If you're installing PHP Monitor for the first time, please check out the README at here on GitHub before asking questions. There's also an excellent FAQ in the README in case you're having issues.
Upgrade
The recommended way of upgrading is running brew upgrade phpmon after you've installed PHP Monitor using Homebrew. This always gets you the latest and greatest stable version of PHP Monitor. If you did not use Homebrew to install the app, you can download a zip below (by expanding Assets and choosing phpmon.zip).
What's New
I have made a demonstration video showcasing the new features in PHP Monitor 5.0, check it out!
If you'd like to see a more general breakdown of what's new with screenshots, see this blogpost on my site.
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Link a Folder. Wait, you couldn't do this before? No. But you can now! You can now press the + button in the site list to add a folder as a link to Valet. You'll be able to customize the name of the link and automatically secure the site without any extra steps. Convenient!
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Wow, the site list is a lot faster now! Loading the sites in the "Linked & Parked Domains" section is now faster than ever. I have also fixed the scrolling, which was rather laggy. Optimization, baby. If you have more than 50 sites listed, this will be like night & day.
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Instant & Smarter Search. Yes, faster than ever, but also more powerful than ever. You can now search for multiple queries: searching for "term1 term2" will find entries that contain both words in the name of the site, but this does not need to be a full match. Want to find "my-nice-website-with-valet"? You can search for "nice valet" and find it now!
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"Driver Type" has changed, and is now "Project Type". In order to make "Linked & Parked Domains" a lot faster, PHP Monitor no longer asks Valet what driver is being used. Instead, it scans your
composer.jsonfile to find out what kind of framework you're using. -
Services indicator in the menu. Every time you open the menu, the status of the Homebrew services is now retrieved in the background and also updated periodically. In case Valet isn't working, you'll be able to tell if it's the services that are disabled.
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Identify PHP versions in the site list, at a glance. Not only can you now see what the PHP requirement is that you set up in
composer.jsonon a per-project basis in the site list, but you can also see what version of Laravel you have in therequiresection of yourcomposer.jsonfile. -
Easy compatibility check for sites: If the currently linked version of PHP is compatible with the constraint detected in
composer.json, you'll see a green checkmark. -
Get suggestions for which version of PHP to switch to. If you click on the version number next to the site (if
composer.jsonwas valid and detected), PHP Monitor will automatically determine which versions of PHP that you have installed are compatible with the constraint and suggest a version to switch to. If you have PHP 7.4 and 8.0 installed, but the site requires^8.0, PHP Monitor will propose switching to 8.0. -
Changes in .ini files are detected in real-time. PHP Monitor now uses a very performant system API to watch various .ini files for the currently linked PHP version. If you make a change, PHP Monitor will update its information immediately.
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Automatically update global composer dependencies when changing PHP versions. This is a new preference that you can enable, it's off by default. You can also manually update these global dependencies by using the menu item "Update Global Composer Dependencies...". Makes sense!
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Fix My Valet. The "Force Link PHP" functionality has been renamed, and is now a bit more informative. If switching between PHP versions has failed, PHP Monitor will now also suggest to run Fix My Valet.
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Link additional apps for the site list. By having a valid
.phpmon.conf.jsonfile in your home folder (~) you can now add additional apps that should be available in the site list's right-click menu. More information here. Make sure to have a valid JSON file here, or the apps will not be detected. -
Alfred integration. You'll need to download the workflow file to get started. Please note that you need to have PHP Monitor up and running before any of these work, so you may want to start PHP Monitor when you boot up your Mac. You can then type "pm" in Alfred and use common interactions! (I will be looking into getting a Raycast extension in order soon.)
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A one-time donation encouragement message. If you've launched the app more than a couple of times (or have switched between PHP versions like... 40 times), you'll get a one-time message to encourage you to donate a bit to keep the project going. Sending a tip really helps: thanks to the support of those who have donated before, I was able to bring you this entire list of changes. Thank you.
Improvements
- The size of the main site list and its position is now remembered. No more manually resizing and repositioning the site list!
- A new preference was added to hide the "PHP" next to the version number in the menu bar. For minimalists.
- The services section is now available under the "First Aid & Services" menu item at the bottom. If all you use is PHP Monitor, you will never need this.
- The app now looks better in the dark than ever with a color palette that supports both light and dark macOS appearance, and is different for both rendering modes. I previously used unflattering colors that were used in both modes. No more!