Symfony Recipes

Symfony recipes allow the automation of Composer packages configuration via the Symfony Flex Composer plugin.

This repository contains "official" recipes for Composer packages endorsed by the Symfony Core Team. For contributed recipes, see the contrib repository.

See RECIPES.md for a full list of recipes that live in this repository.

Creating Recipes

Symfony recipes consist of a manifest.json config file and, optionally, any number of files and directories. Recipes must be stored on their own repositories, outside of your Composer package repository. They must follow the vendor/package/version/ directory structure, where version is the minimum version supported by the recipe.

The following example shows the real directory structure of some Symfony recipes:

symfony/
    console/
        3.3/
            bin/
            manifest.json
    framework-bundle/
        3.3/
            config/
            public/
            src/
            manifest.json
    requirements-checker/
        1.0/
            manifest.json

All the manifest.json file contents are optional and they are divided into options and configurators.

Note

Don't create a recipe for Symfony bundles if the only configuration in the manifest is the registration of the bundle for all environments, as this is done automatically.

Note

When creating a recipe, don't create bundle config files under config/packages/ when no options are set.

Updating Recipes

When a recipe needs to be updated, we try to minimize the impact for the current versions. Creating a new project with a set of dependencies should always use the same recipes to avoid differences between the generated code and the existing documentation, blog posts, videos for these versions.

As a rule of thumb, consider the same principles as semantic versioning:

• Only change an existing recipe for a version in case of a bug (typos, mis-configuration, ...);
• If the change is about a new best practice or a different way of doing something, do it for the next version of the dependency.

Options

aliases option

This option (not available in the recipes-contrib repository) defines one or more alternative names that can be used to install the dependency. Its value is an array of strings. For example, if a dependency is published as acme-inc/acme-log-monolog-handler, it can define one or more aliases to make it easier to install:

{
    "aliases": ["acme-log", "acmelog"]
}

Developers can now install this dependency with composer require acme-log.

Configurators

Recipes define the different tasks executed when installing a dependency, such as running commands, copying files or adding new environment variables. Recipes only contain the tasks needed to install and configure the dependency because Symfony is smart enough to reverse those tasks when uninstalling and unconfiguring the dependencies.

There are several types of tasks, which are called configurators: copy-from-recipe, copy-from-package, bundles, env, composer-scripts, gitignore, and post-install-output.

bundles Configurator

Enables one or more bundles in the Symfony application by appending them to the bundles.php file. Its value is an associative array where the key is the bundle class name and the value is an array of environments where it must be enabled. The supported environments are dev, prod, test and all (which enables the bundle in all environments):

{
    "bundles": {
        "Symfony\\Bundle\\DebugBundle\\DebugBundle": ["dev", "test"],
        "Symfony\\Bundle\\MonologBundle\\MonologBundle": ["all"]
    }
}

The previous recipe is transformed into the following PHP code:

// config/bundles.php
return [
    'Symfony\Bundle\DebugBundle\DebugBundle' => ['dev' => true, 'test' => true],
    'Symfony\Bundle\MonologBundle\MonologBundle' => ['all' => true],
];

container Configurator

Adds new container parameters in the services.yaml file by adding your parameters in the container option.

This example creates a new locale container parameter with a default value in your container:

{
    "container": {
        "locale": "en"
    }
}

copy-from-package Configurator

Copies files or directories from the Composer package contents to the Symfony application. It's defined as an associative array where the key is the original file/directory and the value is the target file/directory.

Caution!

Copying files from the package should be avoided, except for some very specific use cases. Copying PHP files under the project's src/ directory is almost always a bad idea; consider adding a command in your bundle that is able to generate such PHP files instead.

This example copies the bin/check.php script of the package into the binary directory of the application:

{
    "copy-from-package": {
        "bin/check.php": "%BIN_DIR%/check.php"
    }
}

The %BIN_DIR% string is a placeholder that, when installing the recipe, is turned into the absolute path of the binaries directory of the Symfony app. These are the available placeholders: %BIN_DIR%, %CONF_DIR%, %CONFIG_DIR%, %SRC_DIR% %VAR_DIR% and %PUBLIC_DIR%.

Recipes must use these placeholders instead of hardcoding the paths to be truly reusable. The placeholder values can be overridden in the extra section of your composer.json file (where you can define your own placeholders too):

// composer.json
{
    "...": "...",

    "extra": {
        // overriding the value of the default placeholders
        "bin-dir": "bin/",
        "config-dir": "config/",
        "src-dir": "src/",
        "var-dir": "var/",
        "public-dir": "public/",

        // defining a custom placeholder (can be accessed using
        // %MY_SPECIAL_DIR% in the recipe)
        "my-special-dir": "..."
    }
}

copy-from-recipe Configurator

It's identical to copy-from-package but contents are copied from the recipe itself instead of from the Composer package contents. It's useful to copy the initial configuration of the dependency and even a simple initial structure of files and directories:

"copy-from-recipe": {
    "config/": "%CONFIG_DIR%/",
}

Avoid storing PHP files that should land under the src/ directory; consider adding a command in your bundle that is able to generate such PHP files instead.

env Configurator

Adds the given list of environment variables to the .env and .env.dist files stored in the root of the Symfony project:

{
    "env": {
        "APP_ENV": "dev"
    }
}

This recipe is converted into the following content appended to the .env and .env.dist files:

###> your-recipe-name-here ###
APP_ENV=dev
###< your-recipe-name-here ###

The ###> your-recipe-name-here ### section separators are needed by Symfony to detect the contents added by this dependency in case you uninstall it later. Don't remove or modify these separators.

