5 ms·

> I know brew will package a ruby version to handle this... Not to mention brew is vastly inferior to most Linux package managers (apt, yum, pacman, etc.)

by zumu 7y ago

shrikant 7y ago
I always assumed this is because Linux package managers such as apt and yum are first-class citizens on the platform, while Homebrew is a bit of a de-facto solution on macOS. This still holds, right?
- techntoke 7y ago
  Could also have a lot to do with Ruby. Chocolatey is way worse though (Windows).
  - PhilippGille 7y ago
    Try Scoop on Windows instead of Chocolatey.
- jessedhillon 7y ago
  No, macports is non-native as well and is an excellent, stable alternative, although Homebrew has slightly better coverage. Homebrew's main issue is that it was written from scratch, ignoring lessons from 30+ years of package management experience, and there's no obvious benefit that doing so has brought. Compared to macports, which is based on freebsd ports, Homebrew is brittle and normal operations frequently result in an inconsistent state. In my experience, unless your needs are extremely basic, sooner or later you'll run into an issue where the solution is basically to commit nuclear warfare on your filesystem and start over again. Also, expect to rely on random blog posts and stack overflow as the de facto user's guide (which maybe is just the state of the world for everything now.)
  - your-nanny 7y ago
    I've honestly never found a good reason to use brew instead of macports, aside from an annoying hipsterism. Welcome to try to convince me otherwise.
    - brigandish 7y ago
      Macports is good, I'm also a fan of pkgsrc[0]. As to Homebrew, I don't understand why it complains if I use sudo to do an install but then also complains if I'm not running as an admin account! If there's a reason for this splitting of hairs, I don't know what it is. [0] https://pkgsrc.joyent.com/ https://pkgsrc.joyent.com/
elcritch 7y ago
Until you need/want some project that's relatively new and you pine for the days of brew. Technically inferior Perhaps but often much more up to date. :/
- techntoke 7y ago
  Not a problem with Arch packages and the AUR.
  - elcritch 7y ago
    I've considered switching to arch because of that.
    - krilly 7y ago
      Manjaro has access to the AUR as well, and it's as polished as any distro I've used. For me it's the clear winner for developers and hobbyists
      - Chickenosaurus 7y ago
        I completely agree. Having used Manjaro (xfce and i3 variants) as main OS for half a year, it has been a good experience. To be fair, I can't compare with other distros as this was the first time I used Linux as main OS.
  - thom 7y ago
    I heard great things about AUR when moving to Arch but honestly I've been unimpressed. A lot of stuff is already exists in official repos for other distributions, and I don't actually care about bleeding edge versions, just ease of install. And most of the time in my experience, AUR packages aren't very recent, or aren't configured how I'd like. That said, you can just customise the PKGBUILD yourself, and even then it's no real stress to build from source yourself. Even if you then stabbed yourself in the eye with a pencil, it'd still be a better system than on MacOS or on Windows.
ericd 7y ago
shrug use Mac for the generally superior UI, interface hardware, and app ecosystem, ssh into a Linux VM/server/workstation for the generally superior development experience. Best of both worlds.
m463 7y ago
Would be nice if Apple stepped up in respect to tools...

> I know brew will package a ruby version to handle this... Not to mention brew is vastly inferior to most Linux package managers (apt, yum, pacman, etc.)

by zumu 7y ago

> I know brew will package a ruby version to handle this... Not to mention brew is vastly inferior to most Linux package managers (apt, yum, pacman, etc.)

shrikant 7y ago

I always assumed this is because Linux package managers such as apt and yum are first-class citizens on the platform, while Homebrew is a bit of a de-facto solution on macOS. This still holds, right?

techntoke 7y ago
Could also have a lot to do with Ruby. Chocolatey is way worse though (Windows).
- PhilippGille 7y ago
  Try Scoop on Windows instead of Chocolatey.
jessedhillon 7y ago
No, macports is non-native as well and is an excellent, stable alternative, although Homebrew has slightly better coverage. Homebrew's main issue is that it was written from scratch, ignoring lessons from 30+ years of package management experience, and there's no obvious benefit that doing so has brought. Compared to macports, which is based on freebsd ports, Homebrew is brittle and normal operations frequently result in an inconsistent state. In my experience, unless your needs are extremely basic, sooner or later you'll run into an issue where the solution is basically to commit nuclear warfare on your filesystem and start over again. Also, expect to rely on random blog posts and stack overflow as the de facto user's guide (which maybe is just the state of the world for everything now.)
- your-nanny 7y ago
  I've honestly never found a good reason to use brew instead of macports, aside from an annoying hipsterism. Welcome to try to convince me otherwise.
  - brigandish 7y ago
    Macports is good, I'm also a fan of pkgsrc[0]. As to Homebrew, I don't understand why it complains if I use sudo to do an install but then also complains if I'm not running as an admin account! If there's a reason for this splitting of hairs, I don't know what it is. [0] https://pkgsrc.joyent.com/ https://pkgsrc.joyent.com/

elcritch 7y ago

Until you need/want some project that's relatively new and you pine for the days of brew. Technically inferior Perhaps but often much more up to date. :/

techntoke 7y ago
Not a problem with Arch packages and the AUR.
- elcritch 7y ago
  I've considered switching to arch because of that.
  - krilly 7y ago
    Manjaro has access to the AUR as well, and it's as polished as any distro I've used. For me it's the clear winner for developers and hobbyists
    - Chickenosaurus 7y ago
      I completely agree. Having used Manjaro (xfce and i3 variants) as main OS for half a year, it has been a good experience. To be fair, I can't compare with other distros as this was the first time I used Linux as main OS.
- thom 7y ago
  I heard great things about AUR when moving to Arch but honestly I've been unimpressed. A lot of stuff is already exists in official repos for other distributions, and I don't actually care about bleeding edge versions, just ease of install. And most of the time in my experience, AUR packages aren't very recent, or aren't configured how I'd like. That said, you can just customise the PKGBUILD yourself, and even then it's no real stress to build from source yourself. Even if you then stabbed yourself in the eye with a pencil, it'd still be a better system than on MacOS or on Windows.

ericd 7y ago

shrug use Mac for the generally superior UI, interface hardware, and app ecosystem, ssh into a Linux VM/server/workstation for the generally superior development experience. Best of both worlds.

m463 7y ago

Would be nice if Apple stepped up in respect to tools...