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by bhaak 1958 days ago
Cross-compiling is a need that almost no user ever has.

The only legit need on macOS was for a long time iOS only and now, the two supported CPU architectures. But that is covered by using XCode.

There would be now need for a Apple Homebrew to use or provide universal binaries.

Homebrew's design is for providing tools for the need of the single user of the system (it doesn't even work well in a multi-user environment) with the tools he needs on this system. Switching CPU architecture would be solved with reinstalling Homebrew on the new system (like it is now).
1 comments
bacon_blood 1958 days ago
I just checked your profile and it seems like you're a command line software developer for Linux. I'm not sure why you're telling a Mac developer what Mac developers do and don't need, or what use cases are "legitimate".

I'm speaking from personal experience about what is broken about homebrew's developer tools for a software developer building and using lots of existing open source software for Mac. Please don't respond further unless you are absolutely confident your position is in good faith and supported by personal relevant experience.

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bhaak 1958 days ago
Do you think command line software developing for Linux is a paid full time job? My day job is on macOS where I've been using Homebrew for about 7 years.

I know its warts. I don't say that it isn't broken for the usecase you are describing. I'm saying that like the Homebrew developers, if Apple were in charge of Homebrew, they wouldn't care about such a use case because it would only affect a tiny percentage of their user base.

If you don't believe that just look how old the user base command line tools are that are installed by default on macOS.

For example bash is "GNU bash, version 3.2.57(1)-release (x86_64-apple-darwin17), Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc." That's 14 years ago.

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bacon_blood 1958 days ago
This is a software supply chain issue, but it likely doesn't interest Intel Mac users who are still using x86 homebrew and who can't empathize with the experience of the upstream developers for all the Mac software they use.
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