Homebrew install specific version of formula

Question

How do I install a specific version of a formula in homebrew   For example  postgresql-8 4 4 instead of the latest 9 0

User · Answer

UPDATE  This method is deprecated and no longer works  This method results in error  Installation of mysql from a GitHub commit URL is unsupported  brew extract mysql to a stable tap on GitHub instead   UsageError    brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core c77882756a832ac1d87e7396c114158e5619016c Formula mysql rb Updating Homebrew       gt  Auto-updated Homebrew  Updated 2 taps  homebrew core and homebrew cask         Traceback  most recent call last       9  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew brew rb 122 in   lt main gt       8  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cmd install rb 132 in  install      7  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 302 in  parse      6  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 651 in  formulae      5  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 651 in  map      4  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 655 in  block in formulae      3  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 351 in  factory      2  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 138 in  get formula      1  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 142 in  klass   usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 227 in  load file   Invalid usage  Installation of mysql from a GitHub commit URL is unsupported   brew extract mysql  to a stable tap on GitHub instead   UsageError      12  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew brew rb 155 in   lt main gt       11  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew brew rb 157 in  rescue in  lt main gt       10  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew help rb 64 in  help       9  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew help rb 83 in  command help       8  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew help rb 103 in  parser help       7  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 302 in  parse       6  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 651 in  formulae       5  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 651 in  map       4  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew cli parser rb 655 in  block in formulae       3  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 351 in  factory       2  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 138 in  get formula       1  from  usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 142 in  klass   usr local Homebrew Library Homebrew formulary rb 227 in  load file   Invalid usage  Installation of mysql from a GitHub commit URL is unsupported   brew extract mysql  to a stable tap on GitHub instead   UsageError   I tried to install with the recommended command  but it doesn t work in this particular instance of MySQL 5 7 10   You may have better luck with a more recent Formula    brew extract --version 5 7 10 mysql homebrew cask    gt  Searching repository history    gt  Writing formula for mysql from revision 0fa511b to   usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-cask Formula mysql 5 7 10 rb        brew install  usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-cask Formula mysql 5 7 10 rb Updating Homebrew       gt  Auto-updated Homebrew  Updated 1 tap  homebrew core      gt  Updated Formulae Updated 1 formula  Error  undefined method  core tap   for nil NilClass  Error  Failed to load cask   usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-cask Formula mysql 5 7 10 rb Cask  mysql 5 7 10  is unreadable  wrong constant name   lt Class 0x00007f9b9498cad8 gt  Warning  Treating  usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-cask Formula mysql 5 7 10 rb as a formula     gt  Installing mysql 5 7 10 from homebrew cask    gt  Downloading https   homebrew bintray com bottles cmake-3 19 4 big sur bottle tar gz    gt  Downloading from https   d29vzk4ow07wi7 cloudfront net 278f2ad1caf664019ff7b4a7fc5493999c06adf503637447af13a617d45cf484 response-content-disposition attachment 3Bfilenam                                                                          100 0     gt  Downloading https   downloads sourceforge net project boost boost 1 59 0 boost 1 59 0 tar bz2    gt  Downloading from https   phoenixnap dl sourceforge net project boost boost 1 59 0 boost 1 59 0 tar bz2                                                                          100 0     gt  Downloading https   cdn mysql com Downloads MySQL-5 7 mysql-5 7 10 tar gz  curl   22  The requested URL returned error  404 Not Found Error  Failed to download resource  quot mysql 5 7 10 quot  Download failed  https   cdn mysql com Downloads MySQL-5 7 mysql-5 7 10 tar gz  You could modify the Formula at the path above  written in ruby  to attempt to achieve your desired result  e g   an installation of MySQL 5 7 10 on a recent macOS version    You can use the strategy of identifying the formula and a particular commit in the history of the formula that matches the version of the package you d like to install   Go to https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core  Press t on your keyboard to activate the file finder   Identify a formula that looks most relevant  perhaps  Formula mysql rb  bringing you to a forumla file location  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core blob master Formula mysql rb   Look at the revision history by clicking on the History button  which is located at https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commits master Formula mysql rb   If you re interested in MySQL 5 7 10  you might want to click the latest revision prior to 5 7 11  which navigates to a GitHub commit    https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commit c77882756a832ac1d87e7396c114158e5619016c Formula mysql rb NOTE  You may have to view the commit history in your console per GitHub s suggestion if the commit history does not load in your browser   Replace the commit SHA above in the URL if you re interested in seeing that commit on GitHub   Alternatively  skip to step 7  below   Click the  quot View quot  button to view the source for the mysql rb file after the commit was applied   Then click the  quot Raw quot  button to view the raw source   Copy the URL  Alternatively  build the URL yourself with the mysql rb file name to identify your formula and the particular version of that formula  identified by the commmit SHA in the URL below     https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core c77882756a832ac1d87e7396c114158e5619016c Formula mysql rb  Install it with   brew install  URL from step 7     brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core c77882756a832ac1d87e7396c114158e5619016c Formula mysql rb

