Tell Composer to use Different PHP Version

Question

I've been stuck at this for a few days. I'm using 1and1 hosting, and they have their PHP set up a bit weird.

If I use just php composer.phar install, then I'm using PHP 4.4.6, which is horribly insufficient. However, I can run php5.5 composer.phar install, get a little bit further, but it still fails because somewhere along the line, PHP is called again, but it fails, as it's using 4.4.6.

Is there any way to tell Composer to use the php5.5 command? Has anyone successfully gotten Composer configured on 1and1 hosting?

I'm trying to get Laravel up and running (which uses Composer). I've been able to do it on my GoDaddy domain, but not 1and1.

Answer 1

Ubuntu 18.04 case ... this run for me.

/usr/bin/php7.1 /usr/local/bin/composer update

Answer 2

Just add below code to your composer.json file to set different php version:

"config": {
    "platform": {
        "php": "7.1.3"
    }
}

Answer 3

On xubuntu I had php 7.2 as default. But needed to run composer with php 5.6.

So this worked for me:

php5.6 /usr/bin/composer

Answer 4

If you just need to get composer to ignore the version requirements, you can bypass using:

composer install --ignore-platform-reqs

Answer 5

composer is a PHP binary script and it's using Unix Shebang to define which interpreter for executing.

root@home:~# head /usr/local/bin/composer -n 5

#!/usr/bin/env php
<?php
/*
 * This file is part of Composer.
 *


/usr/bin/php7.1 /usr/local/bin/composer update

So if you're running composer without any specific option, it will use your PHP version at /usr/bin/env php (which is your default PHP)

We can have many versions of PHP inside your Linux and you can flexible use which PHP version for executing as you want like this way:

root@home:~# /usr/bin/php7.1 /usr/local/bin/composer update

Or just

root@home:~# php7.1 /usr/local/bin/composer
root@home:~# php7.2 /usr/local/bin/composer
root@home:~# php7.3 composer
...

To check & find all installed PHP packages, goto /usr/bin/

root@home:~# ls /usr/bin/ | grep php
php
php5.6
php7.1
php7.2
php7.3
php-config
php-config7.1
phpdbg
phpdbg5.6
phpize
phpize7.1

Answer 6

Try this approach

ea-php72 /opt/cpanel/composer/bin/composer

Answer 7

You always can use that way.

In project folder where you has composer.json file. Run the command

 php7.4 /usr/local/bin/composer install

or

php7.4 /usr/local/bin/composer update

where php7.4 your specific version can be(php7.0, php5.5, php7.3 etc...) where /usr/local/bin/composer path for system folder with composer

!!! you should have php7.4-cli

sudo apt-get install -y php7.4-cli

That way for linux/ubuntu user

Cheers ;-)

Answer 8

In my case, Composer detected PHP version 7.2.6 but my actual PHP Version was 8.0.2 .So , I did the following steps and It was the solution for me.

Step 01:- Add below code to your composer.json file

"config": {
    "platform": {
        "php": "7.2.6"
    }
}

Step 02:- Then, run the below command.

C:\xampp\htdocs\your project name>composer update

Answer 9

I too have a shared hosting account on 1&1 (ionos) and here's what I have had to do:

if you login as the root ssh account, you can create a ~/.bash_profile and add

alias php="php7.1"
alias composer="php7.1 composer.phar"

to it so that you can now use the commands you would normally use and it just works. (put composer.phar in your project folder root)

Then, make sure your laravel composer.lock file from your dev machine gets up to your project folder on 1and1 and run

composer install

Using this tip from @tobymackenzie: on shared hosts you really should just run composer install (not update!) from a composer.lock file you created on your own machine. That way the memory usage remains very low.

I still had STDIN issues with artisan commands so make sure you change the .env file to

APP_ENV=local

because having it set to production throws infinite STDIN warnings as it waits for you to type yes. At least on my account it does.

Hope this helps somebody.

Answer 10

You could change your PATH to override the php version.

PATH="/home/user/bin:$PATH"

In /home/user/bin (or any other directory really) make a symlink named php to the php5 binary.

Another option, use a shell alias:

alias php="/path/to/php5"

Answer 11

Ubuntu 18.04 case ... this works for me. Here, Composer picks the required PHP version automatically.

/opt/lampp/bin/php /usr/bin/composer install

OR

 /opt/lampp/bin/php /usr/bin/composer update

Answer 12

Know this question is a bit old... but if you pull down composer into your app root:

https://getcomposer.org/download/

Instead of relying on global composer, then you can run:

php56 composer.phar {your command}

or I believe newer homstead versions would be like:

php7.1 composer.phar {your command}

https://laracasts.com/discuss/channels/laravel/run-composer-commands-with-different-php-versions

Answer 13

php5.5 composer.phar install fails because your composer.json is telling it to run php and not php5.5, edit the file composer.json replace the php scripts references to php5.5. Example:

From:

"post-root-package-install": [
    "php -r \"copy('.env.example', '.env');\""
],

To:

"post-root-package-install": [
    "php5.5 -r \"copy('.env.example', '.env');\""
],

Even when doing this, 1and1 has a memory limit for scripts execution so php5.5 composer.phar install won't fail but it won't complete its execution either. You can still run the scripts post install manually.

