Homebrew Tap for Performance Co-Pilot

This is a custom Homebrew tap for installing Performance Co-Pilot (PCP) on macOS.

Installation

To install PCP using this tap:

brew tap performancecopilot/performancecopilot
brew install --cask pcp-perf

Or install directly without tapping first:

brew install --cask performancecopilot/performancecopilot/pcp-perf

About Performance Co-Pilot

Performance Co-Pilot (PCP) is a system performance analysis toolkit that provides:

• Live performance monitoring and logging
• Distributed system monitoring capabilities
• Extensible monitoring framework with agents (PMDAs)
• Flexible data collection and analysis tools
• Integration with visualization tools like Grafana

Links:

• Homepage: https://pcp.io/
• Source: https://github.com/performancecopilot/pcp
• Documentation: https://pcp.io/docs/

What Gets Installed

PCP installs several system services that start automatically:

• io.pcp.pmcd - Performance Metrics Collector Daemon
• io.pcp.pmie - Performance Metrics Inference Engine
• io.pcp.pmlogger - Performance Metrics Logger
• io.pcp.pmproxy - Performance Metrics Proxy

Installation locations:

• Configuration: /etc/pcp/
• Data directory: /var/lib/pcp/
• Log files: /var/log/pcp/

Uninstalling

To uninstall PCP:

brew uninstall pcp-perf

This will completely remove PCP including all services, packages, configuration files, data, and logs.

Note: Homebrew uninstall performs a complete removal (equivalent to --force mode) because the standard uninstaller requires interactive confirmation, which is not compatible with Homebrew's automated process.

Manual .pkg Uninstall

If you installed PCP using the .pkg installer (not Homebrew), you can use the bundled uninstall script:

Standard Uninstall (preserves config/data/log files):

sudo /usr/local/libexec/pcp/bin/uninstall-pcp

This will prompt for confirmation and remove PCP, leaving configuration and log files in place.

Complete Uninstall (removes everything):

sudo /usr/local/libexec/pcp/bin/uninstall-pcp --force

This skips the confirmation prompt and removes all PCP files including configuration, data, and logs.

For Maintainers

Version Format

PCP uses a two-part versioning scheme: MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH-BUILD

Example: 7.0.4-1

• Release tag: 7.0.4 (used in GitHub release URLs)
• Build number: -1 (appended to DMG and PKG filenames)

This is important to understand when updating versions:

• GitHub release tag is just the semantic version: 7.0.4
• The downloadable DMG file includes the build number: pcp-7.0.4-1.dmg
• The cask uses version.major_minor_patch to extract 7.0.4 for the download URL

When updating to new versions, ensure both parts are included in the version string.

Updating for New Releases

When a new version of PCP is released, follow these steps to update the cask:

1. Download the new DMG from the PCP releases page:

   # Note: Release tag is X.Y.Z, but DMG filename includes build number
   curl -LO https://github.com/performancecopilot/pcp/releases/download/X.Y.Z/pcp-X.Y.Z-B.dmg

2. Calculate SHA256 checksum:

   shasum -a 256 pcp-X.Y.Z-B.dmg

3. Update the cask file (Casks/pcp-perf.rb):

   • Update the version field to include both version and build: X.Y.Z-B
   • Update the sha256 field with the calculated checksum
   • Example: For release 7.0.5 with build 2, use version "7.0.5-2"

4. Test locally before pushing:

   brew reinstall --cask pcp-perf

5. Commit and push changes:

   git add Casks/pcp-perf.rb
   git commit -m "Update pcp-perf to version X.Y.Z-B"
   git push

Testing Changes Locally

To test local changes before publishing:

# Tap the local repository
brew tap --force performancecopilot/performancecopilot /Users/psmith/dev/pcp/brew-pcp

# Install from local tap
brew install --cask pcp-perf

# Verify installation
brew list --cask pcp-perf

Cask Audit

To check the cask for issues:

brew audit --cask --online Casks/pcp-perf.rb

Why a Custom Tap?

The name pcp is already taken in Homebrew by an unrelated package. This custom tap uses the name pcp-perf to distinguish Performance Co-Pilot while maintaining a clear connection to the project.

License

This tap repository is maintained independently of the Performance Co-Pilot project.

• PCP License: See the PCP repository for license details
• This tap: Provided as-is for the convenience of macOS users

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome! Please ensure:

• Cask follows Homebrew Cask style guidelines
• Changes are tested locally before submitting
• Version updates include updated SHA256 checksums