In the PHP ecosystem, pure PHP templates have always offered unmatched performance while remaining the easiest to maintain due to their simple debugging. Lightna enhances PHP templates by making them cleaner and more developer-friendly with automatic escaping and built-in Data Objects import.
Out of the box, Lightna is free of third-party libraries and is built on modern native JavaScript.
Lightna uses Webpack as its JavaScript bundler. Webpack is a time-tested and well-maintained tool, best suited for SSR applications, offering precise manual control.
Lightna uses Tailwind to unlock its potential for real-world projects. However, internally (in Lightna core modules), it minimizes the use of Tailwind utility classes to provide greater extendability for modules.
Lightna doesn't restrict you to Tailwind. You can use any framework or native CSS.
PHPUnit is supported out of the box for code testing.
Out of the box, the Lightna indexer supports MySQL and MariaDB.
laminas/laminas-db – Used to build SQL queries. Other frameworks for querying the
database are also allowed.
doctrine/dbal – Used for seamless and efficient schema updates.Planned transition to Doctrine as the sole dependency for the Database Abstraction Layer.
By default, Lightna uses the project database as a lock provider, but it can be customized per project.
Translation phrases can use key-value pairs or MessageFormatter strings.
Alongside the ./cli command, Lightna uses Makefile to enhance CLI interactions
and simplify customization.