Go stellar with homebrew, the missing MacOs package manager. 👨🏼🚀
Homebrew: Installs all the stuff you’d need on your mac.
Installing Homebrew: /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https//raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"
Right from the get go though, you want to add these two lines to your
.zshrcor.bashrc, because they disable the usually enabled google analytics tracking user’s behaviour, which homebrew uses for better traffic management or whatever.
export HOMEBREW_NO_ANALYTICS=1
export HOMEBREW_NO_INSECURE_REDIRECT=1
Nowadays, most users get their apps / programs from Apple’s Mac App Store,
while for example most gamers get theirs from origin, steam or blizzard.
Not many mainstream users get to download software differently.
Fewer users download .Dmg, .pkg or .app files from websites, containing setup scripts for graphical applications.
Welcome to the world of open source!
Those that use the command-line would most likely be familiar with package
managers, because they are the way you install apps / programs for use on your command-line. Homebrew is like a open source, all free app store.
Quick-Tip: Brew Cask’s
“To install, drag this icon…” no more. brew cask installs macOS apps, fonts and plugins and other non-open source software.
Brew cask install X, where X is the gui app you want to install.
While homebrew is mainly used for installing command-line applications /
programs, you can also install graphical are applications, which are called cask's. These casks include many mainstream apps that you as well just directly download from the distributor’s website.
The advantage that homebrew brings along for those apps, is that these apps can easily be controlled and managed via homebrew. Not only does it also caches, configs and other files that are not visible to the average user, but it also allows the customisation pre-compilations. Thus, you can create your own builds for programs / apps; customise them, introduce your own functionality, for example, build a custom chrome, making all white background of websites dark. 😎 (even though there are easier ways for this specific example.)
How do I use Homebrew?
To install a new program, simply do: brew install X, where X equals the name of the app you want to install.
To see what you’ve got installed, even though you shouldn’t have too many
programs installed you’re aren’t using on a regular basis.
brew list
For further instructions, please read:
- official docs
- howtogeek
- datacamp
The very cool thing about hombrew is that you can also run services running inthe background through it. Such would be an example for skhd or yabai.
