We talked about Package Manager. Linuxbrew is Homebrew Package Manager For GNU/Linux. We Need to Think About the Pros and Cons of Using Linuxbrew on GNU/Linux Server. Reason behind thinking is avoiding the distro specific commands and avoiding complexity of software configuration. Aptitude, Yust, Yum – does not make GNU/Linux distro universally usable.
How to Install Linuxbrew on GNU/Linux Server
At this moment, do not install on production server. There can be security issues. For Debian or Ubuntu, you need to run these :
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apt update -y apt upgrade -y apt install build-essential curl git python-setuptools ruby |
For CentOS, you need to run :
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yum update -y sudo yum groupinstall 'Development Tools' sudo yum install curl git irb python-setuptools ruby |
It is as easy as installing Homebrew. Simply copy paste and hit enter :
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ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Linuxbrew/install/master/install)" PATH="$HOME/.linuxbrew/bin:$PATH" |
Add the following to your .bashrc file :
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export PATH="$HOME/.linuxbrew/bin:$PATH" export MANPATH="$HOME/.linuxbrew/share/man:$MANPATH" export INFOPATH="$HOME/.linuxbrew/share/info:$INFOPATH" |
Rest written here :
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https://github.com/Linuxbrew/brew |
Pros and Cons of Using Linuxbrew on GNU/Linux Server
Positive points :
It does not need explanation that running :
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brew install nginx-extras |
is distro-neutral. It avoids :
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# for CentOS yum install nginx-extras # for Ubuntu, Debian apt install nginx-extras # so on |
Packages in the repositories are often older than the latest latest official versions, and Homebrew and Linuxbrew builds from latest source.
It avoids too much complicated key signing.
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It avoids the need of root privilege.
One LinuxBrew repository can provide a quick method to install needed packages for a cluster of GNU/Linux machines. If we create a repo named thecustomizewindows and lemp-php5 for LEMP with PHP 5 setup, all users can use :
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brew tap thecustomizewindows/lemp-php5 |
to get automatic ready to use servers. We can install a local formula too :
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brew install /path/to/formula.rb |
Negative points :
Now, what are the problems? HomeBrew was developed for Mac OS X, which shamefully lacks a standard command line package management system. As the users were Mac users on “desktop”, the formula on GitHub was not an issue.
For servers we can not use the existing Linuxbrew for serious production servers with announcement. Homebrew/Linuxbrew have their own git repo. Question is, how they’ll run servers for Free Softwares for so many servers on this earth? At this moment, they need to release one version of Linuxbrew without default repo URLs. Because cloning their repo and modifying in current condition will debrand them.
Another problem is philosophical conflict with Free Software Foundation and Open Source. If Free Software Foundation supports Linuxbrew, then it becomes usable to all as GNU can host. But GNUbrew will be correct name in such case with restriction of non-free softwares.
Another problem is server security. The reason Homebrew was created was for escaping the difficulty of too-tight security of UNIX chroot jail shell and UNIX Wheel Group. But in case of server, the hacker is “user” and we are Apple inc !
HomeBrew is great and minimum changes in Linuxbrew can make it a very powerful tool for devops. CentMinMod to many things becoming easy to develop in a streamlined fashion.
About Abhishek Ghosh
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