder to make this argument if you were an official Apple project.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#117

Post by matsemann »

pgt wrote: post #4

/me searches changelog for "`brew update` now runs asynchronously and doesn't block the process to install a 3 year-old package." Dismayed, I do not find it. Asynchronous formula updates would IMO save the most Mac man-years of almost any macOS tool.

How often are you running brew? Not using MacOS anymore, but I mostly did it when configuring the computer the first time, and maybe some more when changing projects. So like two times a year or so.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#118

Post by my123 »

peteretep wrote: post #113
cwxm wrote: post #3

I can’t even begin to imagine how much value Max Howell (creator of Homebrew) has added to the world. It’s the recommended package manager at every place I’ve worked at and saves so much headache. I use Linux at home and package managers like AUR are great, but macOS is where the users are.

Contrarian view here: brew fucking sucks. It’s the worst package manager I’ve used for doing random unwanted updates at odd times. Someone else would have filled the void if homebrew hadn’t shown up, and it would hopefully have been better. I hate that brew is good enough that it’s got some kind of local maximum such that there’s no replacement forthcoming. There, I said it.

MacPorts meanwhile existed years before Homebrew, and is alive and well.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#119

Post by rswail »

The majority of the ports and software I want installed are essentially Unix/Linux/GNU environment tools.

Macports has always seemed to me to be a more "unix-y" way of doing that, and it works politely with Apple's ways on top of the Unix core (eg locking down the system volume).

It also has a very nice "select" and "variants" system that allows you to have multiple versions of a package as well as packages with more or less functionality (eg integrating with the MacOS keychain etc).

When I first got into Macs (only around 5 years ago), I looked at both homebrew and macports and as soon as I saw homebrew blasting stuff into /usr/local while macports neatly put everything in /opt, I was convinced to go with macports. I also had previous experience with the BSD's port systems, which helped push me towards macports.

But I'm open to being convinced about homebrew, although I've never needed something that it had that macports didnt.

Re: Homebrew 3.0

#120

Post by yardie »

peteretep wrote: post #113
cwxm wrote: post #3

I can’t even begin to imagine how much value Max Howell (creator of Homebrew) has added to the world. It’s the recommended package manager at every place I’ve worked at and saves so much headache. I use Linux at home and package managers like AUR are great, but macOS is where the users are.

Contrarian view here: brew fucking sucks. It’s the worst package manager I’ve used for doing random unwanted updates at odd times. Someone else would have filled the void if homebrew hadn’t shown up, and it would hopefully have been better. I hate that brew is good enough that it’s got some kind of local maximum such that there’s no replacement forthcoming. There, I said it.

Macports? They’ve been around even longer than brew. But they were always a bit too Linuxy for most Mac users.
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