Tip

Use %generate(secret)% as the value of any environment variable to replace it with a cryptographically secure random value of 16 bytes.

composer-scripts Configurator

Registers scripts in the auto-scripts section of the composer.json file to execute them automatically when running composer install and composer update. The value is an associative array where the key is the script to execute (including all its arguments and options) and the value is the type of script (php-script for PHP scripts, script for any shell script and symfony-cmd for Symfony commands):

{
    "composer-scripts": {
        "vendor/bin/security-checker security:check": "php-script",
        "make cache-warmup": "script",
        "assets:install --symlink --relative %PUBLIC_DIR%": "symfony-cmd"
    }
}

gitignore Configurator

Adds patterns to the .gitignore file of the Symfony project. Define those patterns as a simple array of strings (a PHP_EOL character is added after each line):

{
    "gitignore": [
        ".env",
        "/public/bundles/",
        "/var/",
        "/vendor/"
    ]
}

Similar to other configurators, the contents are copied into the .gitignore file and wrapped with section separators (###> your-recipe-name-here ###) that must not be removed or modified.

post-install-output Configurator

Displays contents in the command console after the package has been installed. Avoid outputting meaningless information and use it only when you need to show help messages or the next step actions.

The contents must be defined in a file named post-install.txt (a PHP_EOL character is added after each line). Symfony Console styles and colors are supported too:

<bg=blue;fg=white>              </>
<bg=blue;fg=white> What's next? </>
<bg=blue;fg=white>              </>

  * <fg=blue>Run</> your application:
    1. Change to the project directory
    2. Execute the <comment>make serve</> command;
    3. Browse to the <comment>http://localhost:8000/</> URL.

  * <fg=blue>Read</> the documentation at <comment>https://symfony.com/doc</>

add-lines Configurator

If no other configurators can meet your needs, the add-lines configurator can add entire lines to files, either at the top, bottom or after a target:

"add-lines": [
    {
        "file": "webpack.config.js",
        "content": "\nenables the Symfony UX Stimulus bridge (used in assets/bootstrap.js)\n    .enableStimulusBridge('./assets/controllers.json')",
        "position": "after_target",
        "target": ".splitEntryChunks()"
    },
    {
        "file": "assets/app.js",
        "content": "import './bootstrap.js';",
        "position": "top",
        "warn_if_missing": true
    },
    {
        "file": "assets/translator.js",
        "content": "export * from '../var/translations';",
        "position": "bottom",
        "requires": "symfony/webpack-encore-bundle"
    }
]

Each item needs file, content and position, which can be top, bottom or after_target. If after_target is used, a target must also be specified, which is a string that will be searched for in the file.

If warn_if_missing is set to true, a warning will be shown to the user if the file or target isn't found. If requires is set, the rule will only be applied if the given package is installed.

Validation

When submitting a recipe, several checks are automatically executed to validate the recipe:

• YAML files suffix must be .yaml, not .yml;
• YAML files must be valid;
• YAML files must use 4 space indentations;
• YAML files use null instead of ~;
• YAML files under config/packages must not define a "parameters" section;
• JSON files must be valid;
• JSON files must use 4 space indentations;
• Aliases are only supported in the main repository, not the contrib one;
• Aliases must not be already defined by another package;
• Aliases are not in the list of special Composer commands (nothing, lock, and mirrors);
• The manifest file only contains supported keys;
• The package must exist on Packagist;
• The package must have at least one version on Packagist;
• The package must have an MIT or BSD license;
• The package must be of type "symfony-bundle" if a bundle is registered in the manifest;
• The package must have a registered bundle in the manifest if type is "symfony-bundle";
• The package does not only register a bundle for all environments;
• The package does not depend on symfony/symfony or symfony/security;
• All text files should end with a newline;
• All configuration file names under config should use the underscore notation;
• No "semantically" empty configuration files are created under config/packages;
• All files are stored under a directory referenced by the "copy-from-recipe" section of "manifest.json";
• The pull request does not contain merge commits;
• The Symfony website must be referenced using HTTPs.

Full Example

Combining all the above configurators you can define powerful recipes, like the one used by symfony/framework-bundle:

{
    "bundles": {
        "Symfony\\Bundle\\FrameworkBundle\\FrameworkBundle": ["all"]
    },
    "copy-from-recipe": {
        "config/": "%CONFIG_DIR%/",
        "public/": "%PUBLIC_DIR%/",
        "src/": "%SRC_DIR%/"
    },
    "composer-scripts": {
        "cache:clear": "symfony-cmd",
        "assets:install --symlink --relative %PUBLIC_DIR%": "symfony-cmd"
    },
    "env": {
        "APP_ENV": "dev",
        "APP_SECRET": "%generate(secret)%"
    },
    "gitignore": [
        ".env",
        "/public/bundles/",
        "/var/",
        "/vendor/"
    ]
}