install

Additional install commands

macOS

Homebrewverified · 100%

brew install flintrock

local Homebrew formula metadata

overview

Package summary

Tool for launching Apache Spark clusters

Project links

Commands and aliases

flintrock

history

Project history and usage

Flintrock is a command-line tool for launching Apache Spark clusters, especially short-lived EC2 clusters for experimentation, performance testing, and automated pipelines.

Project history

The README explicitly positions Flintrock as a faster, better alternative to spark-ec2. Its motivation section says spark-ec2 made Spark accessible but had pain points around launch speed, missing config files, non-resizable clusters, and custom machine images.

Flintrock developed into a Python CLI with YAML configuration, subcommands for launch, destroy, login, describe, add-slaves, remove-slaves, run-command, and copy-file, and support for current Spark and Hadoop/HDFS defaults.

Adoption history

The project README lists external talks, guides, and papers that used or discussed Flintrock, including a Spark Summit talk titled 'Flintrock: A faster, better spark-ec2'.

Official install guidance centers on pipx/PyPI and GitHub releases, while the README notes Homebrew as a community-supported distribution that may be out of date.

How it is used

A typical workflow is to run flintrock configure, save EC2 and Spark defaults into config.yaml, launch a cluster, work on Spark, and destroy the cluster afterward.

The README recommends IAM roles for S3 access rather than copying AWS credentials to clusters, and describes Flintrock as unsuitable for permanent infrastructure or non-Spark Hadoop services.

Why package nerds care

Flintrock is notable in package history as a CLI that wrapped a complicated cloud data workflow into a user-level package instead of a long-lived infrastructure framework.

Its packaging story also shows the boundary between official Python application distribution and community package-manager formulas: the project points users to pipx for current releases and marks Homebrew as community supported.

Timeline

2016: Release v0.7.0 was published.
2017: Release v0.9.0 was published.
2020: Release v1.0.0 was published.
2021: Release v2.0.0 was published.
2023: Release v2.1.0 was published and standalone builds stopped after this line according to the README.

Related projects

Flintrock is directly related to Apache Spark, Hadoop/HDFS, Amazon EC2, spark-ec2, and S3A access through Hadoop.
The README contrasts Flintrock with permanent-infrastructure tools such as Terraform, Ansible, Ubuntu Juju, Databricks, Amazon EMR, and Apache Bigtop.

Sources

security posture

Risk level: orange

infrastructure mutation or orchestration signal.

Risk classifier

orange risk · medium confidence · infrastructure

Why

infrastructure mutation or orchestration signal

Signals

text:cluster

Install behavior

No Homebrew post-install hook is recorded in formula metadata.
Homebrew bottle metadata is available for 6 platform targets.
Installs with 4 runtime dependencies.
Build metadata lists 2 build dependencies.

Recommended review

Before unattended agent use, check whether the tool reads plaintext credentials, writes remote state, publishes artifacts, or shells out to plugins.

local files

Configuration and credential file locations

These source-backed paths show where this package keeps local settings or durable credentials. Automic Vault can use them as review targets for secret scanning, migration, and command approval.

Configuration files

Config paths the tool may read or write during local use.

Linux: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/Flintrock/config.yaml~/.config/Flintrock/config.yaml
macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Flintrock/config.yaml

executables

Installed executables

Command	Kind	Exposure	Note
`flintrock`	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 generated2026-07-08

manager version2.1.0

manager updated2026-04-21

local dataok

upstreamnot checked

latest detectednot detected

https://github.com/nchammas/flintrock

infoNo cached GitHub release or tag data was available.https://github.com/nchammas/flintrocknone confidence

install metadata

Package metadata

Package key	brew:flintrock
Version	2.1.0
Package manager	Homebrew
Package manager page	https://formulae.brew.sh/formula/flintrock
Homepage	https://github.com/nchammas/flintrock
Repository	https://github.com/nchammas/flintrock
Upstream docs	https://github.com/nchammas/flintrock#readme
License	Apache-2.0
Source archive	https://files.pythonhosted.org/packages/e9/3b/810c7757f6abb0a73a50c2da6da2dacb5af85a04b056aef81323b2b6a082/Flintrock-2.1.0.tar.gz
Last updated	2026-04-21T12:09:21-07:00
Pulse	updated
Dependencies	cryptography, libsodium, libyaml, python@3.14
Build dependencies	pkgconf, rust
Bottle	available (on arm64_linux, arm64_sequoia, arm64_sonoma, arm64_tahoe, sonoma, x86_64_linux)
Homebrew post-install	not defined
Service	none declared

registry facts

Source database details

Source Database	Homebrew formula API
Tap	homebrew/core
Full Name	flintrock
Version Scheme	0
Revision	1
Bottle Stable Root URL	https://ghcr.io/v2/homebrew/core
Deprecated	no
Disabled	no
Keg Only	no
URL Keys	stable

package graph

Links come from deterministic package relationships, av.db category and tag curation, ecosystem matches, and package hub membership.

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.

combined/flintrock.yml

Used sources

Geiger risk classifier
Nucleus package database
av.db category and tag curation
cross-ecosystem install command graph
curated configuration and credential file locations
curated package history
package relationship graph
package version freshness
package-page enrichment

Install flintrock with Homebrew