How To Install Symfony: Easy-to-Follow Steps

If you are looking for a powerful and flexible PHP framework to build web applications, APIs, microservices and web services, you might want to consider Symfony. Symfony consists of a set of reusable PHP components and a framework that provides various Symfony Features, such as smart URLs, code generation, easy templating, internationalisation, caching, automated form validation, and Ajax. In this blog, you will learn "How to Install Symfony?" on your local machine and start developing your projects with it. 

Table of Contents 

1) What is Symfony? 

2) Requirements prior to Symfony installation 

3) Environment setup 

4) Symfony installation process 

5) Configuration of your Symfony application 

6) Launching the Symfony application 

7) Conclusion

What is Symfony? 

Symfony is a PHP framework that follows the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern and aims to speed up the creation and maintenance of web applications. Symfony was created by Fabien Potencier in 2005 and has since become one of the most popular PHP frameworks in the world. Many well-known companies and organisations use Symfony, such as Spotify, BlaBlaCar, Drupal, Magento, and the BBC. Symfony is the foundation of other PHP frameworks, such as Laravel and Silex.
 

Requirements before Symfony installation 

Before installing Symfony, you need to make sure that your system meets the following requirements:
 

PHP Setup 

You need to have PHP 8.2 or higher installed on your machine. You can check your PHP version by running the following command in your terminal: 

php –v 

If you don’t have PHP installed or need to upgrade it, you can follow the instructions on the official PHP website. 

Composer setup 

You need to have Composer, which is a tool for managing PHP dependencies. Composer will help you install Symfony and its components and other libraries you might need for your projects. You can check if you have Composer installed by running the following command in your terminal: 

composer --version 

If you don’t have Composer installed or need to upgrade it, follow the instructions on the official Composer website. 

Configuring the web server 

You need to have a web server that can serve PHP files. You can use any web server, such as Apache, Nginx, or IIS. You need to configure your web server to point to the ‘public/’ 

 directory of your Symfony project, which is where the front controller (index.php) is located. You must also enable URL rewriting, which allows Symfony to handle dynamic and user-friendly URLs. You can find more information on how to configure your web server for Symfony on the official Symfony documentation. 

Verifying necessary PHP extensions 

You need to enable some PHP extensions, which Symfony and some of its components require. These extensions are usually installed and enabled by default in most PHP installations, but you can verify them by running the following command in your terminal:    

php -m 

The extensions that you need are: Ctype, iconv, PCRE, Session, SimpleXML, and Tokenizer. If you are missing any of these extensions, install them through a package manager or by editing your ‘php.ini’ file. 

Addressing file permission issues 

You need to ensure that your web server has write access to the ‘var/’ directory of your Symfony project, where the cache and logs files are stored. If you have any permission issues, you can follow the instructions on how to set up permissions for Symfony applications on the official Symfony documentation. 

Environment setup 

Before installing Symfony, you need to decide which environment you want to use for your development. Symfony supports three environments: ‘dev, prod,’ and ‘test’. The ‘dev’ environment is for developing your application, the ‘prod’ environment is for deploying your application to production, and the ‘test’ environment is for testing your application. Each environment has its configuration files located in the ‘config/packages/’ directory of your Symfony project. You can switch between environments by setting the ‘APP_ENV’ variable in the ‘.env’ file, located in your Symfony project's root directory. Understanding this setup is crucial for anyone preparing for Symfony Interview Questions, as configuring environments is a key aspect of Symfony development.

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Symfony installation process

There are two methods to install Symfony: Symfony binary or Composer. The Symfony binary is a command-line tool that provides all the features you need to develop and run your Symfony application locally. The Composer method is more manual and requires you to create the project structure and install the dependencies yourself. This blog will use the Symfony binary method as it is easier and faster. 

To install Symfony using the Symfony binary, you need to download and install the Symfony binary from the official Symfony website. Alternatively, you can execute the following command in your terminal to install it: 

curl -sS https://get.symfony.com/cli/installer | bash 

It will create a Symfony binary in your ‘$HOME/.symfony/bin’ directory. You can move it to a directory in your system’s ‘PATH’ to make it easier. 

Once you have the Symfony binary installed, you can create a new Symfony project by running the following command in your terminal: 

Symfony new my_project_directory --version="7.0.*@dev" 

It will create a new directory called ‘my_project_directory’ and download the Symfony skeleton, a minimal project template containing the basic files and directories you need to start developing your Symfony application. You can also specify the version of Symfony that you want to use by using the ‘--version’ option. The ‘--version="7.0.*@dev"’ option will install the latest development version of Symfony 7.0, the most recent version when writing this blog. You can also use the ‘--webapp’ option to install more useful packages for building web applications, such as Twig, Doctrine, and Webpack Encore.
 

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Configuration of your Symfony application 

After installing Symfony, you need to configure your Symfony application according to your needs and preferences. You can configure your Symfony application by editing the files in the config/ directory of your Symfony project. Some of the most important files are:
 

a) .env: This file contains the environment variables that are used by your Symfony application, such as the database credentials, the mailer settings, the secret key, and the ‘APP_ENV’ variable that determines the environment that your application runs in. You can override these variables by creating a .env.local file, which is ignored by Git and is only used on your local machine. 

b) config/packages/: This directory contains the configuration files for each package you install in your Symfony project, such as the framework, the router, the security, the validator, and the twig. You can customise each package's behaviour and options by editing these files. You can also create different configuration files for each environment by creating subdirectories named after the environment, such as config/packages/dev/ or config/packages/prod/. 

c) config/routes/: This directory contains the routing files that define the URLs of your Symfony application and the controllers that handle them. You can create different routing files for each feature or module of your application and import them into the main routing file (config/routes.yaml). You can also create different routing files for each environment by creating subdirectories named after the environment, such as config/routes/dev/ or config/routes/prod/. 

d) config/services.yaml: This file contains the service container configuration, which is a mechanism that allows you to register and manage the objects that are used by your Symfony application, such as controllers, repositories, listeners, and services. You can define the arguments, the auto wiring, the autoconfiguration, and the tags of each service in this file. You can also create aliases, bind parameters, and inject dependencies using this file. 

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Launching the Symfony application 

Once you have configured your Symfony application, you can launch it and see it in action. You can launch your Symfony application using the Symfony binary, which provides a built-in web server that runs your application locally. To launch your Symfony application, you need to run the following command in your terminal: 

symfony serve 

It will start the web server and display the URL to access your Symfony application, such as https://127.0.0.1:8000. You can also use the --no-tls option to disable HTTPS or the --port option to change the port number.  

To halt the web server, press Ctrl+C in your terminal. 

Alternatively, you can use any other web server you prefer, such as Apache, Nginx, or IIS, as long as you configure it to point to the public/ directory of your Symfony project and enable URL rewriting. 

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Conclusion 

In this blog, you have learned How to Install Symfony, a high-performance PHP framework for Web Development, in easy-to-follow steps. You have also learned about the requirements, the environment setup, the installation process, the configuration, and the launch of your Symfony application. Now, you can start developing your web projects with Symfony and enjoy its features and benefits. 

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