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It's clunky. How is it better than compiling for yourself or using Apple-blessed MacPorts?

Compiling it yourself takes a lot more work than `brew install ssh-copy-id`.

Here's a pretty good expression of the main complaint I've heard about MacPorts:

> The system [homebrew] is much better than MacPorts, the idea is that for example, Mac OS X comes with python installed. Brew will try to use the default python installation instead of trying to make it's own in /usr/opt/whatever ... so, homebrew premise, is to respect the Mac OS X installed packages and use them to it's favor + respecting the Mac OS X structure ( don't re create a whole new structure like fink and mac ports )

- http://stackoverflow.com/questions/189912/what-package-manag...

An added bonus is that things tend to install way faster because it's not compiling all of this stuff that OS X came with.

Last time I tried to use it I was burned when it came to removing packages. Sure, I can remove them by hand, but then what good is my package management system? The hairier installation is, the more configuration files it creates and modifies all over the system, the more urgent is the need for reliable management system. And there are packages that can't not write all over the system. SSH is one. Sage's another.

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