Ghost casks

[Leftium]

Output of brew config

HOMEBREW_VERSION: 4.6.14
ORIGIN: https://github.com/Homebrew/brew
HEAD: f650b91290412d9300b6259ebaae55396a1536b9
Last commit: 2 days ago
Branch: stable
Core tap JSON: 28 Sep 04:03 UTC
Core cask tap JSON: 28 Sep 04:03 UTC
HOMEBREW_PREFIX: /opt/homebrew
HOMEBREW_CASK_OPTS: []
HOMEBREW_FORBID_PACKAGES_FROM_PATHS: set
HOMEBREW_MAKE_JOBS: 10
Homebrew Ruby: 3.4.5 => /opt/homebrew/Library/Homebrew/vendor/portable-ruby/3.4.5/bin/ruby
CPU: deca-core 64-bit arm_donan
Clang: 17.0.0 build 1700
Git: 2.39.5 => /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools/usr/bin/git
Curl: 8.7.1 => /usr/bin/curl
macOS: 15.6.1-arm64
CLT: 16.4.0.0.1.1747106510
Xcode: N/A
Rosetta 2: false

Output of brew doctor

Please note that these warnings are just used to help the Homebrew maintainers
with debugging if you file an issue. If everything you use Homebrew for is
working fine: please don't worry or file an issue; just ignore this. Thanks!

Warning: Some installed casks are deprecated or disabled.
You should find replacements for the following casks:
  chromium
  disk-inventory-x
  gstreamer-runtime
  platypus
  qview

Warning: No Cask quarantine support available: Swift compilation failed.
This is usually due to a broken or incompatible Command Line Tools installation.
Install the Command Line Tools:
  xcode-select --install

If that doesn't resolve your issues, run:
  sudo rm -rf /Library/Developer/CommandLineTools
  sudo xcode-select --install

Alternatively, manually download them from:
  https://developer.apple.com/download/all/.
You should download the Command Line Tools for Xcode 16.4.



Warning: Homebrew's "sbin" was not found in your PATH but you have installed
formulae that put executables in /opt/homebrew/sbin.
Consider setting your PATH for example like so:
  fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/sbin

Description of issue

Four casks became "ghost casks:"

• included in brew list
• excluded from brew outdated and brew upgrade
• "Not installed" error when brew upgrade [CASK-NAME]
• apps still exist in /Applications; can still run them.

Apparently the common causes of this are the following, but none of them apply to my case:

• Manually moving apps
• Restoring /Applications
• Installed the app outside of Homebrew

Trying to figure out why/how this happened.

• I noticed this issue when I tried brew outdated/upgrade, expecting it to upgrade epicenter-whispering from v7.5.0 to v7.5.1. But this cask was missing from the list of outdated/upgraded apps.
• Is there a built-in way to detect these ghost casks?
• *note: at the time of brew config and brew doctor, I had already fixed the ghost casks by forcing reinstallation. (brew reinstall --cask --force)
• Screenshot when brew outdated/upgrade worked for previous version of cask:

Relevant casks

epicenter-whispering grandperspective pinta ubar

[bevanjkay]

These casks are likely marked as auto_updates true so they are not upgraded or listed by brew outdated/upgrade - if you would like to include these add the --greedy-auto-updates flag.

brew outdated --greedy-auto-updates

[Leftium]

Thanks, I will try --greedy-auto-updates next time. Whispering does have a built-in update system.

However, even with auto_updates true this output is unexpected, no?

> brew upgrade epicenter-whispering
Error: Cask 'epicenter-whispering' is not installed.

> brew info epicenter-whispering
==> epicenter-whispering: 7.5.1
https://whispering.epicenter.so/
Not installed
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/blob/HEAD/Casks/e/epicenter-whispering.rb
==> Name
Epicenter Whispering
==> Description
Audio transcription that works with local and cloud models
==> Artifacts
Whispering.app (App)
==> Analytics
install: 53 (30 days), 53 (90 days), 53 (365 days)

---

After forcing reinstall (brew reinstall --cask --force), this is the output of the same command:

> brew info epicenter-whispering
==> epicenter-whispering: 7.5.1
https://whispering.epicenter.so/
Installed
/opt/homebrew/Caskroom/epicenter-whispering/7.5.1 (29.2MB)
  Installed using the formulae.brew.sh API on 2025-09-27 at 23:21:46
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/blob/HEAD/Casks/e/epicenter-whispering.rb
==> Name
Epicenter Whispering
==> Description
Audio transcription that works with local and cloud models
==> Artifacts
Whispering.app (App)
==> Analytics
install: 53 (30 days), 53 (90 days), 53 (365 days)