Homebrew Formula Scraper — Package Metadata & Analytics Extractor

Extract comprehensive metadata, dependency trees, and download analytics for Homebrew formulas using the official Homebrew JSON API. This Actor retrieves formula names, descriptions, licenses, versions, dependency information, and installation statistics across 30, 90, and 365-day windows. Perfect for developer tooling research, package management analysis, and macOS/Linux ecosystem monitoring.

Use Cases

• Package Research — Discover popular Homebrew formulas, compare versions, and analyze dependency graphs for macOS and Linux development environments.
• Security Auditing — Track deprecated and disabled formulas, monitor deprecation reasons, and identify packages with security concerns or outdated dependencies.
• Ecosystem Analysis — Study installation trends across 30, 90, and 365-day windows to understand developer tooling adoption and popularity shifts.
• License Compliance — Extract license information for all installed formulas to ensure compliance in corporate or open-source environments.
• Dependency Mapping — Build complete dependency trees including build, runtime, test, recommended, and optional dependencies for any formula.

Input

Field	Type	Required	Description
searchQuery	String	No	Optional keyword to filter formulas by name or description (e.g., "python", "node")
maxItems	Integer	No	Maximum formulas to extract (default: 100, max: 1000)
sortBy	String	No	Sort results by: downloads30d, downloads90d, downloads365d, or name (default: downloads30d)
includeDeprecated	Boolean	No	Include deprecated formulas (default: false)
includeDisabled	Boolean	No	Include disabled formulas (default: false)
proxyConfiguration	Object	No	Proxy configuration for requests

Output

The Actor outputs a dataset with the following fields for each formula:

{
  "name": "node",
  "fullName": "node",
  "description": "Platform built on V8 to build network applications",
  "homepage": "https://nodejs.org/",
  "license": "MIT",
  "stableVersion": "22.3.0",
  "headVersion": null,
  "bottleAvailable": true,
  "buildDependencies": ["pkgconf"],
  "dependencies": ["ca-certificates"],
  "testDependencies": [],
  "recommendedDependencies": [],
  "optionalDependencies": [],
  "kegOnly": false,
  "deprecated": false,
  "deprecationDate": null,
  "deprecationReason": null,
  "disabled": false,
  "disableDate": null,
  "disableReason": null,
  "analytics30d": 125430,
  "analytics90d": 389210,
  "analytics365d": 1523840,
  "rubySourcePath": "Formula/n/node.rb",
  "tap": "homebrew/core",
  "generatedDate": "2024-06-16"
}

Pricing

Pay per event: $0.001 per formula extracted.

Limitations

• The Homebrew API is updated periodically; analytics data may lag by a few hours.
• Very large maxItems values (1000) may take 30-60 seconds due to individual formula detail API calls.
• Formulas with no installation data in the analytics period will show null for analytics fields.
• Rate limits on the Homebrew API are generous but not officially documented; the Actor includes retries and graceful backoff.

FAQ

Q: Can I extract all 8,000+ formulas at once? A: Yes, set maxItems to 1000. The Actor will fetch the most popular formulas by default. To get all formulas, sort by name and run multiple times with different search queries.

Q: Why are some analytics fields null? A: Homebrew only tracks analytics for formulas with installations. If a formula has zero installs in the tracked period, the analytics field will be null.

Q: Do I need a proxy? A: No, the Homebrew API is public and does not require authentication or proxy. However, you can configure a proxy if your network requires it.

Changelog

• v1.0.0 — Initial release with full formula metadata, dependency trees, and installation analytics