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The problem with homebrew versions is that someone has to have that specific version of software listed in the repository for you to be able to use it   Also  since brew versions is no longer supported  another solution is required   For solutions that indicate using brew switch  this will only work if you haven t done a brew cleanup since the version needs to exist on your computer   I had a problem with wanting to install a specific older version of docker-machine which wasn t listed in homebrew versions   I solved this using the below  which should also work for any brew installed software   The example below will use docker-machine as the package I want to downgrade from version 0 5 0 to 0 4 1    Go to your homebrew Formula directory  You can determine this by running brew info  any package name    For example  brew info docker-machine gives me a line that shows me a path -  usr local Cellar docker-machine 0 5 0   This tells me that on my machine  homebrew is installed at  usr localand my Formula directory is located by default at  usr local Library Formula Locate the specific formula file   rb  for your package  Since I want to downgrade docker-machine  I can see a docker-machine rb file  Get the version history for this formula file    Enter git log docker-machine rb   This will list out the complete commit history for this file   You will see output like this            more       commit 20c7abc13d2edd67c8c1d30c407bd5e31229cacc     Author  BrewTestBot      Date    Thu Nov 5 16 14 18 2015  0000          docker-machine  update 0 5 0 bottle       commit 8f615708184884e501bf5c16482c95eff6aea637     Author  Vincent Lesierse      Date    Tue Oct 27 22 25 30 2015  0100          docker-machine 0 5 0          Updated docker-machine to 0 5 0          Closes  45403           Signed-off-by  Dominyk Tiller       commit 5970e1af9b13dcbeffd281ae57c9ab90316ba423     Author  BrewTestBot      Date    Mon Sep 21 14 04 04 2015  0100          docker-machine  update 0 4 1 bottle       commit 18fcbd36d22fa0c19406d699308fafb44e4c8dcd     Author  BrewTestBot      Date    Sun Aug 16 09 05 56 2015  0100          docker-machine  update 0 4 1 bottle          more   The tricky part is to find the latest commit for the specific version you want   In the above  I can tell the latest 0 4 1 version was committed with this commit tag   commit 5970e1af9b13dcbeffd281ae57c9ab90316ba423   The commits above this point start using version 0 5 0  git log entries are listed from latest to earliest date     Get a previous version of the formula file  Using the commit tag from step  3  you can use the first 6 chars   you can get an older version of the formula file using the following   git checkout 5970e1 docker-machine rb Uninstall your current package version  Just run the normal brew commands to uninstall the current version of your package  Ex  brew uninstall docker-machine Install the older package version Now  you can just run the normal brew install command and it will install the formula that you have checkout out  Ex  brew install docker-machine   You may need to re-link by using the brew link docker-machine if necessary   If at any time you want to revert back to the latest version of a specific package  go into the Formula directory and issue the following commands on your formula file   rb   git reset HEAD docker-machine rb git checkout -- docker-machine rb   Then you can brew uninstall docker-machine and brew install docker-machine to get the latest version and keep it that way going forward

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it could be done very easy for last version of brew   brew tap homebrew versions brew install subversion17   for svn 1 7 branch instead of last available brew install postgresql8    for postgresql 8  which you ask

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On the newest version of homebrew  0 9 5 as of this writing  there will be a specific recipe for the version of the homebrew keg you want to install  Example     brew search mongodb mongodb    mongodb24  mongodb26   Then just do brew install mongodb26 like normal   In the case that you had already installed the latest version  make sure to unlink the latest version and link the desired version  brew unlink mongodb  amp  amp  brew link mongodb26

