How to set gcc 4.8 as default gcc compiler

Assuming you're using bash (it's the default), then you can add /usr/local/bin as your top priority in PATH like this:

echo "PATH=\"/usr/local/bin:$PATH\"" >> ~/.bash_profile

This will ensure that /usr/local/bin is checked before all other areas of your path. Then just start a new terminal session to load the new variable.

Another way to do this:

  cd /usr/bin
  rm cc gcc c++ g++
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/gcc-4.8 cc
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/gcc-4.8 gcc
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/c++-4.8 c++
  ln -s /usr/local/bin/g++-4.8 g++

Thanks to you all for your help. I ended up just creating aliases within ~/.bash_profile as follows:

alias gcc='gcc-4.8'
alias cc='gcc-4.8'
alias g++='g++-4.8'
alias c++='c++-4.8'

The answer from Lynken is very helpful, but I adapted it with aliases since that's easier for me to undo if necessary.

Specifically, if PATH is set such that /usr/local/bin (where brew puts the link to gcc 4.8) appears before appears /usr/bin (where gcc is linked by default), then creating links as Lyken suggested within /usr/local/bin should theoretically work for me. In practice, it doesn't for some reason -- failing with a linker error and aliases work around that error without me needing to solve that issue, too.

The other benefit of aliases is that I'm not having to link which I want homebrew to handle and not have to compete with that tool for which version of gcc is linked in /usr/local

I use to gcc-4.8:

export CC=/usr/local/bin/gcc

export CXX=/usr/local/bin/g++

export CPP=/usr/local/bin/cpp

export LD=/usr/local/bin/gcc

alias c++=/usr/local/bin/c++

alias g++=/usr/local/bin/g++

alias gcc=/usr/local/bin/gcc

alias cpp=/usr/local/bin/cpp

alias ld=/usr/local/bin/gcc

alias cc=/usr/local/bin/gcc

and back to apple gcc:

export CC=/usr/bin/gcc

export CXX=/usr/bin/g++

export CPP=/usr/bin/cpp

export LD=/usr/bin/ld

alias c++=/usr/bin/c++

alias g++=/usr/bin/g++

alias gcc=/usr/bin/gcc

alias cpp=/usr/bin/cpp

alias cc=/usr/bin/gcc

alias ld=/usr/bin/ld

or put it in file and then: source <file>

Let's assume your actual shell initialization is done through ~/.profile, then you will have to modify it so as to put /usr/local/bin ahead of any other PATH component where gcc and all its associated binary are.

Here is the way to perform this clean modification:

cd

_shell_init=`egrep '(^| )PATH' .profile 2>/dev/null`

if [ "${_shell_init}" = "" ] ; then
    # PATH isn't defined in .profile
    # install there the first relative definition of PATH
    echo 'PATH=/usr/local/bin:${PATH}
export PATH' >>.profile
    . .profile
    exec ${SHELL}
else
    # remove all occurences of /usr/local/bin wherever they might be
    # set into PATH, and insert it ahead of all other components
    sed -E -e '/(^| )PATH=/s,:/usr/local/bin,,' \
        -e '/(^| )PATH=/s,/usr/local/bin:,,' \
        -e '/(^| )PATH=/s,,&/usr/local/bin:,' .profile >.profile.new
    mv .profile.new .profile
    . .profile
    exec ${SHELL}
fi

Beware: if your ~/.profile is already structured, this shell script will have to be manually tuned to fit correct PATH definition in the right place.

How to set gcc 4.8 as default gcc compiler

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