HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_CLEANUP doesn't seem to work

[hacfi]

Output of brew config

HOMEBREW_VERSION: 4.4.8
ORIGIN: https://github.com/Homebrew/brew
HEAD: e78a0adb4f260913fffdc956cc8c20fb54109feb
Last commit: 16 hours ago
Branch: master
Core tap HEAD: 9e5969b3eb2a1b9d965950f4e8a5b029bae2d752
Core tap last commit: 3 hours ago
Core tap JSON: 26 Nov 07:31 UTC
Core cask tap JSON: 26 Nov 07:31 UTC
HOMEBREW_PREFIX: /opt/homebrew
HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS: []
HOMEBREW_GITHUB_API_TOKEN: set
HOMEBREW_MAKE_JOBS: 10
HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALLED_DEPENDENTS_CHECK: set
HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_CLEANUP: set
HOMEBREW_SORBET_RUNTIME: set
Homebrew Ruby: 3.3.6 => /opt/homebrew/Library/Homebrew/vendor/portable-ruby/3.3.6/bin/ruby
CPU: 10-core 64-bit arm_firestorm_icestorm
Clang: 15.0.0 build 1500
Git: 2.39.3 => /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/usr/bin/git
Curl: 8.4.0 => /usr/bin/curl
macOS: 14.3.1-arm64
CLT: 15.3.0.0.1.1708646388
Xcode: N/A
Rosetta 2: false

Output of brew doctor

Please note that these warnings are just used to help the Homebrew maintainers
with debugging if you file an issue. If everything you use Homebrew for is
working fine: please don't worry or file an issue; just ignore this. Thanks!

Warning: Some installed casks are deprecated or disabled.
You should find replacements for the following casks:
  menubar-countdown
  spectacle

Warning: Some installed kegs have no formulae!
This means they were either deleted or installed manually.
You should find replacements for the following formulae:
  [email protected]

Warning: Some installed formulae are deprecated or disabled.
You should find replacements for the following formulae:
  [email protected]
  terraform

Description of issue

I have set HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_CLEANUP=1 in my environment (see brew config output) but every now and then old versions seem to be deleted and I get errors like

dyld[12242]: Library not loaded: /opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib
  Referenced from: <FBEECA3A-5653-30B7-BF1B-8CE4B1F31911> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/postgresql@16/16.2_1/bin/postgres
  Reason: tried: '/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file), '/System/Volumes/Preboot/Cryptexes/OS/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file), '/System/Volumes/Preboot/Cryptexes/OS/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib' (no such file)

or

  Referenced from: <6258768C-2734-345E-A19E-BF158D41EAFD> /opt/homebrew/Cellar/mysql/8.3.0_1/bin/mysqld
  Reason: tried: '/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file), '/System/Volumes/Preboot/Cryptexes/OS/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file), '/System/Volumes/Preboot/Cryptexes/OS/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file), '/opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1/lib/libicuuc.74.dylib' (no such file)```

and a software that was running fine stops working. I never run `brew cleanup` so to me it looks like `HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_CLEANUP=1` is ignored. Can anyone confirm that `HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_CLEANUP=1` doesn't work as expected?

[gromgit]

What's the output of:

ls -l /opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c
ls -l /opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c*/*/lib/libicu18n.*.dylib

? I'm guessing that:

1. icu 74.x is still installed, along with some other versions, and
2. every icu version has shared libraries with the major version number embedded in the filename.

If the above exactly describes your system state, then what you're seeing is not Homebrew auto-cleaning despite you telling it not to. Rather, it's ICU's file naming that breaks Homebrew's attempt to provision version-independent paths (i.e. /opt/homebrew/opt/icu/... instead of /opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu/<ver>/...). I don't think there's anything Homebrew can do about this, short of rebuilding all dependents every time ICU releases a new major version.

[hacfi]

Thanks for the quick reply @gromgit !

ls -l /opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c

lrwxr-xr-x  1 user  admin  25 Nov 21 07:28 /opt/homebrew/opt/icu4c -> ../Cellar/icu4c@76/76.1_1

ls -l /opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c*/*/lib/libicu18n.*.dylib
zsh: no matches found: /opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c*/*/lib/libicu18n.*.dylib

But I was able to find it at /opt/homebrew/Cellar/icu4c/74.2/lib/libicui18n.74.dylib.

Is there a way to package icu4c along with the package itself? This should resolve the issue.

[gromgit]

No. brew reinstall postgresql@16 mysql is the Homebrew-approved solution.