See which packages were installed manually and which as dependencies

[buresdv]

This could be very useful to quickly scan which packages might be candidates for deletion.

[buresdv]

Could be accomplished by checking the key installed_on_request from brew info --json=v2 [package]. Seems to be true for packages installed manually, and false for packages installed as dependencies.

[buresdv]

Done!

[occludedpixel]

But if brew upgrade foo is run, Cork will register foo as a installed manually even though it was originally just a dependency?

[buresdv]

The moment you manually update a dependency, Homebrew starts tracking it as manually installed, since you manually modified it.

[occludedpixel]

I see.. was hoping that Cork had a way of tracking intentionally installed packages that would differentiate between the two given the second point of "Things that Cork makes easier" in the README highlights "Knowing which packages you installed intentionally...".

Would you happen to have any suggestions on how to work around this?

[buresdv]

Tracking which packages were installed intentionally is very difficult in Homebrew itself.

Like you saw, modifying a dependency makes it act as if it was installed manually.

The core problem Cork solves is that the Homebrew way of listing manually installed packages doesn't actually list which packages were installed intentionally - it uses some weird internal fuckery that sometimes leaves packages out, and sometimes lists packages that were not installed manually at all. Cork solves it by taking installation info directly from package metadata - this is what is meant by that "know which packages were installed manually" line.

Of course, I could build a custom internal tracker that would keep track of which packages you actually clicked "Install" on, but then we get into the realm of weird edge cases.

I don’t think building a custom tracking solution would be worth the effort, and it would most likely end up being even less accurate than the current system.