FAQ.md

Frequently Asked Questions

How do Font Casks Differ from Other Casks?

Font Casks are managed via hard links rather than symbolic links (symlinks).

Homebrew-cask uses the "symlink farm" method to manage installed files, like GNU Stow and Homebrew.

Due to a quirk in OS X, a symlinked font file is not visible to the system (i.e. it won't show up in Font Book). Therefore we manage fonts via "hard links".

How do Hard Links Differ from Symlinks

For a full explanation, you may of course refer to Wikipedia.

The only difference which is relevant to Caskroom-fonts is that hard links may not cross filesystem boundaries (Volume boundaries in OS X lingo).

So, if you have placed the Caskroom (typically /opt/homebrew-cask/Caskroom) onto a separate Volume than the font installation directory (typically ~/Library/Fonts), then you will not be able to manage fonts using homebrew-cask.

It is highly unlikely that you have such a configuration on your Mac. Special, explicit effort would be required to create it.