Edit

Frequently Asked Questions

Licensing

Do I need a license to test Backpack?

You don't need a license code AT ALL. Go ahead and install Backpack CRUD on your machine - it's free and open-source, released under the MIT License.

You only need to pay if you want the extra features provided by our premium add-ons (e.g. Backpack PRO and Backpack DevTools). That's it.

Do I need a license to put a PRO project on a testing domain?

No:

when you purchase Backpack PRO for Unlimited Projects, you can use it on any number of domains, subdomains and IPs (that's why it's called unlimited);
when you purchase Backpack PRO for One Project, you get the right to use it on one MAIN domain, but also on as many staging/test/beta domains or subdomains as you need; if someone from our team contacts you, then you can explain, it's perfectly reasonable to have test instances - we know how it goes;

Can I use Backpack to create an open-source project?

Yes you can! Use Backpack CRUD v6, which is free and open-source, released under the MIT License.

Can I use Backpack PRO in an open-source project?

In short - no, you cannot. Please use Backpack CRUD v6 instead, which is free and open-source, released under the MIT License.

Backpack PRO is a closed-source add-on, which requires payment in order to receive an access token. If you did include backpack/pro as a dependency in your open-source software, then your software would no longer be open-source. Everybody who installed your project/package would need to pay for Backpack PRO to get access to it.

Can I get Backpack PRO for free to use in a non-commercial project?

No - we're no longer giving away free licenses. But we have released Backpack CRUD v5 and v6 under the MIT License, which means it's free and open-source. It has fewer features, but you can do absolutely do anything you want with it.

Installation

How do I update Backpack to the latest non-breaking version?

Run composer update on your project to update the dependencies given your version constrains in composer.json. If you want to update a specific package, you can run composer update backpack/crud for example to only update backpack/crud and it's dependencies.

If you have your assets cached you can run php artisan basset:clear to clear the cache too. You can manually rebuild the asset cache if necessary with php artisan basset:cache. We do recommend you keep basset disabled on localhost while developing.

Some packages may require you to run additional commands to update the database schema or publish new assets. Please refer to the package documentation or upgrade guide for more information.

How do I uninstall Backpack from my project?

You can remove Backpack from your project pretty easily, if you decide to stop using it. You just have to do the opposite of the installation process:

# delete the files Backpack has placed inside your application
rm -rf app/Http/Middleware/CheckIfAdmin.php
rm -rf config/backpack
rm -rf config/gravatar.php
rm -rf resources/views/vendor/backpack
rm -rf routes/backpack

# delete any CrudControllers you've created, so MAYBE:
rm -rf app/Http/Controllers/Admin

# delete any Requests you've created for your CrudControllers.
# MAKE SURE YOU DON'T NEED ANYTHING IN THIS DIRECTORY ANYMORE.
# You might have OTHER requests that are not Backpack-related.
rm -rf app/Http/Requests

# (MUST) remove other Backpack packages that you are using, like PRO, Editable Columns, DevTools etc:
composer remove --dev backpack/devtools
composer remove backpack/pro
composer remove backpack/editable-columns

etc...

# After everything related to Backpack is deleted, just need to delete the crud!
composer remove backpack/crud

That's it! If you've decided NOT to use Backpack, we'd be super grateful if you could send us an email telling us WHY you decided not to use Backpack, or why it didn't fit your project. It might help us take Backpack in a different direction, a direction where you might want to use it again. Thank you 🙏

Errors when installing paid add-ons

When installing our paid add-ons:

Composer will add our private repository (repo.backpackforlaravel.com) to your composer.json file;
Composer will try to download the dist version of the package from there;
- if successful, you're good;
- if the dist version fails to download, Composer will throw an error (with an HTTP code like 402); then Composer will try to download the source version of the package straight from our Github repo; that will 100% fail, because you do NOT have access to our private Github repo; to rephrase, you don't have access to the source, only to the dist version;

