Caskroom Support

[chrisamanse]

Can you support installation of Realm Browser using caskroom?

[TimOliver]

Hi @chrisamanse!

Interesting! I've never heard of Caskroom before. What sort of advantages would it give over the App Store or (as we're potentially investigating it) the Sparkle framework?

Thanks!

[chrisamanse]

I'm new to Caskroom as well.

Well, Sparkle would be more user-friendly. However, for those who are fond of installing tools through the command line, it would be convenient to install or update Realm Browser just by running a terminal command (assuming homebrew is already installed). On the other hand, App Store updates would lag behind GitHub releases.

As of now, without Sparkle support, I think caskroom would be a great alternative for installing and updating the app :)

[vitorgalvao]

Sparkle and homebrew-cask (caskroom is the organisation) aren’t mutually exclusive. Sparkle allows you to auto-update your app, while homebrew-cask allows you to install it by using the command line. They’re different things.

[jpsim]

Since the browser is open source, why not use Homebrew proper instead? A few OSS OS X apps do this already.

[jpsim]

Also, the caskroom formula you posted has a number of issues, first of which is the lack of signature verification.

[vitorgalvao]

@jpsim Because homebrew is more geared towards CLI apps and homebrew-cask towards GUI apps, and as we bring the projects closer together, that divide will be even more pronounced.

[chrisamanse]

@jpsim I'll update the Cask in my PR.

@vitorgalvao If the app, for example, is updated using Sparkle, will homebrew-cask also recognize the update?

[vitorgalvao]

@chrisamanse Homebrew/homebrew-cask#13201. Homebrew-cask won’t care. It won’t stop the app from doing what it does and updating automatically.

[chrisamanse]

Just added realm-browser.rb in homebrew-cask (Homebrew/homebrew-cask@c023d76)

We can now install realm browser by running brew cask install realm-browser. You may also need to update the casks info repo by running brew cask update.

[phatblat]

FYI, I submitted Homebrew/homebrew-cask#39852 to add Realm Studio to Homebrew cask. Not sure if there's a way to deprecate the Browser's cask.