Homebrew: Permissions Denied Issue Fix (OS X / macOS)

homebrew-permissions-issue.md

Homebrew Permissions Denied Issues Solution

sudo chown -R $(whoami) $(brew --prefix)/*

my solution with link: /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
and command: sudo chown -R "$(whoami)":admin /usr/local
it ":admin" for sum in user
MacOS BigSur 11.4

Chances are it's your sudo chown bit that saved you Reinstallation probably was never part of the equation

@Qlub53 I first did the sudo chown part, didn't work, I then proceeded to reinstall, and my problems were gone :)

Thanks @aether2501

"sudo chown -R $(whoami) $(brew --prefix)/*"
Worked just fine for me. But can Anyone explain why there's people saying that this is a terrible solution and that they are going to Macports?

Trying to run a brew cleanup, I kept getting errors like this one, exclusively with .DS_Store files:

Error: Permission denied @ apply2files - /usr/local/lib/prey/versions/1.9.12/node_modules/sqlite3/lib/.DS_Store

Ended up using simply:

cd /usr/local/lib/
sudo find . -name ".DS_Store" -delete

And the next brew cleanup ran fine.

Thanks!!! @mihkell
It works for MacOS BigSur 11.4

Well I ran this command:

sudo chown -R $(whoami) /usr/local

as well as:

chmod u+w /usr/local

And now I regret it. It's a security faux pas for the reasons others have said.

How do I change the ownership and permissions of /usr/local (and all subfolders and their contents) back to the factory defaults?

I'm running High Sierra.

Many thanks.

Here's what I did to force Homebrew to run as root:
cd /usr/local/Homebrew/Library/Homebrew
Edit brew.sh, look for "Running Homebrew as root is extremely dangerous and no longer supported" (line 250 in my version), delete the check.

Did exactly that by temporary just returning in function check-run-command-as-root() in /usr/local/Homebrew/Library/Homebrew/brew.sh. Worked (some symlink related problems got fixed) and changed back. No more problems since then.

Worked on Monterey.

Was getting

Error: Could not cleanup old kegs! Fix your permissions on:
  /usr/local/Cellar/php@7.4/7.4.16
  /usr/local/Cellar/php@7.4/7.4.24

wooooow <3

I'm really expected to recursively change ownership of my entire usr/local directory just because Homebrew told me to? A directory shared by all sorts of other applications and services? Ridiculous

Homebrew needs to work with the systems it is installing itself on. If there are permission issues then it needs to suggest sudo commands to the user that cover its specific requirements. Better yet provide a script for users to run under sudo to pre-create the dirs set permissions prior to install.

The closest I could come up with is the following. This make use of the users default group setting so other users can install homebrew utilities as well. Replace $GID if you want to use a different group, admin is a common one.

for name in Cellar Cask Homebrew Frameworks; do [ ! -d $name ] && sudo install -d -g $GID -m 0775 /usr/local/$name; done

Thank you!

Was getting

erma4inapower@MacBook-Pro-Dmitrij  ~  brew services start php
Error: Permission denied @ rb_sysopen - /Users/erma4inapower/Library/LaunchAgents/homebrew.mxcl.php.plist

Ended up:

sudo chown -R $(whoami) /Users/erma4inapower/Library/LaunchAgents/

🙏🙏🙏

thanks! really helpful

life saver!

tysm🙏🏽

thank you!

thank you !!! what exactly did I just do ??? 🤔🤔🤔 you saved my lifeee

thank you 😁

This just save my bacon... Thanks a lot...

thank you!

It worked! Thank you!

Youre a genius my friend, thank you!

Thank you!

my solution with link: /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

and command: sudo chown -R "$(whoami)":admin /usr/local

it ":admin" for sum in user

MacOS BigSur 11.4
Thanks~

Thank you ser!

great, you save my life

您的邮件已经收到。谢谢

In my case I had to setup a new local user on my machine and to remove the old one.
Then the folder ( defined by brew --prefix ) looses its owner.
With this the owner is set to the new local user and - it works!

您的邮件已经收到。谢谢