How to replace PHP 5.3 with PHP 5.2

[sustain]

I'm trying to install Joomla and PHP 5.3 is breaking things!

[paramajaya]

I have the same problem with Drupal 6.13 on XAMPP 172. I am wondering if XAMPP 1.7.2 will have PHP 5.2 replacing PHP 5.3. I like Mercury and Tomcat as services on XAMPP 1.7.2

[Diesel9a1]

The Apache 1.7.2 PHP 5.3 package enables me to work the Zend Optimiser for my Joomla site without having to mess with any settings. But as is becoming common knowledge, Joomla 1.5.14 isn't fully compatible with PHP 5.3.

Is there a work round? I have Apache 1.6.7 and PHP 5.2.x, but cannot get the Zend Optimiser bit to work. Can somebody point me in the right direction to download slightly earlier XAMPP package with a PHP 5.2.x and Zend Optimiser working, or help me get Zend working correctly with my older XAMPP?

Thanks.

[dmphotography]

I've noticed quite a few Open Source programs aren't very compatible with PHP 5.3 and some aren't compatible at all.
The good news is you CAN still download older versions of XAMPP until Joomla or whatever other programs aren't quite yet compatible with PHP 5.3 get updated.
PHP 5.3 had quite a few major changes to it, so there's going to be a lot of PHP apps that will need to be majorly modified.

Anywho, XAMPP 1.7.1 works fine with Joomla 1.5 and has PHP verison 5.2.8.
You can download it from:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xampp/files/XAMPP%20Windows/1.7.1/xampp-win32-1.7.1-installer.exe/download

As a future reference, every version of XAMPP from way back can still be found on SourceForge.net.
Here's where you can find those:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/xampp/files/
They are listed in descending order, meaning the oldest versions are on top and the latest versions are on bottom.

Hope that helps!

[Diesel9a1]

Thanks for the link Dm.

[progers]

Here's what I did. I already had 1.7.2 installed, and had upgraded my MySQL databases. Reverting to 1.7.1 seemed to prevent MySQL from starting, which I assume was due to the older version of MySQL trying to open a newer DB.

Instead, I created a hybrid. I kept all of XAMPP 1.7.1, but I simply replaced the 1.7.1 mysql directory with the 1.7.2 version.

Specifically, stop the Apache and MySQL services using the XAMPP control panel. For safety, rename the mysql in the 1.7.1 directory to mysql-5.1.33 (which is the version number.) Next, copy the mysql from your 1.7.2 directory. Restart the Apache and MySQL services. You should be fine.

This hybrid got rid of the annoying PHP 5.3-related warnings from Drupal 6.14, but it kept MySQL happy with the upgraded database.

Good luck!