I have deployed Laravel webapps to 1and1 without commit vendor directory, following this guide: Deploy Laravel Webapp to 1and1

Answer 14

I'm on a Hostgator shared account, the following worked for me:

1. First, find out where your desired version of PHP lives (you can start typing ea-php and hit TAB to list all available executables starting with ea-php):

   which ea-php73

   /usr/local/bin/ea-php73
   

2. Then, find out where composer lives:

   which composer

   /opt/cpanel/composer/bin/composer
   

3. Then use those to run your composer command:

   /usr/local/bin/ea-php73 /opt/cpanel/composer/bin/composer install

Answer 15

You could try and copy the php and php-config files into /usr/local/bin instead. That path has a higher order of precedence and should override the /usr/bin folder without needing to disable SIP. That is what I did.

Answer 16

Must add in two places in your composer.json file to set different php version:

"config": {
    "platform": {
        "php": "7.4"
    }
}

"require": {
    "php": "^7.4",
}

Answer 17

I had no luck with any of above answers, I had auto scripts in composer.json so just ignoring or faking platforms just caused failed scripts etc. Setting php version in command just didn't work!

I did notice however that although running which php and php -v returned correct version which /usr/bin/env php returned the problematic version of php that composer was using. So found a very good answer here and outlined below:

Issue:

/usr/bin/env php looks for an executable named php in the current $PATH; it pays no attention to aliases, shell functions, etc. If you want it to execute php v5.3, you have to put that version in a directory under the name php, and put that directory in your PATH somewhere before the directory that contains the problematic version.

Fix:

Create new php executable folder like below with your specific php executable linked inside:

mkdir /usr/local/bin/php-overrides
ln -s /usr/local/bin/php7 /usr/local/bin/php-overrides/php

Add below to your ~/.bash_profile (or other appropriate startup script):

PATH="/usr/local/bin/php-overrides:$PATH"

https://serverfault.com/questions/579956/alias-doesnt-work-in-script-with-usr-bin-env-php

Answer 18

For people using Plesk, you need the different pieces:

1. Get the PHP version required from /opt/plesk/php/<version/bin/php, eg /opt/plesk/php/7.4/bin/php
2. Get the real path of composer since /usr/local/bin/composer is a custom Plesk script by vieweing the script contents ( cat /usr/local/bin/composer ). In my case, it was /usr/local/psa/var/modules/composer/composer.phar
3. Put it all together:

# /opt/plesk/php/7.4/bin/php /usr/local/psa/var/modules/composer/composer.phar install

... or to make it simpler, just create a new file ( I like composer74 ) in /usr/local/bin:

1. cat > /usr/local/bin/composer74 to create the file
2. paste the following:

#!/bin/bash
/opt/plesk/php/7.4/bin/php /usr/local/psa/var/modules/composer/composer.phar

insto the terminal

3. Hit CTRL+D to save the file
4. chmod +x /usr/local/bin/composer74 to make it executable
5. Use it anywhere:

# composer74 install

Answer 19

The existing answers partly do not answer the question, give suggestions that do not work or give bad advice.

The question stated:

However, I can run php5.5 composer.phar install, get a little bit further, but it still fails because somewhere along the line, PHP is called again, but it fails, as it's using 4.4.6.

Instead, I am here showing a way to test and verify the suggestions.

I wish I had a better answer myself but I am unsure what is the best solution. Personally I would go with a solution which make sure PHP is called with the correct version on the host (e.g. via an alias or setting the PHP environment correctly, running the entire operation inside a container or some other solution), regardless of Composer and add a platform php constraint.

If you don't run any scripts and just need the requirements to resolve the dependencies correctly config:platform:php would probably be your friend.

Let's say our default php version is 7.4 but our project requires 7.2.

1. Check your default PHP version

   command line:

   # shows version of default PHP
   php --version
   # show path of default PHP
   which php
   
   # show version of /usr/bin/env php
   # /usr/bin/env php --version
   

2. Create a test script in your composer.json

   "scripts": {
       "php-version": "php --version"
   
   }
   

   Now you can test what version of PHP is used for the commands Composer calls, e.g.

   composer php-version
   /usr/bin/php7.2 /usr/bin/composer php-version
   

   In my case, both of these use my default php script (which is version 7.4). So, while the 7.2 version is used to run Composer, the scripts called by Composer use the default command.

3. Now let's add the platform constraint as suggested in some of the answers

   "config": {
       "platform": {
          "php": "^7.2"
       }
   }
   

   Does not really change anything for me:

   /usr/bin/php7.2 /usr/bin/composer php-version
   
   # result is still 7.4
   

   Actually, what the platform constraint may be important for is resolving the requirements, so you should add it (in your project composer.json). It just won't solve the above problem of composer using PHP with the correct version. See also Composer docs for platform.

Answer 20

There are two ways to do it.

1. Tell the composer to ignore the platform requirements while running the command in the terminal.

composer update --ignore-platform-reqs

2. Tell the composer to ignore the platform requirements in the composer.json file in the project root directory.

"config": {  
    "platform-check": false, 
}, 

Answer 21

We can tell Composer, what version of PHP we are supporting with our app by using the platform configuration in our composer.json file by adding the following configuration,

{
"config": {
    "platform": {
        "php": "5.5"
    }
},
"require": {
    ...
 }
}

Or from the command-line

composer config platform.php 5.5