Building and Publishing Your Own PHP Packages to Packagist

Creating your own PHP package can be a rewarding way to contribute to the open-source community, share reusable components, or streamline internal tooling.

Structure Your Package

Start by setting up a clean directory structure for your package.

my-package/
├── src/
│   └── HelloWorld.php
├── tests/
│   └── HelloWorldTest.php
├── composer.json
├── README.md
└── LICENSE

The src directory contains your actual code. The tests directory contains your unit tests. You’ll also want to add a README.md, a license (MIT is common), and a composer.json file.

Create composer.json

Run the following command inside your project directory:

composer init

Composer will ask you a series of questions. Example:

{
  "name": "yourvendor/hello-world",
  "description": "Hello World pkg",
  "type": "library",
  "license": "MIT",
  "autoload": {
    "psr-4": {
      "YourVendor\\\\HelloWorld\\\\": "src/"
    }
  },
  "require": {}
}

Make sure to:

• Use PSR-4 autoloading
• Choose a unique vendor/package name
• Pick an appropriate license (MIT, GPL, etc.)

Write Your Code and Tests

Here’s a simple example:

src/HelloWorld.php

<?php

namespace YourVendor\HelloWorld;

class HelloWorld
{
    public function greet(string $name): string
    {
        return "Hello, {$name}!";
    }
}

tests/HelloWorldTest.php

<?php

use PHPUnit\Framework\TestCase;
use YourVendor\HelloWorld\HelloWorld;

class HelloWorldTest extends TestCase
{
    public function testGreet()
    {
        $hello = new HelloWorld();
        $this->assertEquals("Hello, Kostas!", $hello->greet("Kostas"));
    }
}

Step 4: Test Your Package Locally

Before publishing, verify everything works:

1. Install PHPUnit (if not globally):

   composer require --dev phpunit/phpunit

2. Run tests:

   vendor/bin/phpunit

Push to GitHub

Create a new GitHub repository and push your code:

git init
git remote add origin https://github.com/yourvendor/hello-world.git
git add .
git commit -m "Initial"
git push -u origin main

Make sure your repository is public and contains a composer.json.

Submit to Packagist

1. Go to https://packagist.org/packages/submit
2. Paste your repository’s public GitHub URL
3. Click “Check” and follow the prompts

That’s it! Packagist will automatically track new releases if your repo has a valid composer.json and tags.

Tagging New Versions

Packagist relies on Git tags for versioning. To publish a new version:

git tag v1.0.0
git push origin v1.0.0

Then, update your package on Packagist or wait for the auto-sync.