[nextw33k]

brew is a package manager, I can install a set of applications and libraries that will be kept up to date with a simple command line. If your coding doesn't take you outside of what Apple provide then you are probably not missing anything.

Personally I have the Android SDK and NDK, QtCreator, Qt5, cppcheck, cloc, mongodb, node, wine and others. If you are not using a variety of 3rd party tools to produce/automate your work then you probably don't need to worry.

Having all those kept up to date for me saves me so much time.

[72deluxe]

I use xcode and use wxWidgets, but I grab these manually and compile them myself. I also use the Android SDK and NDK, cppcheck cloc etc like you

I didn't realise that they could be kept up to date with homebrew?? Is that the case?

Last time I looked at MacPorts (and perhaps homebrew) I saw it as a porting of BDS/GNU tools to OSX and therefore making the OS more Linuxy to my mind. I wanted a clean break from Linuxland when I moved to OSX, hence I removed MacPorts etc. (Additionally the ported software all ran under X and not Quartz so it didn't really fit in; also, the fetched packages and compiled systems were massive in size which I didn't appreciate on a laptop that shared space with recorded audio and video etc. so space was at a premium).

[ascendantlogic]

Homebrew is really the default package manager. You don't need it, per se, but for the vast majority of people it'd be like trying to set up a Linux system without using apt-get or yum: an exercise in pain.

[72deluxe]

That'll explain my early Debian experiences (installing from DVD and attempting to use dpkg exclusively) and my Slackware experiences then...