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http://linuxbrew.sh/ http://linuxbrew.sh/ but… why? We have distributions that are providing perfectly packaged things like Debian/Arch/RedHat. I find already

http://linuxbrew.sh/ http://linuxbrew.sh/ but… why? We have distributions that are providing perfectly packaged things like Debian/Arch/RedHat. I find already Homebrew hacky on macOS so why porting it on Linux distributions :D Is there anyone on HN using it, I'd be curious to know what are the advantages.

selectodude 8y ago
It's for people who don't have root access to a remote terminal (super computer users, generally) but want more up to date packages.
- Zarel 8y ago
  It's also useful for people who do have root access to a terminal, remote or otherwise, but want more up-to-date packages. Some packages (my favorite example is youtube-dl) are useless if they're not up-to-date. And sometimes the new version has a feature that's really important to you. I'm using it for ripgrep and node, for instance. ripgrep isn't available in apt, and the node version in apt is incredibly outdated. There's a reason most software these days tells you to curl an installer and pipe it to bash, and that's because distro package managers never have the latest version. Here's ripgrep's apt installation instructions: curl -LO https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep/releases/download/0.10.0/ripgrep_0.10.0_amd64.deb sudo dpkg -i ripgrep_0.10.0_amd64.deb There's no way I'm memorizing that. I'll have to google 'ripgrep' copy/paste it from the readme each time. Linuxbrew is just so much easier: brew install ripgrep
  - anothergoogler 8y ago
    youtube-dl is on PyPI https://pypi.org/project/youtube_dl/ https://pypi.org/project/youtube_dl/
    - Zarel 8y ago
      Neat! That could be useful in certain situations. In case you're suggesting Linuxbrew is unnecessary (I don't think you are, but just in case), there's definitely something way more convenient about just using Linuxbrew to install everything, than to track down what software is best installed from what repository.
      - anothergoogler 8y ago
        Out of curiosity, for how long have you been using Linux as a daily driver?
        asark 8y ago
        To respond to the implied dig, I've spent months to years using the following distros on desktops and laptops, in no particular order: Gentoo, Red Hat, Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian, Mandrake So I've had plenty of exposure to three major package management systems and a bunch of distro-managed repos, from the perspective of a desktop user (I've used Linux on the server plenty, too, but that's less directly relevant). I've poked around in a few others in a desktop context—Slackware, Arch, Nix, probably more that I'm forgetting. I also used Macports for over a year. Homebrew's the most pleasant overall solution for managing user-facing desktop software that I've used, by a long shot.
        Zarel 8y ago
        I use macOS as my daily driver. I've been using CentOS and Ubuntu Server to run my webservers for around twelve years now, which includes a top-1000 website in the US. I used to manually compile things like Node.js and ripgrep from source to get up-to-date versions, but these days I just use Linuxbrew.
  - gerdesj 8y ago
    and that's because distro package managers never have the latest version. I am using Arch - seems pretty up to date: [gerdesj@jglaptop ~]$ aurman -Ss ripgrep community/ripgrep 0.10.0-2 A search tool that combines the usability of ag with the raw speed of grep Thanks for the heads up wrt search tools.
    - Zarel 8y ago
      Oh, yeah, I don't personally use Arch, but from what I hear, it isn't an Arch problem at all. I was mostly talking about apt (Debian, Ubuntu, Mint, etc) and yum (Fedora, CentOS, etc).
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
Athas 8y ago
Linuxbrew, like Homebrew, is useful for non-invasive non-system/infrastructure packages. Compared to system package managers, it is (arguably) simpler to use and contribute to, and often has more up-to-date packages (especially compared to e.g. RHEL) because it tries to solve a much simpler problem. I think there is room for a package manager that focuses more on managing your user-specific CLI tools than your system libraries. I don't like macOS all that much, but Homebrew is really good.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  The “benefits” you are listing for Homebrew are interesting, because you can also look at them as disadvantages: > it is (arguably) simpler to use and contribute to, and often has more up-to-date packages (especially compared to e.g. RHEL) because it tries to solve a much simpler problem. Unfortunately, this often means it breaks or doesn’t do certain things…doing something simple like getting an old version of a package is nigh unto impossible, both because there doesn’t seem to be a built-in way to do this, and also because old packages are constantly removed from the package index. The fact that package inclusion is easy is nice, but it also opens issues that we’re already seeing in the npm community with regards to malicious packages. The ability to install software to a non-system location is useful, but that’s really not something that Homebrew itself really recommends doing on macOS because it breaks a lot of things. It’s really only designed for a single user machine with the regular user being an admin, which is likely true for the majority of its authors, but for those who don’t fit into this you need to resort to a bunch of hacks to make it work.
  - Athas 8y ago
    I think the latter restriction is because multi-user macOS are rare. Linuxbrew is very much oriented towards non-root uses and works quite well on a multi-user system. In fact, unprivileged use on multi-user systems is the main reason I think Linuxbrew is useful. I agree that Homebrew very aggressively focuses only on the common case (newest version, few/no options). I think it's the right choice, as Homebrew is never the only way to install something. It would be bad if RPM had made the same design tradeoff, though.
squarefoot 8y ago
Just discovered it, so I still have to see if it fits my needs, however if I understood what it does, it could be useful to solve a recent problem: after some upgrades (apt, Debian) all my Windows VST audio plugins I used under .wine through LinVST stopped working. not a single one can be used anymore and it seems a newer .wine version is to blame for incompatibility, so I would attempt to create a different user and install a previous wine version locally then move the .wine directory there and see if running the LinVST patcher there will make the plugins useable again. That way I would not touch the system wine installation which runs fine for other things, ditto for the main user .wine directory, while still being able to test a different version.

selectodude 8y ago

It's for people who don't have root access to a remote terminal (super computer users, generally) but want more up to date packages.

