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How to Use Homebrew-cask

Getting Started

First ensure you have Homebrew version '0.9.5' or higher:

$ brew --version
0.9.5

Install the homebrew-cask tool:

$ brew install caskroom/cask/brew-cask

Frequently Used Commands

Homebrew-cask is implemented as a subcommand of Homebrew. All homebrew-cask commands begin with brew cask. Homebrew-cask has its own set of command verbs many of which are similar to Homebrew's. The most frequently-used commands are:

  • search -- searches all known Casks
  • install -- installs the given Cask
  • uninstall -- uninstalls the given Cask

Searching for Casks

The brew cask search command accepts a series of substring arguments, and returns tokens representing matching Casks. Let's see if there's a Cask for Google Chrome:

$ brew cask search chrome
google-chrome

A search command with no search term will list all available Casks:

$ brew cask search
# <list of all available Casks>

Installing Casks

The command brew cask install accepts a Cask token as returned by brew cask search. Let's try to install Google Chrome:

$ brew cask install google-chrome
==> Downloading https://dl.google.com/chrome/mac/stable/GGRO/googlechrome.dmg
==> Success! google-chrome installed to /opt/homebrew-cask/Caskroom/google-chrome/stable-channel
==> Linking Google Chrome.app to /Users/paulh/Applications/Google Chrome.app

Uninstalling Casks

Easy peasy:

$ brew cask uninstall google-chrome

This will both uninstall the Cask and remove symlinks which were created in ~/Applications.

To uninstall all versions of a Cask, use --force:

$ brew cask uninstall --force google-chrome

Note that uninstall --force is currently imperfect. See the man page for more information.

Other Commands

  • info -- displays information about the given Cask
  • list -- with no args, lists installed Casks; given installed Casks, lists staged files
  • fetch -- downloads Cask resources to local cache (with --force, re-download even if already cached)
  • doctor -- checks for configuration issues
  • cleanup -- cleans up cached downloads (with --outdated, only cleans old downloads)
  • home -- opens the homepage of the given Cask; or with no arguments, the homebrew-cask project page
  • alfred -- modifies Alfred's search scope to include installed Casks
  • update -- a synonym for brew update
  • zap -- try to remove all files associated with a Cask (including resources which may be shared with other applications)

The following commands are for Cask authors:

  • audit -- verifies installability of Casks
  • cat -- dumps the given Cask to the standard output
  • create -- creates a Cask and opens it in an editor
  • edit -- edits the given Cask

The following aliases and abbreviations are provided for convenience:

  • ls -- list
  • -S -- search
  • rm, remove -- uninstall
  • up -- update
  • dr -- doctor

Inspecting Installed Casks

List all installed Casks

$ brew cask list
adium          google-chrome     onepassword

Show details about a specific Cask:

$ brew cask info caffeine
caffeine: 1.1.1
http://lightheadsw.com/caffeine/
Not installed
https://github.com/caskroom/homebrew-cask/blob/master/Casks/caffeine.rb

Updating/Upgrading Casks

Since the homebrew-cask repository is a Homebrew Tap, you'll pull down the latest Casks every time you issue the regular Homebrew command brew update. Currently, homebrew-cask cannot always detect if an Application has been updated. You can force an update via the command brew cask install --force. We are working on improving this.

It is generally safe to run updates from within an Application.

Updating/Upgrading the Homebrew-cask Tool

When a new version homebrew-cask is released, it will appear in the output of brew outdated after running brew update. You can upgrade it via the normal Homebrew brew upgrade workflow:

$ brew update && brew upgrade brew-cask && brew cleanup && brew cask cleanup

Additional Taps (optional)

The primary homebrew-cask Tap includes most of the Casks that a typical user will be interested in. There are a few additional Taps where we store different kinds of Casks.

Tap name description
caskroom/versions contains alternate versions of Casks (e.g. betas, nightly releases, old versions)
caskroom/fonts contains Casks that install fonts, which are kept separate so we can educate users about the different licensing landscape around font installation/usage
caskroom/unofficial contains Casks that install unofficial builds or forks

There are also alternate Cask Taps maintained by users.

