How to Set Up PHP Composer

Overview

Composer is a dependency and package manager for PHP. For more information about Composer, read the Composer documentation. You can search for packages to download at the packagist.org website.

How to set up Composer

In order to use Composer, you must install several PHP modules. You must also verify that you have properly configured your server’s php.ini file to allow Composer to run.

By default, when you call Composer, it only uses the server’s php.ini file. The system stores this file in the /opt/cpanel/ea-*/root/etc/php.ini location.

Required PHP modules

To use Composer, you must enable several PHP modules in EasyApache. For more information about EasyApache 4, read our EasyApache 4 documentation.

• Phar — This module provides a way to store entire PHP applications into a single “phar” file (PHP Archive) for easy distribution and installation.

  Note:

  EasyApache4 installs this module by default.

• Iconv — This module provides a Character Set Conversion.

  Note:

  If you install this module, the MBstring module is not required.

• Mbstring — This module provides enhanced Chinese, Japanese, and other language support.

  Note:

  If you install this module, the Iconv module is not required.

Required PHP directives

You must update the following PHP directives in the php.ini file:

• allow_url_fopen — On
• zend.detect_unicode — Off

Servers that use Suhosin

If you use Suhosin, you must add the Phar PHP module to the Suhosin whitelist in the server’s php.ini file. Add the following line to your server’s php.ini file:

suhosin.executor.include.whitelist=phar

What if I cannot edit the php.ini file

If you cannot make changes to the php.ini file, you must manually run the following command each time you run Composer:

• With Suhosin:

php -d allow_url_fopen=1 -d zend.detect_unicode=0 -d suhosin.executor.include.whitelist=phar $(which composer)

• Without Suhosin:

php -d allow_url_fopen=1 -d zend.detect_unicode=0 $(which composer)

If you use Composer often, you can create a Bash alias to perform this step for you. If you add an alias, you can run the composer command without any additional flags or options. Add the following line to your .bashrc file to create this alias each time that you log in to the server:

• With Suhosin:

alias composer="php -d allow_url_fopen=1 -d zend.detect_unicode=0 -d suhosin.executor.include.whitelist=phar $(which composer)"

• Without Suhosin:

alias composer="php -d allow_url_fopen=1 -d zend.detect_unicode=0 $(which composer)"

Troubleshoot Composer

Command not found

If you receive the command not found error message, you may need to add the proper path to your account’s .bash_profile file.

Add the following lines to your account’s .bash_profile file:

source /etc/profile.d/cpanel-php-composer.sh

If you experience problems with the source option, add the PATH option to the .bash_profile file instead:

PATH=$PATH:/opt/cpanel/composer/bin

The Composer self-diagnostic tool

Composer contains a self-diagnostic tool to ensure that you have properly configured PHP.

Run the diagnostic tool with the following command:

composer diagnose

The Checking platform setting section provides feedback about your server’s PHP configuration. It will also inform you of any PHP configuration failures.

The following example demonstrates this section:

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$ composer diagnose
Checking platform settings: OK
Checking git settings: OK
Checking http connectivity to packagist: Warning: Accessing packagist.org over http which is an insecure protocol.
OK
Checking https connectivity to packagist: OK
Checking github.com rate limit: OK
Checking disk free space: OK
Checking pubkeys: FAIL
Missing pubkey for tags verification
Missing pubkey for dev verification
Run composer self-update --update-keys to set them up
Checking composer version: FAIL
You are not running the latest stable version, run `composer self-update` to update (1.1.1 => 1.1.2)

Alternative diagnostic tools

If you require an alternate diagnostic tool, use the diagnostic tool from Composer’s Github account. Run the following command:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/composer/getcomposer.org/master/web/installer | php -- --check

This utility only checks the server’s PHP configuration, as in the following example:

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# curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/composer/getcomposer.org/master/web/installer | php -- --check
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100  286k  100  286k    0     0   466k      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:-- 1002k
All settings correct for using Composer
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