macOS
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brew install cromwelllocal Homebrew formula metadata
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Install cromwell with Homebrew
Workflow Execution Engine using Workflow Description Language. Version 92 via Homebrew; verified from local package data.
install
Additional install commands
overview
Package summary
Workflow Execution Engine using Workflow Description Language
Project links
Commands and aliases
- cromwell
- womtool
history
Project history and usage
Cromwell is Broad Institute's open-source workflow management system for bioinformatics and other scientific workflows. It is closely associated with WDL, ships with the womtool helper, and can run workflows locally, as a server, or against pluggable execution backends.
Project history
The repository was created in 2015, and early releases began that year. The official documentation says Cromwell started life as a WDL engine, with WDL draft-2 as its first language, and later added WDL 1.0 support while continuing to track WDL development.
Cromwell's architecture centers on workflow execution backends. The official backend documentation describes included support for Local, HPC schedulers such as SGE, LSF, HTCondor, and Slurm, Google Cloud through Google Batch, GA4GH TES, and AWS Batch beta support.
Adoption history
Broad's README points many users toward Terra, a managed bioinformatics platform with built-in Cromwell support, while self-managed users can download a JAR or Docker image. This split shaped Cromwell's adoption: package managers provide local CLI access, but large production usage often happens through managed or institution-maintained deployments.
How it is used
Users run Cromwell to execute WDL workflows and use womtool for WDL validation and workflow object model tasks. Common deployments range from five-minute local tutorials to persistent server mode, cloud batch backends, and HPC scheduler integrations.
Why package nerds care
For package maintainers, Cromwell is a JVM scientific-workflow package whose command-line distribution wraps a larger service-oriented engine. It matters because reproducible workflow tooling often needs both local executables for validation and stable release artifacts for institutional compute environments.
Timeline
- 2015: Repository created and 0.5 release published.
- 2015: Early 0.x releases established Cromwell as a WDL workflow engine.
- 2020s: Documentation emphasizes Terra-managed usage, self-managed JAR or Docker deployments, WDL support, and modular backends.
Related projects
- WDL and OpenWDL are the workflow language context for Cromwell.
- Terra is a managed platform with built-in Cromwell support.
- GA4GH TES, Google Batch, AWS Batch, and HPC schedulers are execution-backend contexts.
Sources
security posture
Risk level: green
narrow executable package without higher-risk signals.
Risk classifier
green risk · low confidence · appliance
Why
- narrow executable package without higher-risk signals
Signals
- metadata:no-higher-risk-signals
Install behavior
- No Homebrew post-install hook is recorded in formula metadata.
- Homebrew bottle metadata is available for 1 platform targets.
- Installs with 1 runtime dependencies.
Recommended review
Before unattended agent use, check whether the tool reads plaintext credentials, writes remote state, publishes artifacts, or shells out to plugins.
executables
Installed executables
| Command | Kind | Exposure | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
cromwell | cli | global executable | |
womtool | cli | global executable |
freshness
Version and freshness
These signals separate page generation age, package-manager activity, and upstream release comparison. Version lag is warned only when an evidence URL and comparable versions are present.
page generated2026-07-10
manager version92
manager updated
local dataok
upstreamnot checked
latest detectednot detected
https://github.com/broadinstitute/cromwell
- infoNo package-manager update timestamp was available.low confidence
- infoNo cached GitHub release or tag data was available.https://github.com/broadinstitute/cromwellnone confidence
install metadata
Package metadata
| Package key | brew:cromwell |
|---|---|
| Version | 92 |
| Package manager | Homebrew |
| Package manager page | https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/cromwell |
| Homepage | https://github.com/broadinstitute/cromwell |
| Repository | https://github.com/broadinstitute/cromwell |
| Upstream docs | https://cromwell.readthedocs.io/en/stable |
| License | BSD-3-Clause |
| Source archive | https://github.com/broadinstitute/cromwell/releases/download/92/cromwell-92.jar |
| Dependencies | openjdk |
| Bottle | available (on all) |
| Homebrew post-install | not defined |
| Service | none declared |
registry facts
Source database details
| Source Database | Homebrew formula API |
|---|---|
| Tap | homebrew/core |
| Full Name | cromwell |
| Version Scheme | 0 |
| Revision | 0 |
| Head Version | HEAD |
| Bottle Stable Root URL | https://ghcr.io/v2/homebrew/core |
| Deprecated | no |
| Disabled | no |
| Keg Only | no |
| URL Keys |
|
source trail
Generated from repository data
This page is generated by av-web from the private package SQLite artifact built by scripts/generate-pkg-sqlite.py.
Combined YAML source
View the package source record on GitHub.
Used sources
- Geiger risk classifier
- Nucleus package database
- av.db category and tag curation
- cross-ecosystem install command graph
- curated package history
- package relationship graph
- package version freshness
- package-page enrichment