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    Regarding your last paragraph: It depends. If you're writing for macOS, you may want to remain portable by writing your scripts in such a way that the default version of bash on the system is able to execute the code. Doing that ensures that the shell code will be valid on any current macOS system. Release 3.2.57 of bash is very old, but it's going to remain the default version of that shell on macOS for the foreseeable future. Commented Aug 27, 2021 at 15:56
  • Admittedly, I had no clue about this limitation of macOS and generally didn’t consider flawed software environments in that paragraph. I prefer environments with rolling updates where individual components (such as Bash) have individual versions (up-to-date rather than frozen) and are updated independently. So my assumption was that even if a system gets installed with old Bash, it will eventually update the package. The fact that an old version needs to be kept forever is quite surprising to me. Commented Aug 27, 2021 at 16:14
  • In this particular case, it comes down to licensing issues. Commented Aug 27, 2021 at 16:18