You can tap any of the above with a brew tap command:

$ brew tap <tap_name>

after which, Casks from the new Tap will be available to search or install just like Casks from the main Tap. brew update will automatically keep your new Tap up to date.

You may also specify a fully-qualified Cask token (which includes the Tap) for any brew cask command. This will implicitly add the Tap if you have not previously added it with brew tap:

$ brew cask install caskroom/fonts/font-symbola

Options

brew cask accepts a number of options:

  • --version: print version and exit
  • --debug: output debug information
  • --no-binaries: skip symlinking executable binaries into /usr/local/bin

You can also modify the default installation locations used when issuing brew cask install:

  • --caskroom=/my/path determines where the actual applications will be located. Default is /opt/homebrew-cask/Caskroom
  • --appdir=/my/path changes the path where the symlinks to the applications (above) will be generated. This is commonly used to create the links in the root Applications directory instead of the home Applications directory by specifying --appdir=/Applications. Default is ~/Applications.
  • --prefpanedir=/my/path changes the path for PreferencePane symlinks. Default is ~/Library/PreferencePanes
  • --qlplugindir=/my/path changes the path for Quicklook Plugin symlinks. Default is ~/Library/QuickLook
  • --widgetdir=/my/path changes the path for Dashboard Widget symlinks. Default is ~/Library/Widgets
  • --fontdir=/my/path changes the path for Fonts symlinks. Default is ~/Library/Fonts
  • --binarydir=/my/path changes the path for binary symlinks. Default is /usr/local/bin
  • --input_methoddir=/my/path changes the path for Input Methods symlinks. Default is ~/Library/Input Methods
  • --screen_saverdir=/my/path changes the path for Screen Saver symlinks. Default is ~/Library/Screen Savers

To make these settings persistent, you might want to add the following line to your .bash_profile or .zshenv:

# Specify your defaults in this environment variable
export HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS="--appdir=/Applications --caskroom=/etc/Caskroom"

Note that you still can override the environment variable HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS by explicitly providing options in the command line:

# Will force the Chrome app to be linked to ~/Applications
# even though HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS specified /Applications
$ brew cask install --appdir="~/Applications" google-chrome

Advanced searching

The default search algorithm is a lax substring approach, which does not use the command-line arguments exactly as given. If you need to specify a search more precisely, a single search argument enclosed in / characters will be taken as a Ruby regular expression:

$ brew cask search '/^google.c[a-z]rome$/'
google-chrome

Other Ways to Specify a Cask

Most brew cask commands can accept a Cask token as an argument. As described above, the token on the command line can take the form of:

  • a token as returned by brew cask search, eg: google-chrome
  • a fully-qualified token which includes the Tap, eg: caskroom/fonts/font-symbola

brew cask also accepts three other forms as arguments

  • a path to a Cask file, eg: /usr/local/Cellar/brew-cask/0.25.0/Casks/google-chrome.rb
  • a curl-retrievable URI to a Cask file, eg: https://raw.github.com/caskroom/homebrew-cask/f54bbfaae0f2fa7210484f46313a459cb8a14d2f/Casks/google-chrome.rb
  • a file in the current working directory, eg: my-modfied-google-chrome.rb. Note that matching Tapped Cask tokens will be preferred over this form when there is a conflict. To force the use of a Cask file in the current directory, specify a pathname with slashes, eg: ./google-chrome.rb.

The last three forms are intended for users who wish to maintain private Casks.

Taps

You can add Casks to your existing (or new) Taps: just create a directory named Casks inside your Tap, put your Cask files there, and everything will just work.

Alfred Integration

Many users combine Homebrew-cask with Alfred 2 to great effect. Just add the Cask staging area to Alfred's "search scope" by either

  • running brew cask alfred link, or
  • manually adding /opt/homebrew-cask/Caskroom via Alfred's preferences GUI

Applications will then become available in Alfred immediately after a brew cask install. Your fingertips will thank you.

Oh, and you can brew cask install alfred too! Not bad, eh?