First-time Laravel 5.0 Setup

If you want a video to get you through most of these steps, watch the Laracast.

1. Setup Composer

I already had composer installed, but I need to update it. To update composer, run this command:

$ composer self-update

Also, make sure composer is in your PATH by adding this line to your ~/.bash_profile

export PATH=~/.composer/vendor/bin:$PATH

2. Install Vagrant

Download vagrant. After installing, you should be able to run vagrant in Terminal and see the command help.

3. Install Virtualbox

Download VirtualBox.

4. Install Homestead

This command takes maybe 5-10 minutes.

$ vagrant box add laravel/homestead
$ composer global require "laravel/homestead=~2.0"
$ homestead init

5. Setup up SSH keys

If you haven’t already setup your SSH keys, run:

$ ssh-keygen -t rsa -C "your_email@example.com"

6. Configure Homestead

$ homestead edit

1. Set folders: map: to the directory where all your projects are
2. Set folders: to: to /home/vagrant/ + the name of the last directory in map: above

NOTE: these two folders will automatically always be in sync.

Setup A New Laravel 5.0 Project

Server Setup

1. Configure Project in Homestead

$ homestead edit

1. Set sites: map: to myproject.app
2. Set sites: to: to /home/vagrant/path/to/myproject/public
3. Copy the ip: up top on this file for the next step

2. Add Project Url To Hosts File

Add this line to your /etc/hosts file, replacing YOUR_IP with the IP you copied in the previous step.

YOUR_IP myproject.app

3. Run Site Locally

After this command and you should be able to access http://myproject.app in your browser.

$ homestead up

Database Access

1. Add Project DB Credentials to Homestead

$ homestead edit

1. Add to databases: your project’s database: - myproject
2. Copy the ip: up top on this file for the Sequel Pro step

2. Configure Database Credentials

Open myproject/.env file and set the following:

DB_HOST=127.0.0.1
DB_DATABASE=myproject
DB_USERNAME=homestead
DB_PASSWORD=secret

3. Access Database Via Sequel Pro

Open Sequel Pro and setup a new connection, replacing YOUR_IP with the IP you copied from step 1:

Name: My Project
Host: YOUR_IP
Username: homestead
Password: secret
Database: myproject

4. Access Database through Terminal

$ homestead ssh
$ cd path/to/myproject
$ mysql -uhomestead -p
mysql> show databases;

Laravel 5.0 Project Migration and Seeding

1. Add UserTableSeeder

Add UserTableSeeder.php to myproject/databases/seeds/.

NOTE: In order to use the User model, I had to add use App\User; to the top of the file.

<?php

use Illuminate\Database\Seeder;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use App\User;

class UserTableSeeder extends Seeder {

    /**
     * Run the database seeds.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function run()
    {
        Model::unguard();

        DB::table('users')->delete();

        User::create([
            'name' => 'Your Name',
            'email' => 'your@email.com',
            'password' => 'your_password'
        ]);
    }

}

2. Edit DatabaseSeeder

Uncomment the following in in myproject/databases/seeds/DatabaseSeeder.php.

$this->call('UserTableSeeder');

3. Run Migration and Seeder

$ homestead ssh
$ cd path/to/myproject
$ php artisan migrate:refresh --seed

If that doesn’t work, run composer dump-autoload and try again.

4. Check in DB for tables and values

Yeah… do that ^

Have Questions or Feedback?

Feel free to leave a comment below or tweet me @kevinkirchner.

Go Read Some Documentation

This should get you up and running. If there’s more you need to figure out, read through the laravel docs (http://laravel.com/) and check out laracasts at (https://laracasts.com)