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If you can t find your version with brew search  lt formula gt   you can also try going over the commit logs for your formula to find the version you want    here is an example for installing an older version of nginx via brew    ngxnx formula commit log see nginx  update 1 6 3 bottle eba75b9a1a474b9fc4df30bd0a32637fa31ec049   From there  we can install 1 6 3 with the sha and raw git url   brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew eba75b9a1a474b9fc4df30bd0a32637fa31ec049 Library Formula nginx rb

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I ve discovered a better alternative solution then the other complex solutions    brew install https   raw github com Homebrew homebrew-versions master postgresql8 rb   This will download and install PostgreSQL 8 4 8    I found this solution by starting to follow the steps of searching the repo and a comment in the repo    After a little research found that someone has a collection of rare formulars to brew up with     If your looking for MySQL 5 1 x  give this a try   brew install https   raw github com Homebrew homebrew-versions master mysql51 rb

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Official method   judging from the response to https   github com Homebrew brew issues 6028    Unfortunately Homebrew still doesn   t have an obvious builtin way of installing an older version   Luckily  for most formulas there   s a much easier way than the convoluted mess that used to be necessary  Here are the full instructions using bash as an example   brew tap-new  USER local-tap   extract with a version seems to run a  git log --grep  under the hood brew extract --version 4 4 23 bash  USER local-tap   Install your new version from the tap brew install bash 4 4 23   Note this  fails  trying to grab a bottle for the package and seems to have   some odd doubling of the version in that output  but this isn t fatal    This creates the formula version in your custom tap that you can install per the above example  An important note is that you probably need to brew unlink bash if you had previously installed the default latest version of the formula and then brew link bash 4 4 23 in order to use your specific version of Bash  or any other formula where you have latest and an older version installed    A potential downside to this method is you can t easily switch back and forth between the versions because according to brew it is a  different formula    If you want to be able to use brew switch  FORMULA  VERSION you should use the next method     Scripted Method  Recommended   This example shows installing the older bash 4 4 23  a useful example since the bash formula currently installs bash 5    First install the latest version of the formula with brew install bash then brew unlink bash then install the older version you want per the snippets below finally use brew switch bash 4 4 23 to set up the symlinks to your version   If you performed a brew upgrade after installing an older version without installing the latest first  then the latest would get installed clobbering your older version  unless you first executed brew pin bash   The steps here AVOID pinning because it is easy to forget about and you might pin to a version that becomes insecure in the future  see Shellshock etc   With this setup a brew upgrade shouldn t affect your version of Bash and you can always run brew switch bash to get a list of the versions available to switch to   Copy and paste and edit the export lines from the code snippet below to update with your desired version and formula name  then copy and paste the rest as-is and it will use those variables to do the magic     This search syntax works with newer Homebrew export BREW FORMULA SEARCH VERSION 4 4 23 BREW FORMULA NAME bash   This will print any all commits that match the version and formula name git -C   brew --repo homebrew core  log   --format format  H   s -F --all-match   --grep  BREW FORMULA SEARCH VERSION --grep  BREW FORMULA NAME   When you are certain the version exists in the formula  you can use the below     Gets only the latest Git commit SHA for the script further down export BREW FORMULA VERSION SHA   git -C   brew --repo homebrew core  log    --format format  H   s -F --all-match   --grep  BREW FORMULA SEARCH VERSION --grep  BREW FORMULA NAME     head -1   awk   print  1      Once you have exported the commit hash you want to use  you can use this to install that version of the package   brew info  BREW FORMULA NAME     sed -n       -e    From   s           -e  s github com raw githubusercontent com         -e  s blob           -e  s master  BREW FORMULA VERSION SHA p      xargs brew install   Follow the directions in the formula output to put it into your PATH or set it as your default shell

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An updated answer since that adds to what  lance-pollard already posted as working answer   How to Install specific version of a Formula  formula used in this example is terraform     Find your formula file  e g  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core blob master Formula terraform rb Get the commit version from github   s history with https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commits master Formula terraform rb or git log master -- Formula terraform rb if you have cloned the repo locally  Get the raw git URL with the commit version of your formula  If the formula link in github com is https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core blob e4ca4d2c41d4c1412994f9f1cb14993be5b2c59a Formula terraform rb  your raw URL will be  https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core e4ca4d2c41d4c1412994f9f1cb14993be5b2c59a Formula terraform rb Install it with  brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core e4ca4d2c41d4c1412994f9f1cb14993be5b2c59a Formula terraform rb

