Install hk with Homebrew, MacPorts, scoop

Project links

• Homepage
• Repository
• Upstream docs
• Package manager page

Commands and aliases

• generate-docs
• hk

Project history

The official README describes hk as a git hook manager and project linting tool with an emphasis on performance. Its About page explains the motivation: git hooks need to be fast or developers stop using them, and naive parallel execution can break when multiple formatters or linters modify the same files.

hk's configuration model uses Apple's Pkl language through hk.pkl files. The configuration documentation describes layered sources, including built-in defaults, user-level hkrc, project config, Git config, environment variables, and CLI flags.

Adoption history

hk is a young tool in the git-hook manager space. The GitHub repository was created in January 2025, early GitHub releases began in March 2025, and the documentation quickly oriented around global Git hook installation, per-project hk.pkl files, and integration with mise-en-place.

The input package facts show packaging through Homebrew, MacPorts, and Scoop, which is a practical footprint for a developer CLI aimed at local workstations rather than servers.

How it is used

The intended workflow is to install hooks globally or per repository, run hk init to create hk.pkl, and then let Git events run configured lint and fix steps. hk check and hk fix provide explicit command-line entry points for running checks outside Git hooks.

The configuration docs emphasize precedence and local overrides: hk.local.pkl is for local changes that should not be committed, while ~/.config/hk/config.pkl can hold user-wide defaults.

Why package nerds care

hk matters to package nerds because it is part of the newer wave of developer workflow CLIs that try to make local checks fast enough to keep enabled. Its differentiator is not another hook file format by itself, but the combination of Pkl configuration, built-in linter definitions, libgit2 usage, mise integration, and locking around file modification.

It also reflects a packaging trend: single-purpose Rust CLIs distributed through Homebrew, Scoop, MacPorts, and direct release binaries for developers who want one binary in their path.

Timeline

• 2025-01-26: The jdx/hk GitHub repository was created.
• 2025-03-29: Early v0.6.x GitHub releases were published.
• 2025: hk documentation described global Git hook installation and hk.pkl project setup.
• 2026: hk documentation described pklr as the built-in Pkl evaluator and layered configuration sources.

Related projects

• mise-en-place: jdx's environment/tool-version manager that hk documentation names as an integration point.
• pre-commit, lefthook, Husky, lint-staged: adjacent git-hook and lint-running tools in the same developer workflow category.
• Pkl: Apple's configuration language used for hk.pkl.

Sources

• https://api.github.com/repos/jdx/hk
• https://hk.jdx.dev/about.html
• https://hk.jdx.dev/configuration
• https://hk.jdx.dev/getting_started
• https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jdx/hk/main/README.md
• input: source_facts.package-manager