How to install software packages on a Mac? (MacPorts, Fink, anything better?)

Posted by Ben Alpert on Super User See other posts from Super User or by Ben Alpert
Published on 2009-08-24T03:15:26Z Indexed on 2012/10/03 21:43 UTC
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Filed under:

osx

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package-management

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macports

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fink

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homebrew

On my Mac OS X machine, how would you recommend I install command line software and other packages? I've been using MacPorts and it always seems quite slow, presumably because it has to compile the packages on-the-fly.

I'd much prefer a package management system that has binary packages, saving me the need to compile things every time I want to download something new. I think Fink has binaries for some of the packages, but I usually see MacPorts recommended as the system to use.

Which do you think works better and why? (Or is there another system that I haven't heard of?)

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