Composer (software)

Composer

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Developer(s)	Nils Adermann, Jordi Boggiano
Initial release	March 1, 2012 (2012-03-01)
Stable release	1.1.1 / May 17, 2016 (2016-05-17)
Development status	Active
Written in	PHP
Operating system	Cross-platform
Type	Package manager
License	MIT License
Website	getcomposer.org

Composer is an application-level package manager for the PHP programming language that provides a standard format for managing dependencies of PHP software and required libraries. It was developed by Nils Adermann and Jordi Boggiano, who continue to manage the project. They began development in April 2011 and first released it on March 1, 2012. Composer is strongly inspired by Node.js's "npm" and Ruby's "bundler". The project's dependency solving algorithm started out as a PHP-based port of openSUSE's libzypp satsolver.

Composer runs through the command line and installs dependencies (e.g. libraries) for an application. It also allows users to install PHP applications that are available on "Packagist" which is its main repository containing available packages. It also provides autoload capabilities for libraries that specify autoload information to ease usage of third-party code.

Composer is used as an integral part of several popular open-source PHP projects, including Laravel.

The logo of the project depicts a conductor, rather than a composer. However, several people within Composer's community have speculated that the logo is of famed composer, Beethoven.

External links

• Official website
• Composer on GitHub
• Composer documentation
• Composer Tutorial
• Packagist - the main Composer repository
• Composer at Open Hub