1

I tried to install homebrew (OSX 10.9.5) using the recommended

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"

but got

Illegal variable name.

I do have macports installed, so perhaps some commands do not what they are meant to?? But note that ruby is /usr/bin/ruby and curl is /usr/bin/curl.

How can I overcome this problem?

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3 Answers 3

Reset to default
4

The problem lies with usage of tcsh as underlying shell. tcsh does not support $() as a syntax for command substituion. When using bash instead, it works just fine.

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-2

in terminal preferences, change /bin/tcsh to /bin/bash

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1
  • Presumably the OP is using tcsh because they want to use it in preference to bash! They don't need to (semi)permanently change their shell - just drop into bash to install brew, then exit bash and return to tcsh. And that'll work even if they're using iTerm2, or another terminal emulator, not just Terminal.app.
    – John N
    Dec 9, 2016 at 10:03
-2

in terminal just type 'bash' and then enter now run the same command. I works fine.

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