Welcome to our step-by-step tutorial on how to install the Laravel PHP framework using Composer. Laravel is a popular open-source web application framework that follows the model-view-controller (MVC) architectural pattern. IT provides an expressive and elegant syntax that helps developers build web applications with ease. Composer is a dependency manager for PHP that allows you to declare the libraries your project depends on and it will manage (install/update) them for you.
Pre-requisites
Before we dive into the installation process, make sure you have the following pre-requisites installed on your system:
- PHP (>= 7.3.0)
- Composer
- Git
Step 1: Install Composer
If you haven’t installed Composer yet, head over to Composer’s official Website and follow the installation instructions for your operating system. Composer is a cross-platform tool and supports Windows, macOS, and Linux.
Step 2: Install Laravel
Once Composer is installed, open up your terminal or command prompt and run the following command to create a new Laravel project:
composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel my-laravel-appThis command tells Composer to create a new Laravel project called ‘my-laravel-app’ using the Laravel framework. The ‘–prefer-dist’ flag tells Composer to prefer the distribution (source code) archive for downloading the Laravel framework.
Step 3: Serve Your Application
After the installation is complete, navigate to your newly created Laravel project directory:
cd my-laravel-appNow, you can start the Laravel development server using the following Artisan command:
php artisan serveThis will start a development server on http://localhost:8000 where you can view your Laravel application in the browser.
Conclusion
Congratulations! You have successfully installed the Laravel framework using Composer. You are now ready to start building your web applications with the power and elegance of Laravel. If you encounter any issues during the installation process, feel free to visit the official Laravel website for further assistance.
FAQs
Q: Can I install Laravel without Composer?
A: While Composer is the recommended way to install Laravel, you can also download the Laravel source code directly from GitHub and manually manage its dependencies. However, using Composer is the preferred method as it handles the dependencies and updates automatically.
Q: Can I use a specific version of Laravel with Composer?
A: Yes, Composer allows you to specify the version of Laravel you want to install using its create-project command. For example, you can run composer create-project --prefer-dist laravel/laravel my-laravel-app "5.8.*" to install Laravel 5.8.
