Wrong PHP Version/Executable in VSCode terminal but works perfectly in Mac terminal

Question

I just updated my Mac M1 to Big Sur 11.5.2 and something in VSCode seems to have broken. I am unable to use the latest home-brew php which is installed.

In VSCode its pointing to /usr/bin/php which is Macs built in php, that's not the one im using with home-brew. I tried everything and changed the path but still the same thing.

I checked the one similar question to mine and all it suggests is to use Homebrew which I already am doing so Im not sure what I am doing wrong here.

I am running PHPUnit tests in the VSCode terminal and I am getting the following error:

/Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/map -> ./vendor/bin/phpunit tests                           
/usr/bin/php declares an invalid value for PHP_VERSION.
This breaks fundamental functionality such as version_compare().
Please use a different PHP interpreter.
/Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/map ->

However when I run the same thing in the Mac terminal by going to the same folder it works perfectly:

/Users/themyth/app/Sites/MapFramework/Map -> ./vendor/bin/phpunit tests                                            
PHPUnit 9.5.8 by Sebastian Bergmann and contributors.

Runtime:       PHP 8.0.9
Configuration: /Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/Map/phpunit.xml

...R                                                                4 / 4 (100%)

Time: 00:00.004, Memory: 6.00 MB

There was 1 risky test:

1) tests\map\core\exception\MapExceptionTest::testDisplayMethodShowsBasicStaticHtml
This test did not perform any assertions

/Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/Map/tests/map/core/exception/MapExceptionTest.php:16

OK, but incomplete, skipped, or risky tests!
Tests: 4, Assertions: 4, Risky: 1.
/Users/themyth/app/Sites/MapFramework/Map -> 

When I do which php in both terminals I get a different result:

In Mac terminal:

/Users/themyth/app/Sites/MapFramework/Map -> which php
/opt/homebrew/bin/php

In VSCode terminal:

/Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/map -> which php
/usr/bin/php
/Users/themyth/App/Sites/MapFramework/map -> 

How can I point VSCode to the right version of PHP? I don't think this happened before doing the Big Sur update and I am not sure what to edit.

I tried to open settings.json but I can't find any info about this and I am not sure how to edit this.

Any advice would be appreciated.

---

Edit 1:

I think this issue happened since I installed PHPIntellisense on VSCode but can't be sure, what I do know is that it was working before. I dont know how to configure VSCode to point to the home-brew PHP which is already installed and working perfectly in the regular terminal

---

Edit 2

I tried to edit settings.json and it made no difference:

{
    "workbench.colorTheme": "Monokai Dimmed",
    "security.workspace.trust.untrustedFiles": "open",
    "redhat.telemetry.enabled": false,
    "php.validate.executablePath": "/opt/homebrew/bin/php",
    "php.executablePath": "/opt/homebrew/bin/php"
}

---

Edit 3

I have completely uninstalled VSCode and reinstalled everything. To start from fresh and the same problem happens. This is what the current settings.json file looks like:

{
    "workbench.colorTheme": "Default Dark+",
    "php.validate.executablePath": "/opt/homebrew/bin/php"
}

When I do which php in the terminal in VSCode I always get the same thing /usr/bin/php

The same problem is continuing, Im not sure if this is because of the OSX update.

How could I configure the VSCode terminal to be exactly like the Mac terminal?

I also opened another project where I am using Symfony and I am trying to create a basic controller & that doesn't work too. I have edited the question to be more generic now:

php bin/console make:controller test I get the following error:

Fatal error: Composer detected issues in your platform: Your Composer dependencies require a PHP version ">= 8.0.0". You are running 7.3.24-(to be removed in future macOS)

What is most frustrating is this seems so straight forward I can't understand what I need to do to fix this

Answer 1

In case you are using XAMPP instead of Homebrew follow these 2 steps: 1.nano ~/.zshrc 2.export PATH=/Applications/XAMPP/bin:$PATH

Answer 2

If you are using Mamp, just check this checkbox

if you are not using Mamp, check your .zshrc file in ~/ folder

Answer 3

Have you checked user settings, settings.json. Look for "php.executablePath": "c:\php80\php.exe",

Answer 4

It might be you are trying to use XDebug to run/debug your code. In that case despite doing the above, it still didn't work! I had to edit launch.json to add "runtimeExecutable" (which I did in both blocks) so it looks something like this (use brew --prefix php to find the right path to use):

{
    // Use IntelliSense to learn about possible attributes.
    // Hover to view descriptions of existing attributes.
    // For more information, visit: https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?linkid=830387
    "version": "0.2.0",
    "configurations": [
      {
        "name": "Launch currently open script",
        "type": "php",
        "request": "launch",
        "program": "${file}",
        "cwd": "${fileDirname}",
        "port": 0,
        "runtimeArgs": [
          "-dxdebug.start_with_request=yes"
        ],
        "runtimeExecutable": "/opt/homebrew/bin/php",
        "env": {
          "XDEBUG_MODE": "debug,develop",
          "XDEBUG_CONFIG": "client_port=${port}"
        }
      },
        {
            "name": "Listen for XDebug",
            "type": "php",
            "request": "launch",
            "port": 9000,
            "runtimeExecutable": "/opt/homebrew/bin/php"
        }
    ]
}

Answer 5

I got the same problem. Open your terminal and write this:

nano ~/.zshrc

At the top of the file you have this:

# If you come from bash you might have to change your $PATH.
# export PATH=$HOME/bin:/usr/local/bin:$PATH

Put this line just under:

export PATH=/opt/homebrew/opt/php@8.0/bin:$PATH

Save and close, restart your terminal and it will normally work.

NB: I write php@8.0 but you can do this with all versions you install with homebrew