Configuration (.env)

With the boilerplate, WordPress is configured in the .env file at the root of the project, not in wp-config.php. config/application.php reads it with Symfony Dotenv and defines the WordPress constants.

composer create-project creates .env from .env.example:

.env

APP_ENV=dev
APP_DEBUG=true

WP_HOME=http://localhost:8080
WP_SITEURL=${WP_HOME}/wp

DB_NAME=wordpress
DB_USER=wordpress
DB_PASSWORD=wordpress
DB_HOST=127.0.0.1
DB_PREFIX=wp_
DB_CHARSET=utf8mb4

# Generate your keys here: https://roots.io/salts.html
AUTH_KEY='generateme'
# ...

Variables

Variable	Required	Default	Effect
WP_HOME	yes		URL of the site, with its scheme (https://example.com). Also used to build WP_CONTENT_URL.
WP_SITEURL		WP_HOME/wp	URL of the WordPress core, installed in web/wp.
DB_NAME	yes		Database name.
DB_USER	yes		Database user.
DB_PASSWORD	yes		Database password. It can be empty (DB_PASSWORD=), but it must be defined.
DB_HOST		localhost	Database host (db with the Docker environment).
DB_PREFIX	yes		Table prefix, usually wp_.
DB_CHARSET		utf8mb4	Connection charset.
APP_DEBUG		false	Boolean, defines WP_DEBUG (see below).
APP_ENV		dev	Selects the extra .env.* files that are loaded (see below).
DISABLE_WP_CRON		false	Boolean, disables the WordPress cron triggered by page loads (use a real cron instead).
WP_POST_REVISIONS		true	true (keep every revision), false (none) or a number of revisions to keep.
AUTH_KEY, SECURE_AUTH_KEY, LOGGED_IN_KEY, NONCE_KEY, AUTH_SALT, SECURE_AUTH_SALT, LOGGED_IN_SALT, NONCE_SALT			Salts. Generate them at https://roots.io/salts.html (the Docker setup script does it for you).
WP_CACHE_KEY_SALT			Prefix for the object cache keys.

A missing required variable stops the request with an explicit InvalidArgumentException.

Booleans (APP_DEBUG, DISABLE_WP_CRON) accept true/false, 1/0, on/off and yes/no.

APP_DEBUG

APP_DEBUG=true defines WP_DEBUG as true, and changes the behaviour of Simply:

• the service container is still cached, but it is rebuilt when one of the files it was built from changes;
• Twig templates are not cached, and the Twig dump() function is available.

Keep APP_DEBUG=false in production. See cache and deployment.

.env files

Symfony Dotenv loads, in this order: .env, .env.local, .env.$APP_ENV and .env.$APP_ENV.local. A file loaded later overrides the previous ones. .env.* files are ignored by git (except .env.example): use .env.local for values specific to a machine.

caution

config/application.php reads the variables loaded by Dotenv. A variable defined only in the server environment, and in no .env* file, is ignored.

Settings defined by the boilerplate

config/application.php also defines:

• AUTOMATIC_UPDATER_DISABLED, DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT and DISALLOW_FILE_MODS: WordPress, plugins and themes are managed with Composer, not from the admin;
• CONTENT_DIR (/content): the wp-content directory is web/content;
• DB_COLLATE (empty);
• $_SERVER['HTTPS'] = 'on' when the request comes through a proxy with X-Forwarded-Proto: https.

Change config/application.php only if you need another behaviour.