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Has any great design been invented that isn't tied to hardcoded paths preventing multiple versions of the same library etc and would allow easy linking to any version? Nix? Anything else?

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I don't know if this is normal or if anyone else does it but I usually either download binaries or compile from source and move the executable to /usr/local/bin/ and create a symlink. Lets me easily switch between versions. I avoid using a package manager for anything where I want control over the version and installation.

- curl -fSLJO $RELEASE

- tar xvf $DOWNLOAD.tar.gz && cd $DOWNLOAD`

- make .

- mv $EXECUTABLE /usr/local/bin/$EXECUTABLE-$VERSION`

- ln -s /usr/local/bin/$EXECUTABLE-$VERSION /usr/local/bin/$EXECUTABLE

- # chmod 750, chown root:$appuser, etc

Works great for everything I've tried thus far. Redis, HAproy, Prometheus exporters, and many more.

Yes, these "great designs" are invented at a constant rate. I saw about 30 of them, or 1 per year at average. For example, Fedora invented and then abandoned modular design recently.

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