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

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.