Setup ProcessWire

Setup ProcessWire

This example installs ProcessWire 3 with Composer inside the Devilbox PHP container and serves it through the htdocs virtual host directory.

Overview

Project name	Container path	Database	TLD_SUFFIX	Project URL
my-pw	/shared/httpd/my-pw	my_pw	lvh.me	http://my-pw.lvh.me / https://my-pw.lvh.me

Projects live in /shared/httpd/ inside the PHP container and in ./data/www/ on the host.

Required configuration

Service	Version	Notes
Webserver	Apache 2.4 or Nginx	Apache works with ProcessWire’s .htaccess; Nginx may need a custom vhost template.
PHP	PHP 8.3 or compatible	Confirm your selected ProcessWire 3 release supports the PHP container you choose.
Database	MySQL or MariaDB	Use the bundled MySQL service for this example.

Start the stack:

./dvl.sh up php httpd mysql bind

Walk through

It will be ready in seven steps:

1. Enter the PHP container.
2. Create a new virtual host directory.
3. Install ProcessWire.
4. Link the webroot.
5. Add the MySQL database.
6. Verify DNS.
7. Step through the web installer.

1. Enter the PHP container

./dvl.sh shell php83

2. Create the vhost directory

mkdir -p /shared/httpd/my-pw
cd /shared/httpd/my-pw

3. Install ProcessWire

composer create-project processwire/processwire processwire

Expected structure:

tree -L 1
.
└── processwire

4. Link the webroot

ln -s processwire htdocs

Expected structure:

tree -L 1
.
├── processwire
└── htdocs -> processwire

5. Add the MySQL database

mysql -u root -h 127.0.0.1 -p -e 'CREATE DATABASE my_pw CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_unicode_ci;'

6. Verify DNS

my-pw.lvh.me resolves automatically. Add a hosts-file entry only when using another suffix.

7. Step through guided web installation

Open http://my-pw.lvh.me or https://my-pw.lvh.me and follow the ProcessWire installer.

Use these database values:

• DB host: 127.0.0.1
• DB name: my_pw
• DB user: root
• DB password: your .env value
• DB port: 3306

The installer will guide you through profile selection, compatibility checks, database setup, admin URL selection, and admin user creation.

Next steps

• Use Adminer or phpMyAdmin from the Devilbox intranet to inspect my_pw.
• Add an Nginx-specific vhost template only if clean URLs fail.
• Configure trusted local HTTPS before browser-based demos.