The easiest way to install a number of Unix style applications and open source software onto macOS Big Sur, Catalina, Mojave and earlier Sierra OS versions is via a package manager, unfortunately, macOS Big Sur doesn’t come with one, but fortunately, some good folks care, they come in the form of Homebrew.
The install of Homebrew also works on macOS Catalina, macOS Mojave, (High)Sierra, El Capitan, and Yosemite, so macOS 10.10 – 10.14
I just upgraded to El Capitan, and when I tried updating brew I got the following error: $ brew update Error: The /usr/local directory is not writable. Even if this directory was writable when you installed Homebrew, other software may change permissions on this directory. It is possible you are getting the command wrong too, but it is possible Homebrew is not compatible with your MacOS version though I don’t think that is as likely. I have Homebrew working fine for me on my Macs with various system software releases, like Mojave, Sierra, El Capitan, Mavericks, etc.
Homebrew isn’t the only option, also available is MacPorts and Fink but Homebrew is the newest and most popular of the trio.
El Capitan Mac Os
Install Homebrew
To download install Homebrew run the install script on the command line as below and let the script do its thing:
If you don’t have Apples Xcode Command Line Tools installed it will alert you to that it will install it and carry on with the Homebrew installation and download the Command Line Tools you will need to enter your admin password at some point.
Then Homebrew is installed.
After this Homebrew is installed and ready to install other apps.
To get started run brew help can give some command example usage.
To check for any issues with the Homebrew install run:
One issue that typically comes up is an outdated or missing version of Xcode.
For the latest macOS, brew doctor will warn that the Homebrew install won’t be 100% if Xcode is not up to date, so update Xcode from the App Store.
To search for an application:
To install
To list all apps installed by Homebrew
To remove an installed application
To update Homebrew itself
To see what packages are out of date but not to upgrade them
To see what upgrade packages all or singular
To hold a package at a certain version
To release a package from a certain version
To see what else you can do
Where does Homebrew install stuff …. in the Cellar
Where the brew lives.
You can see your Homebrew configuration by running
El Capitan Os X Download
The output should be similar to …
All installations via Homebrew are filed independently in the filing system in /usr/local/Cellar and linked into /usr/local/bin which is a directory which allows you to run these commands and apps as if part of the regular operating system.
This directory is also out of the SIP bounds so there should be no authentication macOS error dialog boxes.
Remove Home-brew and all packages
To remove the Home-brew installation and all packages it has installed..
Homebrew El Capitan Software
HomeBrew is a great package manager just start installing some apps and explore.!