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We're not talking about keeping up to date with the latest revision of python / java here, it's a shell that's woefully out of date. Apple is not RHEL backporti

We're not talking about keeping up to date with the latest revision of python / java here, it's a shell that's woefully out of date. Apple is not RHEL backporting fixes so binaries continue to run for 10 years - in fact they seem quite cavalier about backwards compatibility.

toast0 3y ago
Upstream changed the license. Apple doesn't distribute GPLv3 software. Apple's not going to distribute a newer version. That's how license changes work. The old version continues to work as well as it always did; scripts written for the new version don't work, but why would you write a bash4 script for macOs? Not that they were going to update bash regularly anyway. So if you needed a new version in the base, you'd need a new version of the OS. And then you're back to the same problem you have now. Apple doesn't distribute the version of the 3rd party tool you want for the OS you're on.
- wubrr 3y ago
  > The old version continues to work as well as it always did; scripts written for the new version don't work, Right, so scripts written for bash4+ don't work - which is most of modern bash scripts.. > but why would you write a bash4 script for macOs? The problem is that you have to write special scripts (among other things) just for macos. This is very real problem because most modern software companies run their stuff on linux, while the dev laptops/workstations are often macos.
  - toast0 3y ago
    If you want your server environment to match your desktop environment, macOs is a poor choice. It would be better to have a dev vm or use an os that you can run a real server on. FreeBSD, Linux, Windows, maybe Solaris.
foldr 3y ago
Bash is only there for backwards compatibility with old scripts. The default MacOS shell is an up-to-date zsh.
philistine 3y ago
Apple should declare Bash as deprecated, because they did everything to deprecate Bash, including replacing the default with Zsh, but classify it as such.

toast0 3y ago

Upstream changed the license. Apple doesn't distribute GPLv3 software. Apple's not going to distribute a newer version. That's how license changes work. The old version continues to work as well as it always did; scripts written for the new version don't work, but why would you write a bash4 script for macOs? Not that they were going to update bash regularly anyway. So if you needed a new version in the base, you'd need a new version of the OS. And then you're back to the same problem you have now. Apple doesn't distribute the version of the 3rd party tool you want for the OS you're on.

wubrr 3y ago
> The old version continues to work as well as it always did; scripts written for the new version don't work, Right, so scripts written for bash4+ don't work - which is most of modern bash scripts.. > but why would you write a bash4 script for macOs? The problem is that you have to write special scripts (among other things) just for macos. This is very real problem because most modern software companies run their stuff on linux, while the dev laptops/workstations are often macos.
- toast0 3y ago
  If you want your server environment to match your desktop environment, macOs is a poor choice. It would be better to have a dev vm or use an os that you can run a real server on. FreeBSD, Linux, Windows, maybe Solaris.

foldr 3y ago

Bash is only there for backwards compatibility with old scripts. The default MacOS shell is an up-to-date zsh.

philistine 3y ago

Apple should declare Bash as deprecated, because they did everything to deprecate Bash, including replacing the default with Zsh, but classify it as such.