Symfony 4: Flex and Aliases

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    Symfony 4: Flex and Aliases with Ryan Weaver
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    It’s time to demystify something incredible:
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    tractor beams.
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    Well, actually, we haven’t figured those out yet.
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    So, let’s demystify something else,
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    something that’s already been happening behind the scenes.
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    First, commit everything with a nice message.
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    Let’s install a new feature called The Symfony Security Checker.
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    This is a great tool, but, full disclosure,
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    we’re mostly installing it to show off the Recipe system.
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    Ooh!
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    Run, git status.
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    OK, there are no changes.
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    Now run, composer require sec-checker.
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    Once again, sec-checker should not be a valid package name.
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    So what’s going on?
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    Move over and open composer.json.
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    Our project began with just a few dependencies.
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    One of them was symfony/flex.
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    This is super important.
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    Flex is a composer plugin with 2 superpowers.
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    The first superpower is the alias system.
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    Find your browser and go to symfony.sh.
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    This is the Symfony Recipe Server.
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    We’ll talk about what that means next.
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    Search for security.
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    Ah, here’s a package called sensiolabs/security-checker,
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    and below, it has Aliases: sec-check, sec-checker, security-check,
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    and more.
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    Thanks to Flex, we can say composer require sec-checker
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    or any of these aliases,
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    and it will translate that into the real package name.
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    Yep, it’s just a shortcut system.
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    But the result is really cool.
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    Need a logger? composer require logger
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    Need to send e-mails? composer require mailer
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    Need a tractor beam? composer require…
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    Wait, no, we can’t help with that one.
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    Back in composer.json – yep,
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    composer actually added sensiolabs/security-checker.
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    That’s the first superpower of Flex.
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    The second superpower is even better. Recipes. Mmm!
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    Go back to your terminal, and yes, it did install.
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    And check this out. Symfony operations: 1 recipe
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    Then, Configuring sensiolabs/security-checker.
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    What does that mean?
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    Run git status.
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    Whoa!
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    We expected composer.json and composer.lock to be updated.
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    But there are also changes to a symfony.lock file,
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    and we suddenly have a brand new config file.
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    First, symfony.lock.
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    This file is managed by Flex.
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    It keeps track of which recipes have been installed.
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    Basically, commit it to git, but don’t worry about it.
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    The second file is
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    config>packages>dev /security_checker.yaml.
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    This was added by the recipe.
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    And cool, it adds a new bin console command to our app.
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    Don’t worry about the code itself.
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    You'll understand and be writing code like this soon enough.
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    The point is this – thanks to this file,
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    we can now run PHP ./bin/console security:check.
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    Cool!
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    This is the recipe system in action.
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    Whenever you install a package,
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    Flex will execute the recipe for that package,
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    if there is one.
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    Recipes can add configuration files, create directories,
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    or even modify files like .gitignore,
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    so that the library instantly works without any extra setup.
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    I love Flex.
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    By the way,
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    the purpose of the security-checker
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    is that it checks to see if there are any known vulnerabilities
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    for packages used in our project.
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    Right now, we’re good.
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    But, the recipe made 1 other change.
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    Run, git diff composer.json.
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    Of course, composer require added the package,
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    but the recipe added a new script.
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    Thanks to that,
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    whenever we run composer install, when it finishes,
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    it runs the security-checker automatically.
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    So cool!
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    Oh, and I won't show it right now,
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    but Flex is even smart enough to uninstall the recipes
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    when you remove a package.
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    That makes testing out new packages fast and easy.
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    So, you might be wondering, where do these recipes live?
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    Great question!
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    They live in the cloud.
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    I mean, they live on GitHub.
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    On Symfony.sh,
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    click Recipe, next to the security-checker.
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    Ah, it takes us to the symfony/recipes repository.
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    Here you can see what files will be added,
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    and a few other changes described in manifest.json.
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    All recipes either live in this repository
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    or another one called symfony/recipes–contrib.
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    There's no important difference between the 2 repositories,
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    but the official recipes are watched more closely for quality.
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    Next, let’s put the Recipe system to work by installing Twig,
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    so we can create proper templates.

Stellar Development with Symfony 4

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Symfony 4: Flex and Aliases

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6 minutes 3 seconds // HDCC //

Let's learn about the Composer plugin Flex and Flex's two superpowers: aliases and recipes. Aliases will ease the process of dependency installation and recipes will help us make sure everything is working in our dependency upon installation.

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