Composer tips

Nikola Poša

@nikolaposa

http://blog.nikolaposa.in.rs

Web developer & Open-Source Contributor

Workflow

Initial installation of project dependencies:
```
composer install
```
Sync with someone else's changes:
```
composer install
```
Add new dependency:
```
composer require vendor/package
```
Update specific dependency:
```
composer update vendor/package
```
Update all project dependencies:
```
composer update
```
Remove specific dependency:
```
composer remove vendor/package
```

Do NOT manually edit composer.json

Dev environment dependencies

composer require --dev phpunit/phpunit

Choosing a version

be precise
use caret operator
- ```
^1.2 (>=1.2.0 <2.0.0)
```
- sticks closer to semantic versioning
let the Composer decide about the version:
```
composer require vendor/package
```

dev-master temptation

library without releases

{
    "repositories": [
        {
            "type": "vcs",
            "url": "https://github.com/you/package"
        }
    ],
    "require": {
        "you/package": "^1.0"
    }
}

avoid using those!

dev-master temptation

make use of aliases if available

{
    "name": "vendor/package",
    "extra": {
        "branch-alias": {
            "dev-master": "1.0.x-dev"
        }
    }
}

{
    "require": {
        "vendor/package": "1.0.*@dev"
    }
}

dev-master temptation

require inline aliases

{
    "require": {
        "vendor/package": "dev-bugfix as 1.0-dev"
    }
}

composer.lock

records the exact versions of dependencies in your project
MUST be put into VCS in case of applications
MAY be put into VCS in case of libraries

Useful commands

```
composer <command> -v|vv|vvv
```
```
composer show vendor/name
```
```
composer outdated
```

Autoloading

Composer should be the only mean for autoloading classes

{
    "autoload": {
        "psr-4": { "App\\": "src/" }
    },
    "autoload-dev": {
        "psr-4": { "App\\Tests\\": "tests/" }
    }
}

Define target platform

"config": {
    "platform": {
        "php": "5.6.29"
    }
}

Safer alternative for --ignore-platform-reqs

Scripts

{
    "scripts": {
        "test": "phpunit",
        "cs-fix": "php-cs-fixer fix --rules=@PSR2"
    }
}

Custom commands

composer test

blog.nikolaposa.in.rs/2015/09/06/composer-tips/