Running composer in a different directory than current

Question

I don't know if this question has been asked, because searching finds results mostly about moving the libraries installation directory.

I have a globally installed composer command. Is there a way to run, for example, composer install in a different directory than current, i.e. to specify the directory in which I would like tu run the command?

E.g. being in /home/someuser, I would like to acquire the same result as in running composer install it inside /home/someuser/myproject. Of course, one way would be to simply change the current directory, run composer and go back.

Tomas Votruba · Accepted Answer · 2021-12-09T13:13:21.930

197

Try composer install -h. There you'll find an option --working-dir (or -d). And that's what you're looking for.

Then run:

composer install --working-dir=/home/someuser/myproject

You can find more in composer docs.

Depending on your operating system, the = might need to be removed:

composer install --working-dir /home/someuser/myproject

edited Dec 09 '21 at 13:13

answered Oct 12 '15 at 13:41

Tomas Votruba

23,240
9
79
115

6

`-d=/home/someuser/myproject` actually throws an error for me. Current version of composer seems to accept `-d /home/user/myproject/` instead. – Jan Richter Aug 06 '18 at 23:09
3

AFAIK it depens on the operating system (Windows, Linux, OS X). Thank you for your comment, I've updated the answer to make the OS differences more clear. – Tomas Votruba Aug 07 '18 at 06:33
1

using `=` made my build fail a million times, thanks for adding this detail :) – Levi Dec 05 '19 at 14:38
1

It was not working on linux. You need to create composer.json file with curly brackets: {} in it. And then all was ok. – liutis Dec 09 '21 at 12:31
1

works excellent for me – C Alonso C Ortega May 08 '22 at 14:53

score 17 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 02 '17 at 09:30

17

In addition to the above answer from Tomáš Votruba i had to append the = charachter on OSX. So the full command would be:

composer install -d=/home/someuser/myproject

My first post on SO so was unable to simply add this as a comment.

answered Nov 02 '17 at 09:30

Eric Mulder

171
1
3

M_R_K · Answer 3 · 2019-09-02T02:49:15.200

5

This works for me, PHP 7.3 on ubuntu 18.04

Install

composer install --working-dir=/your_composer_dir

Update

composer update --working-dir=/your_composer_dir

edited Sep 02 '19 at 02:49

answered Jul 12 '19 at 01:34

M_R_K

5,929
1
39
40

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Feb 10 '23 at 17:53

I am using a Windows machine with PHPStorm (terminal) and this worked for me.

composer install --working-dir /home/someuser/myproject

My Linux OS machines require me to use

composer install --working-dir=/home/someuser/myproject

Note: You may be able to substitute ~/ for /home/someuser/ if your path is super long.

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Oct 19 '22 at 05:36

I tried what others said, but it was giving me: Invalid working directory specified 'PATH' does not exist. Although it was my working dir that contained composer.json!

I don't know why anyway, but this worked for me (only for gnu/linux users):

composer --working-dir=$(pwd)

And by the way, if you had run composer -h, it would've told you the solution:

-d, --working-dir=WORKING-DIR If specified, use the given directory as working directory.

henlly · Answer 6 · 2018-10-05T00:18:42.540

-6

Run:

cd /home/mysites/google.com

Then run:

composer require facebook/graph-sdk

Above steps will open up the directory named (google.com) and install facebook Graph SDK there.

edited Oct 05 '18 at 00:18

answered Oct 04 '18 at 22:02

henlly

1
1
4

2

I don't think that changing the directory is wanted. Additionally, if the requirement is to run `composer install`, why did you introduce some package to be installed? – Nico Haase Apr 11 '19 at 12:21

Running composer in a different directory than current

6 Answers6

Linked

Related