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My machine is single-user, problem is some things require root. Maybe they shouldn't according to Homebrew's stance on permissions, but idk, I'm working with wh

My machine is single-user, problem is some things require root. Maybe they shouldn't according to Homebrew's stance on permissions, but idk, I'm working with what I've got.

selkin 2y ago
Can you give a concrete example? I know why certain software has be run with root privileges, but it's a bit hard for me to come with a reasonable scenario where a software would fail to run properly when installed to a directory that is owned by the same non-root user that launches that software.
- frollogaston 2y ago
  The symptom was something like https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16432071/how-to-fix-homebrew-permissions https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16432071/how-to-fix-home... , which btw has a terrible accepted answer. I forget the root cause (no pun intended), possibly some bad interaction with stuff I installed outside of Homebrew. It's also possible I did something wrong, but even then there's something to be said about so many users having the same problem uniquely with Homebrew. Lemme try to repro again when I'm home.
  - agos 2y ago
    this kind of errors are quite common with Homebrew in my experience. if you did anything "wrong", then it's something really easy to do wrong which lots of other (me included) have done wrong at some point, and that the software should help to prevent
    - frollogaston 2y ago
      Digging through it more, it seems like Homebrew didn't play nice with anything else that used that dir. Maybe it's less of a problem now that it installs to /opt/homebrew, but I imagine there are still times Homebrew needs to place files in root-owned dirs or next to them. This issue is also brought up in the Github commit posted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43766371 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43766371 "I wouldn't worry about it not being root. We don't install anything base enough for it to be a concern (unlike MacPorts or Fink)."

My machine is single-user, problem is some things require root. Maybe they shouldn't according to Homebrew's stance on permissions, but idk, I'm working with what I've got.

selkin 2y ago

Can you give a concrete example? I know why certain software has be run with root privileges, but it's a bit hard for me to come with a reasonable scenario where a software would fail to run properly when installed to a directory that is owned by the same non-root user that launches that software.

frollogaston 2y ago
The symptom was something like https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16432071/how-to-fix-homebrew-permissions https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16432071/how-to-fix-home... , which btw has a terrible accepted answer. I forget the root cause (no pun intended), possibly some bad interaction with stuff I installed outside of Homebrew. It's also possible I did something wrong, but even then there's something to be said about so many users having the same problem uniquely with Homebrew. Lemme try to repro again when I'm home.
- agos 2y ago
  this kind of errors are quite common with Homebrew in my experience. if you did anything "wrong", then it's something really easy to do wrong which lots of other (me included) have done wrong at some point, and that the software should help to prevent
  - frollogaston 2y ago
    Digging through it more, it seems like Homebrew didn't play nice with anything else that used that dir. Maybe it's less of a problem now that it installs to /opt/homebrew, but I imagine there are still times Homebrew needs to place files in root-owned dirs or next to them. This issue is also brought up in the Github commit posted here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43766371 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43766371 "I wouldn't worry about it not being root. We don't install anything base enough for it to be a concern (unlike MacPorts or Fink)."