Error: could not symlink share/doc/node/gdbinit /usr/local/share/doc/node is not writable.

Question

Problem :

I made the big mistake of trying remove all sudo dependencies. I simply downloaded npm as a package from the preferred site and did a manual global install. But I had to always run with the sudo. That’s why I tried to uninstall and tried to run it with homebrew.

Now the problem is I cannot even get node or npm to run. I think I need to link with brew link but I am getting following error:

Could not symlink share/doc/node/gdbinit

Target /usr/local/share/doc/node/gdbinit

already exists. You may want to remove it:

  rm '/usr/local/share/doc/node/gdbinit'

I have also tried to remove that: And now I am getting permission denied.

I have tried to run brew prune also I have uninstalled and then reinstalled using following steps:

$ brew uninstall npm

$ brew uninstall node

$ npm uninstall npm -g

$ sudo rm -rf /usr/local/lib/node_module

Also I am running Yosemite 10.10.5. My git version is 2.6.0 installed. And my homebrew is updated. But still the brew doctor gives me following warning:

Warning: You have unlinked kegs in your Cellar

Leaving kegs unlinked can lead to build-trouble and cause brews that depend on

those kegs to fail to run properly once built. Run `brew link` on these:

Now I am completely stuck and don’t know how to solve it. Does anybody have any clue?

Answer 1

I can see that several files and directories in your /usr/local are now owned by root, as you have ran a couple of steps using sudo. Now to get rid of these, please take back the ownership of all of the files and directories under your /usr/local by following command:

sudo chown -R $(whoami) $(brew --prefix)/*

Once that is done, Just run brew doctor again. And all your issues will be resolved.