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Clone the project

Summary

The first installation step: clone the Dotkernel API repository into an empty directory, then grant write permissions on the data, public/uploads and log folders so the application can write caches, uploads and logs.

Details

In this step you will:

If you are using the Microsoft Windows Operating System on your machine, you can use WSL2 as a development environment. Read more about installing and using WLS2.

Make sure to review the prerequisites before proceeding.

Clone the Project

Using your terminal, navigate inside the directory where you want to download the project files.

Make sure that the directory is empty before running the command below.

Run this command to clone the project files.

git clone https://github.com/dotkernel/api.git .

Set File and Folder Permissions

To prevent future permission errors, certain folders must have their permissions set to 777. This way they assign everyone (owner, group, and other users) permissions to read, write, and execute.

It is safe to set these permissions as accessing the application files is dictated by the .htaccess file. The public folder is publicly accessible by design, so those files are served directly. Everything else is routed to the index.php file.

chmod -R 777 data
chmod -R 777 public/uploads
chmod -R 777 log

The -R parameter is used to recursively apply the permissions to all subdirectories and files.

FAQ

Q: Why must the target directory be empty?

A: git clone <url> . clones into the current directory and refuses to run if that directory already contains files.

Q: Is setting 777 on those folders safe?

A: Access to application files is controlled by the .htaccess rules: only the public folder is served directly and everything else is routed through index.php. The three writable folders sit outside the served path.

Q: Which folders need write access, and why?

A: data for caches and generated files, public/uploads for uploaded content, and log for the error log.

Q: I hit permission errors after installing. What now?

A: Re-run the chmod commands, and see the FAQ page, which lists the specific error messages and their fixes.

Q: Can I develop on Windows?

A: Yes, using WSL2 as the development environment. See the WSL2 setup guide.

Q: What comes after cloning?

A: Install dependencies with Composer, then configure the local files. See Composer and Configuration files.