Composer Update Helper

Generates composer require commands from outdated dependencies. Works with any PHP project: Symfony, Laravel, Yii, CodeIgniter, Slim, Laminas, etc.

Features

• ✅ Works with any PHP project
• ✅ Separates production and development dependencies
• ✅ Shows ignored packages with available versions
• ✅ Multi-framework support with version constraints:
  • Symfony: respects extra.symfony.require
  • Laravel: respects laravel/framework + illuminate/* versions
  • Yii: respects yiisoft/yii2 version
  • CakePHP: respects cakephp/cakephp version
  • Laminas: respects laminas/* versions
  • CodeIgniter: respects codeigniter4/framework version
  • Slim: respects slim/slim version
• ✅ Compares versions to avoid unnecessary updates
• ✅ Can execute commands directly with --run flag
• ✅ Automatic installation via Composer plugin

Installation

composer require --dev nowo-tech/composer-update-helper

After installation, two files will be copied to your project root:

• generate-composer-require.sh - The main script
• generate-composer-require.ignore.txt - Configuration file for ignored packages (only created if doesn't exist)

Note: These files are automatically added to your .gitignore during installation to prevent them from being committed to your repository.

Usage

Show suggested update commands

./generate-composer-require.sh

Example output:

⏭️  Ignored packages (prod):
  - doctrine/doctrine-bundle:2.13.2

⏭️  Ignored packages (dev):
  - phpunit/phpunit:11.0.0

🔧 Suggested commands:
  composer require --with-all-dependencies vendor/package:1.2.3 another/package:4.5.6
  composer require --dev --with-all-dependencies phpstan/phpstan:2.0.0

Execute the update commands

./generate-composer-require.sh --run

Ignoring Packages

Edit generate-composer-require.ignore.txt to exclude packages from updates:

# Packages to ignore during update
# Each line is a package name (e.g.: vendor/package)

doctrine/orm
symfony/security-bundle
laravel/framework

Ignored packages will still be displayed in the output with their available versions, but won't be included in the composer require commands.

Environment Variables

Variable	Description	Default
PHP_BIN	Path to PHP binary	php
COMPOSER_BIN	Path to Composer binary	Auto-detected

Example:

PHP_BIN=/usr/bin/php8.2 ./generate-composer-require.sh

Framework Version Constraints

The script automatically detects your framework and respects version constraints to prevent breaking updates.

Symfony

Respects extra.symfony.require in composer.json:

{
    "extra": {
        "symfony": {
            "require": "8.0.*"
        }
    }
}

Laravel

Automatically detects laravel/framework version and limits all laravel/* and illuminate/* packages:

{
    "require": {
        "laravel/framework": "^12.0"
    }
}

Other Frameworks

Framework	Core Package	Limited Packages
Yii	yiisoft/yii2	yiisoft/*
CakePHP	cakephp/cakephp	cakephp/*
Laminas	laminas/laminas-mvc	laminas/*
CodeIgniter	codeigniter4/framework	codeigniter4/*
Slim	slim/slim	slim/*

Example Output

🔧 Detected framework constraints:
  - symfony 8.0.*
  - laravel 12.0.*

⏭️  Ignored packages (prod):
  - doctrine/orm:3.0.0

🔧 Suggested commands:
  composer require --with-all-dependencies symfony/console:7.1.8

Requirements

• PHP >= 7.4
• Composer 2.x

Development

Using Docker (Recommended)

The project includes Docker configuration for easy development:

# Start the container
make up

# Install dependencies
make install

# Run tests
make test

# Run tests with coverage
make test-coverage

# Check code style
make cs-check

# Fix code style
make cs-fix

# Run all QA checks
make qa

# Open shell in container
make shell

# Stop container
make down

# Clean build artifacts
make clean

Without Docker

If you have PHP and Composer installed locally:

# Clone repository
git clone https://github.com/nowo-tech/composer-update-helper.git
cd composer-update-helper

# Install dependencies
composer install

# Run tests
composer test

# Run tests with coverage
composer test-coverage

# Check code style
composer cs-check

# Fix code style
composer cs-fix

# Run all QA checks
composer qa

Available Make Commands

Command	Description
make up	Start Docker container
make down	Stop Docker container
make shell	Open shell in container
make install	Install Composer dependencies
make test	Run PHPUnit tests
make test-coverage	Run tests with code coverage
make cs-check	Check code style (PSR-12)
make cs-fix	Fix code style
make qa	Run all QA checks
make clean	Remove vendor and cache
make setup-hooks	Install git pre-commit hooks

Pre-commit Hooks (Optional)

Install git hooks to automatically run CS-check and tests before each commit:

make setup-hooks

This ensures code quality checks run locally before pushing to GitHub.

Continuous Integration

Every push to GitHub automatically triggers:

• ✅ Tests on PHP 7.4, 8.0, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3
• ✅ Code Style check (PSR-12) with automatic fixes on main/master branch
• ✅ Code Coverage report with 100% coverage requirement
• ✅ Automatic code style fixes committed back to repository

CI/CD Features

• Automatic Code Style Fixes: On push to main/master, PHP CS Fixer automatically fixes code style issues and commits them back
• 100% Code Coverage: The CI pipeline requires 100% code coverage to pass, ensuring comprehensive test coverage
• Multi-PHP Testing: Tests run on all supported PHP versions (7.4, 8.0, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3)
• Pull Request Validation: On pull requests, code style is checked (but not auto-fixed) to maintain code quality

See GitHub Actions for build status.

Demo Projects

The repository includes demo projects for different PHP frameworks to test the Composer Update Helper:

• Laravel 12 (PHP 8.5) - Latest stable version
• Symfony 8.0 (PHP 8.5) - Latest stable version
• Yii 2 (PHP 8.5) - Latest stable version (Yii 3 in development)
• CodeIgniter 4.6 (PHP 8.5) - Latest stable version
• Slim 4.12 (PHP 8.5) - Latest stable version
• Legacy - Laravel 12 (PHP 8.5) - Updated from Laravel 5.8

Each demo is independent and can be run separately with Docker Compose. See demo/README.md for detailed instructions.

Quick Start with Demos

# Using Makefile (recommended)
cd demo
make laravel           # Start Laravel demo
make laravel-down      # Stop Laravel demo
make laravel-install   # Install dependencies
make laravel-test      # Run tests
make all               # Start all demos

# Generic commands
make up DEMO=laravel      # Start a demo
make down DEMO=laravel    # Stop a demo
make install DEMO=laravel # Install dependencies
make test DEMO=laravel    # Run tests
make shell DEMO=laravel   # Open shell

# Or using docker-compose directly
cd demo/laravel
cp .env.example .env  # Copia y renombra (quita .example)
# Edita .env para cambiar PORT y contraseñas MySQL si es necesario
docker-compose up -d

# Access at http://localhost:8001

See demo/README.md for complete documentation.

Contributing

Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for details.

For branching strategy, see docs/BRANCHING.md.

Changelog

Please see CHANGELOG.md for version history.

Author

Created by Héctor Franco Aceituno at Nowo.tech

License

The MIT License (MIT). Please see LICENSE for more information.