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Currently the old ways of installing specific formula versions have been deprecated  So it seems like we have to use brew edit  formula   E g  say we want to install an the 62 1 version of icu4c  needed e g  for postgresql 10 5   Then you d have to    gt  brew edit icu4c   drops you to editor   Here you d have to alter the url  version and sha256  perhaps also mirror  to the corresponding 62 1 strings    url  https   ssl icu-project org files icu4c 62 1 icu4c-62 1-src tgz  mirror  https   github com unicode-org icu releases download release-62-1 icu4c-62 1-src tgz  version  62 1  sha256  3dd9868d666350dda66a6e305eecde9d479fb70b30d5b55d78a1deffb97d5aa3    then run brew reinstall icu4c to finally download the 62 1 version

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Homebrew changed recently  Things that used to work do not work anymore  The easiest way I found to work  January 2021   was to   Find the  rb file for my software  first go to Formulas  find the one I need and then click  quot History quot   for CMake  this is at https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commits master Formula cmake rb   Pick the desired version among the revisions  e g  3 18 4  click three dots in the top right corner of the  rb file diff       and then click Raw  Copy the URL    Unlink the old version brew unlink cmake Installing directly from the git URL does not work anymore  brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core 2bf16397f163187ae5ac8be41ca7af25b5b2e2cc Formula cmake rb will fail   Instead  download it and install from a local file curl -O https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core 2bf16397f163187ae5ac8be41ca7af25b5b2e2cc Formula cmake rb  amp  amp  brew install   cmake rb    Voila  You can delete the downloaded  rb file now

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Edit  2021  this answer is no longer functional due to the github install being deprecated   Thanks Tim Smith for update   Install an old brew package version  Flyway 4 2 0 example  Find your local homebrew git dir or clone Homebrew homebrew-core locally cd  usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-core  OR git clone git github com Homebrew homebrew-core git List all available versions git log master -- Formula flyway rb Copy the commit ID for the version you want and install it directly brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core 793abfa325531415184e1549836c982b39e89299 Formula flyway rb

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There s now a much easier way to install an older version of a formula that you d previously installed  Simply use  brew switch  formula   version    For instance  I alternate regularly between Node js 0 4 12 and 0 6 5   brew switch node 0 4 12 brew switch node 0 6 5   Since brew switch just changes the symlinks  it s very fast  See further documentation on the Homebrew Wiki under External Commands

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None of these really worked for my case  Python   so I ll add my 2 cents   cd  brew --prefix  git log Library Formula python rb   Output looks like this    commit 9ff2d8ca791ed1bd149fb8be063db0ed6a67a6de Author  Dominyk Tiller  lt dominyktiller gmail com gt  Date    Thu Jun 30 17 42 18 2016  0100      python  clarify pour bottle reason  commit cb3b29b824a264895434214e191d0d7ef4d51c85 Author  BrewTestBot  lt brew-test-bot googlegroups com gt  Date    Wed Jun 29 14 18 40 2016  0100      python  update 2 7 12 bottle   commit 45bb1e220341894bbb7de6fd3f6df20987dc14f0 Author  Rakesh  lt rakkesh users noreply github com gt  Date    Wed Jun 29 10 02 26 2016  0530      python 2 7 12      Closes  2452       Signed-off-by  Tim D  Smith  lt git tim-smith us gt   commit cf5da0547cd261f79d69e7ff62fdfbd2c2d646e9 Author  BrewTestBot  lt brew-test-bot googlegroups com gt  Date    Fri Jun 17 20 14 36 2016  0100      python  update 2 7 11 bottle          I want version 2 7 11 so my hash is cf5da0547cd261f79d69e7ff62fdfbd2c2d646e9  or cf5da05 for short    Next  I check out that version and install the formula python   git checkout cf5da05 brew install python   Finally  clean up   git checkout master

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I just copied an older release of elasticsearch into the  usr local Cellar elasticsearch directory     mkdir  usr local Cellar elasticsearch 5 4 3 bin   cp elasticsearch  usr local Cellar elasticsearch 5 4 3 bin   brew switch elasticsearch 5 4 3   That s it  Maybe it s useful for anyone

