Requirements and Installation

Requirements

• PHP 8.4.6 or above, with the json extension
• Composer
• A web server, or the built-in development server

The windwalker/core package itself only requires PHP and ext-json. Other extensions depend on the packages you use, for example a pdo_* extension for the database.

The starter project also builds CSS and JavaScript with Vite, so the following are needed when you use it:

• Node.js 20 or above
• Yarn 4 (via Corepack)

Install the Starter

The recommended way to begin is the Windwalker Starter. It provides a ready-to-run application skeleton with the core package, configuration, routes and a Vite asset build.

composer create-project windwalker/starter {folder} ^4.0 --remove-vcs

Replace {folder} with your project directory. After the dependencies are installed, an interactive installer asks for the application name, a secret, and the database settings, then installs the frontend dependencies.

TIP

Settings are stored in .env. To regenerate it later, run composer env.

Run the Application

Start the built-in PHP server from the project root:

php windwalker server:start

Then open http://localhost:8000. If the default port is taken, pass --port:

php windwalker server:start --port 8080

When deploying to a production server, point the document root to the www directory.

Project Layout

Directory	Purpose
etc	Configuration: app/, conf/, packages/, di/
resources	Assets, languages, migrations and seeders
routes	Route definitions
src	Application code
views	Templates
www	Public web root