laravel/documentation/start/config.md

Basic Configuration

• Quick Start
• Cleaner URLs
• Errors & Logging

Quick Start

When starting a new project, you shouldn't be bombarded with loads of confusing configuration decisions. For that reason, Laravel is intelligently configured out of the box. The application/config/application.php file contains the basic configuration options for your application.

There is only one option that must be set when starting a new application. Laravel needs to know the URL you will use to access your application. Simply set the url in the application/config/application.php file:

'url' => 'http://localhost';

Note: If you are using mod_rewrite, you should set the index option to an empty string.

Cleaner URLs

Most likely, you do not want your application URLs to contain "index.php". You can remove it using HTTP rewrite rules. If you are using Apache to serve your application, make sure to enable mod_rewrite and create a .htaccess file like this one in your public directory:

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
     RewriteEngine on

     RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
     RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d

     RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php/$1 [L]
</IfModule>

Is the .htaccess file above not working for you? Try this one:

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine on

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d

RewriteRule . index.php [L]

After setting up HTTP rewriting, you should set the index configuration option in application/config/application.php to an empty string.

Note: Each web server has a different method of doing HTTP rewrites, and may require a slightly different .htaccess file.

Errors & Logging

• 404 Errors
• Error Detail
• Logging

404 Errors

When a request is made to your application that cannot be matched to a route, the 404 error view will be sent to the browser. This view lives in application/views/error/404.php and you are free to modify it however you wish.

Error Detail

You can easily control the level of error detail via the detail option in the application/config/errors.php file.

'detail' => true;

When set to true, error messages will be detailed with a stack trace and snippet of the relevant file. When set to false, the generic error page (application/views/error/500.php) will be displayed. Feel free to modify this view.

Note: In a production environment, it is strongly suggested that you turn off error details.

Logging

You may wish to log any errors that occur in your application. Laravel makes it a breeze. You can turn on logging by setting the log option to true in the application/config/errors.php file:

'log' => true;

You have total control over how your errors are logged via the logger function defined in application/config/error.php. This function is called every time there is an unhandled error or exception in your application.

As you can see, the default logger implementation writes to the application/storage/log.txt file; however, you are free to modify this function however you wish.