If you are a developer who needs a specific old version of PHP or Node or whatever and you're not using Docker then I have great news for you on how you can solve your problem.

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potamic an hour ago | parent | next [-]

When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

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tacker2000 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

yes, docker is a great solution nowadays for this problem, but it wasnt always like that. In PHP land there is a tool called Laravel Valet, which relies heavily on homebrew and lets you switch PHP versions on the fly directly your system. I just remember how much of a pain it was to set up because of homebrew's unnecessary restrictions and deprecations. But once done it worked quite well.

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knowitnone3 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

so don't use brew at all? Great, what else should we not use?

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simonw 7 hours ago | parent [-]

I personally use and enjoy Homebrew for most of my development tasks. The thing I would not use it for is to exactly simulate a specific combination of tool versions.

	▲	tom_ 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Yes. The package manager's job is to give you some sensible version of some useful common standardized thing(s) you want to use. There might well be some legacy/current/edge options, but overall you are putting your trust in their judgement and assuming that they'll do something at least vaguely sensible. If you want something specific than that: the package manager cannot help you here. This is no longer some random thing that you just use; it's one of your product's honest-to-goodness dependencies. You can't outsource this any more. You need to make your own arrangements to ensure that the specific version required is in use.