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  • What Does Homebrew Do?


    Homebrew installs the stuff you need that Apple (or your Linux system) didn’t.

    $ brew install wget
  • Homebrew installs packages to their own directory and then symlinks their files into /opt/homebrew (on Apple Silicon).

    $ cd /opt/homebrew
    $ find Cellar
    Cellar/wget/1.16.1
    Cellar/wget/1.16.1/bin/wget
    Cellar/wget/1.16.1/share/man/man1/wget.1
    
    $ ls -l bin
    bin/wget -> ../Cellar/wget/1.16.1/bin/wget
  • Homebrew won’t install files outside its prefix and you can place a Homebrew installation wherever you like.

  • Trivially create your own Homebrew packages.

    $ brew create https://foo.com/foo-1.0.tgz
    Created /opt/homebrew/Library/Taps/homebrew/homebrew-core/Formula/foo.rb
  • It’s all Git and Ruby underneath, so hack away with the knowledge that you can easily revert your modifications and merge upstream updates.

    $ brew edit wget # opens in $EDITOR!
  • Homebrew formulae are simple Ruby scripts:

    class Wget < Formula
      desc "Internet file retriever"
      homepage "https://www.gnu.org/software/wget/"
      url "https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/wget/wget-1.24.5.tar.gz"
      sha256 "fa2dc35bab5184ecbc46a9ef83def2aaaa3f4c9f3c97d4bd19dcb07d4da637de"
      license "GPL-3.0-or-later"
    
      def install
        system "./configure", "--prefix=#{prefix}"
        system "make", "install"
      end
    end
  • Homebrew complements macOS (or your Linux system). Install your RubyGems with gem and their dependencies with brew.

  • “To install, drag this icon…” no more. Homebrew Cask installs macOS apps, fonts and plugins and other non-open source software.

    $ brew install --cask firefox
  • Making a cask is as simple as creating a formula.

    $ brew create --cask https://foo.com/foo-1.0.dmg
    Editing /opt/homebrew/Library/Taps/homebrew/homebrew-cask/Casks/foo.rb
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