Unfortunately, we cannot customize the errors that Composer throws, so the error text might be confusing. Please take a look at the HTTP error code shown in the error to understand what happened:

400 Error - Bad Request - user and password do not match; please check your auth credentials;
401 Error - Unauthorized - no token username or password; please check your auth credentials;
402 Error - Payment Required - you are trying to download a version newer than you have access to; our system will send you an email with clear instructions on what to do to require the latest version you have access to; you can also check the latest version you have access to in your Backpack account, and require that version specifically; alternatively, please purchase the same product again to gain access to more updates, then it will work again;
404 Error - Not Found - the package that you are trying to download does not exist;
429 Error - Too Many Requests - our server has received too many requests from your IP address; please wait one minute and try again;

If you still can't figure it out, please open a new discussion in our Community Forum. Please make sure to:

mention the steps you have followed to get there (e.g. composer require backpack/pro, php artisan backpack:require:pro etc.);
include a screenshot of the console output, so we can understand what happened;
cross out any personal data (e.g. token username or password);

How do I deploy Backpack to production?

Deploying a Laravel+Backpack project to production isn't very different from deploying a normal Laravel project to production. You only need to account for Basset, the system in Backpack that publishes the CSS and JS assets your admin panel needs.

That being said, here's a detailed step-by-step guide to deploying a Backpack project to production, that should work for most production servers:

Local Preparations Before deploying your application, make sure your development environment is in order:
- Update dependencies:
```
composer install --no-dev --optimize-autoloader
npm install && npm run prod
```
- Configure your .env file for production. This file should not be included in version control (git), but make sure to have a copy with production settings.
Configure the Production Server Ensure your production server meets the following requirements:

Web Server: Nginx or Apache. PHP: Version compatible with your Laravel version. Database: MySQL, PostgreSQL, etc. Composer: Installed globally. Node.js and npm: If you are using asset compilation with Laravel Mix.

Deploy the Code There are several ways to deploy code to production, here’s one method using Git:
- Clone your repository on the server:
```
git clone https://github.com/your_user/your_repository.git
cd your_repository
```
- Copy your local .env file to the production environment and adjust the settings accordingly.
```
APP_ENV=production
APP_URL=https://MY_DOMAIN.COM #This need to be correctly set for Basset
```

Install Dependencies Install Composer and npm dependencies:

composer install --no-dev --optimize-autoloader
npm install && npm run prod

Configure the Application Make the necessary configurations for the application:

Generate the application key:
```
php artisan key:generate
```

Set permissions:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data storage
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data bootstrap/cache
sudo chmod -R 775 storage
sudo chmod -R 775 bootstrap/cache

Run database migrations:
```
php artisan migrate --force
```

Optimize configuration:

php artisan basset:clear
php artisan basset:cache
php artisan optimize:clear
php artisan optimize

Configure the Web Server Set up your web server (Nginx or Apache) to point to the public directory of your Laravel application. Here’s an example Nginx configuration:

server {
listen 80;
server_name your_domain.com;
root /path/to/your/project/public;

index index.php index.html;

location / {
    try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}

location ~ \.php$ {
    include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
    fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.2-fpm.sock;
    fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
    include fastcgi_params;
}

location ~ /\.ht {
    deny all;
}
}

Configure Cron Jobs If your Laravel application uses scheduled tasks, add the following line to your crontab:
```
* * * * * cd /path/to/your/project && php artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1
```
Monitor and Maintain Monitor your application in production:
- Logs: Check logs in storage/logs/laravel.log.
- Services: Ensure services like queue workers are running properly.
Optimize for Production Perform additional optimizations if necessary:
- Optimize Autoload:
```
composer dump-autoload --optimize
```
- Disable Debug in .env:
```
APP_DEBUG=false
```
- Clean & Set config cache
```
php artisan config:clear
php artisan config:cache
```

About

Getting Started

Admin UI

CRUD Panels

Add-ons