Zarel 8y ago
It's also useful for people who do have root access to a terminal, remote or otherwise, but want more up-to-date packages. Some packages (my favorite example is youtube-dl) are useless if they're not up-to-date. And sometimes the new version has a feature that's really important to you. I'm using it for ripgrep and node, for instance. ripgrep isn't available in apt, and the node version in apt is incredibly outdated. There's a reason most software these days tells you to curl an installer and pipe it to bash, and that's because distro package managers never have the latest version. Here's ripgrep's apt installation instructions: curl -LO https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep/releases/download/0.10.0/ripgrep_0.10.0_amd64.deb sudo dpkg -i ripgrep_0.10.0_amd64.deb There's no way I'm memorizing that. I'll have to google 'ripgrep' copy/paste it from the readme each time. Linuxbrew is just so much easier: brew install ripgrep
- anothergoogler 8y ago
  youtube-dl is on PyPI https://pypi.org/project/youtube_dl/ https://pypi.org/project/youtube_dl/
  - Zarel 8y ago
    Neat! That could be useful in certain situations. In case you're suggesting Linuxbrew is unnecessary (I don't think you are, but just in case), there's definitely something way more convenient about just using Linuxbrew to install everything, than to track down what software is best installed from what repository.
    - anothergoogler 8y ago
      Out of curiosity, for how long have you been using Linux as a daily driver?
      - asark 8y ago
        To respond to the implied dig, I've spent months to years using the following distros on desktops and laptops, in no particular order: Gentoo, Red Hat, Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian, Mandrake So I've had plenty of exposure to three major package management systems and a bunch of distro-managed repos, from the perspective of a desktop user (I've used Linux on the server plenty, too, but that's less directly relevant). I've poked around in a few others in a desktop context—Slackware, Arch, Nix, probably more that I'm forgetting. I also used Macports for over a year. Homebrew's the most pleasant overall solution for managing user-facing desktop software that I've used, by a long shot.
      - Zarel 8y ago
        I use macOS as my daily driver. I've been using CentOS and Ubuntu Server to run my webservers for around twelve years now, which includes a top-1000 website in the US. I used to manually compile things like Node.js and ripgrep from source to get up-to-date versions, but these days I just use Linuxbrew.
- gerdesj 8y ago
  and that's because distro package managers never have the latest version. I am using Arch - seems pretty up to date: [gerdesj@jglaptop ~]$ aurman -Ss ripgrep community/ripgrep 0.10.0-2 A search tool that combines the usability of ag with the raw speed of grep Thanks for the heads up wrt search tools.
  - Zarel 8y ago
    Oh, yeah, I don't personally use Arch, but from what I hear, it isn't an Arch problem at all. I was mostly talking about apt (Debian, Ubuntu, Mint, etc) and yum (Fedora, CentOS, etc).
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

Athas 8y ago

Linuxbrew, like Homebrew, is useful for non-invasive non-system/infrastructure packages. Compared to system package managers, it is (arguably) simpler to use and contribute to, and often has more up-to-date packages (especially compared to e.g. RHEL) because it tries to solve a much simpler problem. I think there is room for a package manager that focuses more on managing your user-specific CLI tools than your system libraries. I don't like macOS all that much, but Homebrew is really good.

saagarjha 8y ago
The “benefits” you are listing for Homebrew are interesting, because you can also look at them as disadvantages: > it is (arguably) simpler to use and contribute to, and often has more up-to-date packages (especially compared to e.g. RHEL) because it tries to solve a much simpler problem. Unfortunately, this often means it breaks or doesn’t do certain things…doing something simple like getting an old version of a package is nigh unto impossible, both because there doesn’t seem to be a built-in way to do this, and also because old packages are constantly removed from the package index. The fact that package inclusion is easy is nice, but it also opens issues that we’re already seeing in the npm community with regards to malicious packages. The ability to install software to a non-system location is useful, but that’s really not something that Homebrew itself really recommends doing on macOS because it breaks a lot of things. It’s really only designed for a single user machine with the regular user being an admin, which is likely true for the majority of its authors, but for those who don’t fit into this you need to resort to a bunch of hacks to make it work.
- Athas 8y ago
  I think the latter restriction is because multi-user macOS are rare. Linuxbrew is very much oriented towards non-root uses and works quite well on a multi-user system. In fact, unprivileged use on multi-user systems is the main reason I think Linuxbrew is useful. I agree that Homebrew very aggressively focuses only on the common case (newest version, few/no options). I think it's the right choice, as Homebrew is never the only way to install something. It would be bad if RPM had made the same design tradeoff, though.

squarefoot 8y ago

Just discovered it, so I still have to see if it fits my needs, however if I understood what it does, it could be useful to solve a recent problem: after some upgrades (apt, Debian) all my Windows VST audio plugins I used under .wine through LinVST stopped working. not a single one can be used anymore and it seems a newer .wine version is to blame for incompatibility, so I would attempt to create a different user and install a previous wine version locally then move the .wine directory there and see if running the LinVST patcher there will make the plugins useable again. That way I would not touch the system wine installation which runs fine for other things, ditto for the main user .wine directory, while still being able to test a different version.