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I decided  against my better judgment  to create a formula for Maven 3 1 1  which homebrew versions did not have  To do this    I forked homebrew versions on github  I symlinked from   brew --prefix  Library Taps to the local working copy of my fork  I ll call this my-homebrew versions  I tested by specifying the formula as my-homebrew versions  lt formula gt   I sent a pull request to homebrew versions for my new formula    Yay

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Update  1 15 2015   Find the commit history of the desired software and version  e g  I need to switch from docker version 1 4 1 to 1 3 3   https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commits master Formula docker rb View the file with this button    Click the Raw button   Copy the URL  docker rb url in this example  from address bar brew install  lt url gt   may have to brew unlink first  e g  brew unlink docker  brew switch docker 1 3 3 Switch back to docker 1 4 1 brew switch docker 1 4 1   From this gist  brew update brew versions FORMULA cd  brew --prefix  git checkout HASH Library Formula FORMULA rb    use output of  brew versions  brew install FORMULA brew switch FORMULA VERSION git checkout -- Library Formula FORMULA rb      reset formula     Example  Using Subversion 1 6 17       brew versions subversion   1 7 3    git checkout f8bf2f3  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 7 2    git checkout d89bf83  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 17   git checkout 6e2d550  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 16   git checkout 83ed494  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 15   git checkout 809a18a  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 13   git checkout 7871a99  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 12   git checkout c99b3ac  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 6    git checkout 8774131  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 5    git checkout a82e823  usr local Library Formula subversion rb   1 6 3    git checkout 6b6d369  usr local Library Formula subversion rb     cd  brew --prefix      git checkout 6e2d550  usr local Library Formula subversion rb     brew install subversion     brew switch subversion 1 6 17     git checkout -- Library Formula subversion rb

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For versions not currently in the default brew formulas  you can easily create your own tap with the tool from https   github com buildtools-version-taps homebrew-versions-tap-tool

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Along the lines of  halfcube s suggestion  this works really well    Find the library you re looking for at  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core tree master Formula Click it  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core blob master Formula postgresql rb Click the  history  button to look at old commits  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commits master Formula postgresql rb Click the one you want   postgresql  update version to 8 4 4   https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core blob 8cf29889111b44fd797c01db3cf406b0b14e858c Formula postgresql rb Click the  raw  link  https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core 8cf29889111b44fd797c01db3cf406b0b14e858c Formula postgresql rb brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core 8cf29889111b44fd797c01db3cf406b0b14e858c Formula postgresql rb

User · Answer

Based on the workflow described by  tschundeee and  Debilski   s update 1  I automated the procedure and added cleanup in this script   Download it  put it in your path and brewv  lt formula name gt   lt wanted version gt   For the specific OP  it would be   cd path to downloaded script    brewv postgresql 8 4 4

