Practical examples
Build a small site with FloCMS, one complete feature at a time. These guides show the files to create, the code inside them, the URL to open, and the result to expect.
Before you start
Use a separate development project so that the examples do not replace controllers, views or themes in an existing site:
composer create-project hostkurd/flocms flocms-examples
cd flocms-examples
composer show hostkurd/flocms-core
These examples target FloCMS 2.0 with flocms-core 2.8 or newer (they also run on 2.2.2 and newer). Choose website only when composer create-project asks what you are building, so the examples don't meet the admin panel's pages. They use the normal project's bootstrap, Composer autoloading, language files and page router. See installation.
The first three examples use sample data and do not require a database; the admin guide uses the users table and explains its own setup. In this development project's .env, leave DB_NAME and DB_USERNAME empty. Keep APP_DEBUG=true while learning, and set:
LANGUAGES=en
DEFAULT_LANG=en
APP_TEMPLATE=demo
Create the demo layout in the blog guide before opening a page with APP_TEMPLATE=demo.
Work through the guides
| Guide | What you build | What you learn |
|---|---|---|
| A complete blog page | A translated listing with sample records and an empty state | Controllers, object data, escaped output, loops, partials, layouts and CSS assets |
| A validated contact form | A form that validates input and redisplays values and errors | Requests, CSRF, core validation, explicit email checks and reusable error markup |
| A reusable theme | Shared navigation and a footer for the blog and contact pages | Theme selection, explicit partial data, layout scope, fallback and compiled templates |
| Build your own admin | A users page under /admin where administrators change names and roles |
Admin actions, $actionPermissions, Auth role rules, CSRF forms, redirects after saving. Needs the database |
Follow them in that order: the contact form and theme guide build on the blog's demo theme. The blog guide is complete on its own.
Start the development server after adding the files:
php flo serve
Use the address printed by the command, followed by /blog or /contact. If the project runs under a URL subdirectory, keep that prefix. These pages need no route registration: FloCMS maps /blog to BlogController and /contact to ContactController by convention.
What these examples do
The blog reads an array of sample objects. Its controller has an obvious replacement point for a model backed by the database.
The contact form confirms that input passed validation. It does not send email or save messages. The guide identifies where your application's delivery or persistence service belongs.
All HTML templates here are application files, compiled and executed by PHP. Keep template source under developer control. Escape visitor data with {{ ... }}; reserve raw output for markup already rendered from trusted application templates.
Explore the reference
- Controllers explains conventional action dispatch and view selection.
- Views and templates lists the engine's supported syntax.
- Requests and validation explains input rules and errors.
- Localization explains translations and language-aware URLs.