[kolev]

I've been struggling with this all the time. For example, for months, gcc wouldn't compile on Yosemite, and all packages that depend on it (as there's no version on dependencies, it assumes it requires the latest), even if it's pinned, they still start installing the latest version! Compiling some packages takes hours on MacBook Air. Also, many binaries are hosted on SourceForge, and even upgrading to a point release requires a pull request that needs to be reviewed and approved! I've been waiting weeks to have Terraform upgraded, and I gave up and install all HashiCorp tools myself, not using Homeblew. That's why, I think, it just doesn't make sense in the world of Linux as it doesn't really have a true version and dependency management, it doesn't have things like virtual packages, and other basics, but I'm sure many people who are not comfortable on Linux, but are familiar with OS X and Homebrew, will use it on Linux. Gnome has PackageKit [1] (supposedly cross-Linux), and there's also Zero Install [2], but, honestly, I haven't used them and I don't know if they are any better and work for anything, but GUI apps. I personally started a Bash-based package manager, but having Bash 3.x as a requirement is tough as I cannot use associative arrays - I wonder if I should require v4 and above.

[1] http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/

[2] http://0install.net/