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TLDR  brew install postgresql 8 4 4 See answer below for more details       I   ve re-edited my answer to give a more thorough workflow for installing using older software versions with homebrew  Feel free to add a note if you found the old version better    Let   s start with the simplest case   1  Check  whether the version is already installed  but not activated   When homebrew installs a new formula  it puts it in a versioned directory like  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 3 1  Only symbolic links to this folder are then installed globally  In principle  this makes it pretty easy to switch between two installed versions       If you have been using homebrew for longer and never removed older versions  using  for example brew cleanup   chances are that some older version of your program may still be around  If you want to simply activate that previous version  brew switch is the easiest way to do this   Check with brew info postgresql  or brew switch postgresql  lt TAB gt   whether the older version is installed     brew info postgresql postgresql  stable 9 3 2  bottled  http   www postgresql org  Conflicts with  postgres-xc  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 1 5  2755 files  37M    Built from source  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 3 2  2924 files  39M      Poured from bottle From  https   github com Homebrew homebrew commits master Library Formula postgresql rb       and some more   We see that some older version is already installed  We may activate it using brew switch     brew switch postgresql 9 1 5 Cleaning  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 1 5 Cleaning  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 3 2 384 links created for  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 1 5   Let   s double-check what is activated     brew info postgresql postgresql  stable 9 3 2  bottled  http   www postgresql org  Conflicts with  postgres-xc  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 1 5  2755 files  37M      Built from source  usr local Cellar postgresql 9 3 2  2924 files  39M    Poured from bottle From  https   github com Homebrew homebrew commits master Library Formula postgresql rb       and some more   Note that the star   has moved to the newly activated version      Please note that brew switch only works as long as all dependencies of the older version are still around  In some cases  a rebuild of the older version may become necessary  Therefore  using brew switch is mostly useful when one wants to switch between two versions not too far apart   2  Check  whether the version is available as a tap  Especially for larger software projects  it is very probably that there is a high enough demand for several  potentially API incompatible  major versions of a certain piece of software  As of March 2012  Homebrew 0 9 provides a mechanism for this  brew tap  amp  the homebrew versions repository   That versions repository may include backports of older versions for several formulae   Mostly only the large and famous ones  but of course they   ll also have several formulae for postgresql    brew search postgresql will show you where to look     brew search postgresql postgresql homebrew versions postgresql8    homebrew versions postgresql91 homebrew versions postgresql9    homebrew versions postgresql92   We can simply install it by typing    brew install homebrew versions postgresql8 Cloning into   usr local Library Taps homebrew-versions     remote  Counting objects  1563  done  remote  Compressing objects  100   943 943   done  remote  Total 1563  delta 864   reused 1272  delta 620  Receiving objects  100   1563 1563   422 83 KiB   339 00 KiB s  done  Resolving deltas  100   864 864   done  Checking connectivity    done  Tapped 125 formula    gt  Downloading http   ftp postgresql org pub source v8 4 19 postgresql-8 4 19 tar bz2         Note that this has automatically tapped the homebrew versions tap   Check with brew tap  remove with brew untap homebrew versions   The following would have been equivalent     brew tap homebrew versions   brew install postgresql8   As long as the backported version formulae stay up-to-date  this approach is probably the best way to deal with older software   3  Try some formula from the past  The following approaches are listed mostly for completeness  Both try to resurrect some undead formula from the brew repository  Due to changed dependencies  API changes in the formula spec or simply a change in the download URL  things may or may not work   Since the whole formula directory is a git repository  one can install specific versions using plain git commands  However  we need to find a way to get to a commit where the old version was available   a  historic times  Between August 2011 and October 2014  homebrew had a brew versions command  which spat out all available versions with their respective SHA hashes  As of October 2014  you have to do a brew tap homebrew boneyard before you can use it  As the name of the tap suggests  you should probably only do this as a last resort   E g     brew versions postgresql Warning  brew-versions is unsupported and may be removed soon  Please use the homebrew-versions tap instead    https   github com Homebrew homebrew-versions 9 3 2    git checkout 3c86d2b Library Formula postgresql rb 9 3 1    git checkout a267a3e Library Formula postgresql rb 9 3 0    git checkout ae59e09 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 2 4    git checkout e3ac215 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 2 3    git checkout c80b37c Library Formula postgresql rb 9 2 2    git checkout 9076baa Library Formula postgresql rb 9 2 1    git checkout 5825f62 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 2 0    git checkout 2f6cbc6 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 1 5    git checkout 6b8d25f Library Formula postgresql rb 9 1 4    git checkout c40c7bf Library Formula postgresql rb 9 1 3    git checkout 05c7954 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 1 2    git checkout dfcc838 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 1 1    git checkout 4ef8fb0 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 0 4    git checkout 2accac4 Library Formula postgresql rb 9 0 3    git checkout b782d9d Library Formula postgresql rb   As you can see  it advises against using it  Homebrew spits out all versions it can find with its internal heuristic and shows you a way to retrieve the old formulae  Let   s try it     First  go to the homebrew base directory   cd    brew --prefix     Checkout some old formula   git checkout 6b8d25f Library Formula postgresql rb   brew install postgresql       installing   Now that the older postgresql version is installed  we can re-install the latest formula in order to keep our repository clean     git checkout -- Library Formula postgresql rb   brew switch is your friend to change between the old and the new   b  prehistoric times  For special needs  we may also try our own digging through the homebrew repo     cd Library Taps homebrew homebrew-core  amp  amp  git log -S 8 4 4  -- Formula postgresql rb   git log -S looks for all commits in which the string  8 4 4  was either added or removed in the file Library Taps homebrew homebrew-core Formula postgresql rb  We get two commits as a result   commit 7dc7ccef9e1ab7d2fc351d7935c96a0e0b031552 Author  Aku Kotkavuo Date    Sun Sep 19 18 03 41 2010  0300      Update PostgreSQL to 9 0 0       Signed-off-by  Adam Vandenberg  commit fa992c6a82eebdc4cc36a0c0d2837f4c02f3f422 Author  David H  ppner Date    Sun May 16 12 35 18 2010  0200      postgresql  update version to 8 4 4   Obviously  fa992c6a82eebdc4cc36a0c0d2837f4c02f3f422 is the commit we   re interested in  As this commit is pretty old  we   ll try to downgrade the complete homebrew installation  that way  the formula API is more or less guaranteed to be valid      git checkout -b postgresql-8 4 4 fa992c6a82eebdc4cc36a0c0d2837f4c02f3f422   brew install postgresql   git checkout master   git branch -d postgresql-8 4 4   You may skip the last command to keep the reference in your git repository   One note  When checking out the older commit  you temporarily downgrade your homebrew installation  So  you should be careful as some commands in homebrew might be different to the most recent version   4  Manually write a formula  It   s not too hard and you may then upload it to your own repository  Used to be Homebrew-Versions  but that is now discontinued   A   Bonus  Pinning  If you want to keep a certain version of  say postgresql  around and stop it from being updated when you do the natural brew update  brew upgrade procedure  you can pin a formula     brew pin postgresql   Pinned formulae are listed in  usr local Library PinnedKegs  and once you want to bring in the latest changes and updates  you can unpin it again     brew unpin postgresql

