How can I revert Protractor back to a selected version? - node.js

Question

Current Node Version: V15.3.0
Current Webdriver-manager Version: 7.0.15
I am at a loss. My end-to-end automated testing was running great, until the company I work for upgraded Google Chrome to 86.0.4240.111, previously we were using Chrome 83. So naturally with the update I ran the following command webdriver-manager update --versions.chrome=86.0.4240.111 however afterwards when I attempted to run my testing, I received the error stating that ChromeDriver only supports Chrome version 87. During this time I believe I had Node version V14.5.x or close to, Webdriver was version 6.14.x.
I talked with IT and we were unable to find an older version of Chrome from a trusted website to revert Google Chrome back, and so I upgraded Node and npm to the current versions stated above. Now after updating Webdriver-manager I get the error that ChromeDriver only supports Chrome version 87. I talked with IT and they will not upgrade to 87 even though it was released this past week.
My question is there any version which I can install Node and NPM in which I can use my testing with the current version of chrome which is 86.0.4240.111?
And what specific commands would I need to install the said version. Would it be npm install npm#[Enter Version Here]?
Thank you for taking the time to read and look at my question. If any more info is needed please let me know and I will gladly give you what I can!

Answer 1

Node version doesn't matter
npm version doesn't matter
You don't need to revert protractor
It's difficult to downgrade your browser, due to security concerns. You can only go up in version, but you can install any version of the chromedriver
what you actually need to do is to match a version of your local chrome to the version of chromedriver (the driver is the layer that controls your browser, so it's important to make them correspond to each other). So
First, find out what your version of chrome is. From your example I understand it is 86.0.4240.111
Then, find out what chromedriver version can be used. Take the major version of the browser (first 3 numbers, 86.0.4240 in your case) and find the corresponding version of the driver by going to this url https://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/LATEST_RELEASE_${CHROME_VERSION} (put the major browser version instead of ${CHROME_VERSION}). You'll see the chromedriver you're looking for is 86.0.4240.22
This is where the trickiest part begins. There are 2 installation of protractor usually:
local
global
I won't go over how to find which one you use, you can look it up. But when you find it, make sure you're updating the right one
When you know which protractor you're updating, go to it's folder and from that folder run npm i webdriver-manager#latest and then node ./bin/webdriver-manager update --gecko=false
when you updated the right webdriver, install the right chromedriver like so
node ./bin/webdriver-manager update --gecko=false --versions.chrome $VERSION
Make sure to put 86.0.4240.22 instead of $VERSION