# Install dashing with Homebrew, MacPorts, Nix

Generate Dash documentation from HTML files. Version 0.4.0 via Homebrew; verified from local package data. Also installable with nix: nix profile install nixpkgs#dashing.

## Install

```sh
sudo av install brew:dashing
```

Additional install commands:

### macOS

- Homebrew (100%):

```sh
brew install dashing
```

  Evidence: local Homebrew formula metadata

- MacPorts (94%):

```sh
sudo port install dashing
```

  Evidence: MacPorts ports tree: textproc/dashing/Portfile from https://api.github.com/repos/macports/macports-ports/git/trees/master?recursive=1

### Linux

- Nix (92%):

```sh
nix profile install nixpkgs#dashing
```

  Evidence: nixpkgs package indexes: pkgs/by-name/da/dashing/package.nix from https://api.github.com/repos/NixOS/nixpkgs/git/trees/master?recursive=1

## Package facts

- **Package key:** brew:dashing
- **Package manager:** Homebrew
- **Version:** 0.4.0
- **Source summary:** Generate Dash documentation from HTML files
- **Homepage:** <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing>
- **Repository:** <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing>
- **Generated:** 2026-08-03T19:37:03+00:00

## Executables

- dashing (alias)

## Install behavior

- Bottle: not available

## Freshness

- Page generated: 2026-08-03
- Package-manager version: 0.4.0
## Project history and usage

Dashing is a Go command-line generator for Dash-compatible docsets from existing HTML documentation.

### Project history

The public GitHub release record starts with version 0.0.1 in July 2015, followed by 0.2.0 and 0.3.0 later that year and a maintenance update in 2019 for Go 1.13. Its README describes the project as a maintenance-stage tool that maps HTML with CSS selectors into a complete Dash docset.

### Adoption history

Dashing's official README points users first to Homebrew and MacPorts, with prebuilt macOS binaries and Go installation as alternatives. That places it in the macOS documentation-tooling niche around Dash docsets rather than in a broad language-runtime ecosystem.

### How it is used

A typical workflow is to run `dashing create` in an HTML documentation directory, edit `dashing.json`, and then build a `.docset` bundle for Dash.

### Why package nerds care

For package maintainers, Dashing is useful because it turns arbitrary upstream HTML docs into the SQLite-backed docset format used by Dash and related offline-documentation workflows.

### Timeline

- 2015: Initial 0.0.1 public release.
- 2015: 0.2.0 added regular expression support.
- 2019: 0.4.0 maintenance release updated the build to Go 1.13.

### Related projects

- Dash defines the docset format Dashing targets; Homebrew and MacPorts are documented installation paths.

### Sources

- <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing#readme>
- <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing/releases/tag/0.0.1>
- <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing/releases/tag/0.2.0>
- <https://github.com/technosophos/dashing/releases/tag/0.4.0>


## Security Notes

narrow executable package without higher-risk signals.

- **Geiger risk:** green / low
- narrow executable package without higher-risk signals

## Other Package-Manager Records

- Nix - dashing: normalized package name match | nixpkgs package indexes: pkgs/by-name/da/dashing/package.nix from https://api.github.com/repos/NixOS/nixpkgs/git/trees/master?recursive=1
- MacPorts - dashing: normalized package name match | MacPorts ports tree: textproc/dashing/Portfile from https://api.github.com/repos/macports/macports-ports/git/trees/master?recursive=1


## Combined YAML source

View the package source record on GitHub. [combined/dashing.yml](https://github.com/mxcl/pkgdb/blob/main/combined/dashing.yml)


## Sources

- pkg.so package database
- Geiger risk classifier
- curated package history
- pkgdb category and tag curation
- external package-manager database matches
- cross-ecosystem install command graph