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Here is how I downgrade KOPS  which does not support versioning    brew has a git repo on your localhost cd  usr local Homebrew Library Taps homebrew homebrew-core  git remote -v origin  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core  fetch  origin  https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core  push     find the version of kops rb you need git log Formula kops rb    checkout old commit   kops  update 1 18 1 bottle  git checkout 2f0ede7f27dfc074d5b5493894f3468f27cc73f0 -- Formula kops rb  brew unlink kops brew install kops    now we have old version installed ls -1  usr local Cellar kops  1 18 1 1 18 2  which kops  usr local bin kops ls -l  usr local bin kops  usr local bin kops - gt     Cellar kops 1 18 1 bin kops kops version Version 1 18 1    revert to the newest version brew uninstall kops git checkout -f brew link kops kops version Version 1 18 2

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I just used Homebrew to go back to Maven 2 2 1 since the simple brew install maven installed Maven 3 0 3   First you have to leave the maven dir there so      brew unlink maven   Use the brew tap command     brew tap homebrew versions Cloning into   usr local Library Taps homebrew-versions     remote  Counting objects  590  done  remote  Compressing objects  100   265 265   done  remote  Total 590  delta 362   reused 549  delta 325  Receiving objects  100   590 590   117 49 KiB   79 KiB s  done  Resolving deltas  100   362 362   done  Tapped 50 formula   Now you can install the maven2 formula        brew install maven2     Downloading http   www apache org dist maven maven-2 2 2 1 binaries apache-maven-2 2 1-bin tar gz                                                                          100 0   usr local Cellar maven2 2 2 1  10 files  3 1M  built in 6 seconds      mvn --version Apache Maven 2 2 1  r801777  2009-08-06 12 16 01-0700  Java version  1 6 0 37 Java home   System Library Java JavaVirtualMachines 1 6 0 jdk Contents Home Default locale  en US  platform encoding  MacRoman OS name   mac os x  version   10 7 4  arch   x86 64  Family   mac     Edit  You can also just brew switch maven 2 2 1 to switch to a different version    Edit  The Apache Maven project reorganized their repo   Updated this answer to account for this change

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Update on the Library Formula postgresql rb line 8 to  http   ftp2 uk postgresql org sites ftp postgresql org source v8 4 6 postgresql-8 4 6 tar bz2   And MD5 on line 9 to  fcc3daaf2292fa6bf1185ec45e512db6   Save and exit   brew install postgres initdb  usr local var postgres   Now in this stage you might face the postgresql could not create shared memory segment error  to work around that update the   etc sysctl conf like this   kern sysv shmall 65536 kern sysv shmmax 16777216   Try initdb  usr local var postgres again  and it should run smooth   To run postgresql on start  launchctl load -w  usr local Cellar postgresql 8 4 6 org postgresql postgres plist   Hope that helps

