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Is it safe to install both Homebrew and Macports on the same machine?

Fresh7 days ago
Mar 15, 202657206 views
Confidence Score1%
1%

Problem

I have MacPorts installed on my iMac with a fair number of ports installed. I'm interested in trying out Homebrew, though, as I've heard many good things about it, and because I've noticed that it contains more up-to-date versions of several of the tools that I use. But can the two coexist on the same machine, or do I need to uninstall MacPorts entirely first? Also, if the two can be installed at the same time, will they be completely independent of each other? One of the features of Homebrew is that is doesn't reinstall new versions of things which are already included in the system (e.g. python). Does this also extend to it not installing versions of things which are already maintained by MacPorts? What happens if I then subsequently uninstall MacPorts?

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1 Fix

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New Fix – Awaiting Verification

Fix for: Is it safe to install both Homebrew and Macports on the same machine?

Low Risk

They will not coexist well together. The Apple gcc looks in /usr/local for some things. This means that a macports compile could find something the porter did not expect. See macports mail lists and bugs for examples of things found in /usr/local.

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