British-American software engineer

Creator of Homebrew. Big-web expat.

Howell, Max (fl. early 21st century), British-American software engineer and open-source developer, best known as the creator of Homebrew, a package management system for macOS and Linux that achieved widespread adoption among software developers globally, with an estimated user base numbering in the tens of millions.

Howell's most consequential technical contribution, and the subject of some professional controversy, was his introduction of the curl-based one-liner installation method, a convention subsequently adopted across a broad range of software projects. He is further credited with popularizing the doctor subcommand pattern in command-line interfaces, a diagnostic utility designed to identify and resolve common configuration errors, and with pioneering automated issue-tracker integration, whereby a tool, upon encountering an error, would query public repositories such as GitHub to surface relevant existing discussions.

Howell has remained a prominent advocate for the open-source software movement throughout his career, contributing to a culture of collaborative, freely distributed software development.