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I created a tool to ease the process prescribed in this answer   To find a package pkg with version a b c  run     brew-install-specific pkg a b c   This will list commits on the pkg homebrew formula that mention the given version along with their GitHub urls   Matching versions  1  pkg  update a b c bottle     https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commit  lt COMMIT-SHA gt  2  pkg  release a b c-beta    https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commit  lt COMMIT-SHA gt  3  pkg a b c    https   github com Homebrew homebrew-core commit  lt COMMIT-SHA gt   Select index     Verify the commit from the given URL  and enter the index of the selected commit   Select index  2 Run    brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core  lt COMMIT-SHA gt  Formula pkg rb   Copy and run the given command to install

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Simple Workflow Now that Homebrew versions has been deprecated  Homebrew core supports a few versions of formulae with a new naming format  To install a specific version  e g  postgresql 9 5 you simply run    brew install postgresql 9 5  To list the available versions run a search with      brew search postgresql     gt  Searching local taps    postgresql 10 1       postgresql 9 4        postgresql 9 5        postgresql 9 6

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brew versions and brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core  lt COMMIT-HASH gt  Formula  lt Formula gt  rb not supported now  You can try like this    brew extract --version 5 6 2 gradle vitahlin core   brew install gradle 5 6 2

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Most of the other answers are obsolete by now  Unfortunately Homebrew still doesn   t have a builtin way of installing an outdated version  unless that version exists as a separate formula  e g  python 2  postgresql 9 4         Luckily  for other formulas there   s a much easier way than the convoluted mess that used to be necessary  Here are the full instructions    Search for the correct version in the logs   brew log formula   Scroll down up with j k or the arrow keys   or use eg   4  4  23 to search a specific version    This syntax only works on pre-2 0 Homebrew versions brew log --format format  H   s -F --grep    version       formula      This will show a list of commit hashes  Take one that is appropriate  mostly it should be pretty obvious  and usually is the most recent  i e  top  one  Find the URL at which the formula resides in the upstream repository   brew info    formula      grep  From   Fix the URL    Replace github com with raw githubusercontent com Replace blob master with the commit hash we found in the first step   Install the desired version by replacing master in the previously found URL by the commit hash  e g    brew install https   raw githubusercontent com Homebrew homebrew-core    hash    Formula    formula    rb     The last step may necessitate running brew unlink    formula    before      If you have copied a commit hash you want to use  you can use something like this example to install that version  replacing the value and bash with your commit hash and your desired formula   BREW VERSION SHA 32353d2286f850fd965e0a48bcf692b83a6e9a41 BREW FORMULA NAME bash brew info  BREW FORMULA NAME     sed -n       -e    From   s           -e  s github com raw githubusercontent com         -e  s blob           -e  s master  BREW VERSION SHA p      xargs brew install   This example is installing bash 4 4 23 instead of bash 5  though if you performed a brew upgrade afterward then bash 5 would get installed over top  unless you first executed brew pin bash  Instead to make this smoother WITHOUT pinning  you should first install the latest with brew install bash  then brew unlink bash  then install the older version you want per the script above  and then use brew switch bash 4 4 23 to set up the symlinks to the older version  Now a brew upgrade shouldn t affect your version of Bash  You can brew switch bash to get a list of the versions available to switch to     Alternative using a custom local-only tap  Another way of achieving the same goal appears to be   brew tap-new username repo-name   extract with a version seems to run a grep under the hood brew extract --version  4 4 23  bash username repo-name brew install bash 4 4 23   Note this  fails  when trying to grab a bottle for the package and seems to have   some odd doubling of the version in that output  but this isn t fatal    This creates a formula version in your custom tap that you can install per the above example  The downside is that you probably still need to brew unlink bash and then brew link bash 4 4 23 in order to use your specific version of Bash or any other formula

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Upgraded Postgres by accident  My case   postgresql was upgraded from 11 to 12 accidentally  after running brew upgrade without arguments  I want to keep Postgres 11   Solution   Stop the DB   brew services stop postgresql   Install Postgres 11   brew install postgresql 11   Enable it   brew link postgresql 11 --force    Optional  Rename DB data directory from postgres to postgres 11   cd  usr local var ls -lh mv postgresql 11 postgresql 11-fresh-backup mv postgres postgresql 11   Start the DB   brew services start postgresql 11  If you have any errors  check  usr local var log postgresql 11 log  notice the  11

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I ve tried most of the solutions here and they are outdated  I had to combine some ideas from here with my own work  As a result I ve created a script to help me do the heavy lifting which you can find here  Usage   brewv sh formula name desired version

[installation] Homebrew install specific version of formula?

Examples related to installation

Examples related to versioning

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