README

A clean, modern and opinionated Laravel starter kit built for speed, maintainability, and AI-assisted development. This starter kit combines the latest versions of Laravel with Inertia.js and Vue, enforcing best practices through strict TDD and the Action pattern.

Getting started

laravel new APPNAME --using=michaelsieminski/start-vue

Philosophy

This starter kit is designed with these core principles:

1. Test-Driven Development (TDD): Every feature starts with a test. No exceptions.
2. Action Pattern: Business logic lives in dedicated Action classes, keeping controllers thin and logic reusable.

These conventions are enforced through comprehensive AI instructions, making this the perfect starter kit for AI-assisted development with Claude Code or OpenCode.

Tech Stack

Backend

• PHP 8.4 - Latest PHP with modern syntax and performance
• Laravel 12 - Latest Laravel with streamlined structure
• Inertia.js - Server-driven SPA framework with advanced features
• Laravel Boost - AI-powered development tools for Laravel

Frontend

• Vue 3 - Progressive JavaScript framework
• Tailwind CSS 4 - Utility-first CSS with CSS-first configuration
• Vite 7 - Next generation frontend tooling

Development Tools

• Bun - The fastest frontend build tool
• Pest v4 - Modern testing framework with browser testing support
• Laravel Pint - Opinionated code formatter
• Rector - Automated code refactoring
• Biome - Fast JavaScript/TypeScript formatter and linter
  • Note: Might consider oxc as soon as the Formatter is stable
• Laravel Herd - Native Laravel development environment

Laravel specific configurations

• Prohibit destructive commands - Prevent accidental data loss in Prod
• Model should be strict – Prevent lazy loading and accessing missing attributes locally
• Model unguard – Remove the need for mass assignment protection in models
• Automatic eagerload relationships – Reduce N+1 queries automatically
• Safer Password defaults – Minimum of 8 characters & check if password is breached in Prod
• Use CarbonImmutable Dates - Use immutable dates everywhere

Project Structure

app/
├── Actions/          # Business logic (Action pattern)
├── Http/
│   └── Controllers/  # Thin controllers (orchestration only)
├── Models/           # Eloquent models
└── Providers/        # Service providers

resources/
├── scripts/          # All TypeScript Files
│   pages/            # Inertia Vue Pages
└── css/              # Tailwind CSS

tests/
├── Feature/          # Feature tests
├── Unit/             # Unit tests
└── Browser/          # Browser tests