Running Composer returns: "Could not open input file: composer.phar"

Question

I am new to symfony2 and reading symblog. In third chapter while trying with data-fixtures I tried the command:

php composer.phar update

but I got the error:

Could not open input file: composer.phar

So I googled a little and tried

php composer.phar install

but still getting the same error. So please guide how to deal with this composer to install new extentions or bundles like data-fixtures in symfony2 using wamp.

Eras

did you install composer.phar in right place?? – Begga

I had this issue while trying to setup composer globally. I ended up adding alias composer="php C:\\\\Users\\\\MyUsername\\\\bin\\\\composer.phar" to my .bashrc file. Ugly, but worked. – Tungstic

Solution for windows user is below by @Jamil, you have to user composer rather than php composer.phar – Candycandyce

You don't no need .phar if you have already installed composer just run composer update – Whistler

after following the steps on composer website, sudo mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer then alias='php /usr/local/bin/composer' – Schumacher

Answer 1

If you followed instructions like these:

https://getcomposer.org/doc/00-intro.md

Which tell you to do the following:

$ curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php
$ mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer

Then it's likely that you, like me, ran those commands and didn't read the next part of the page telling you to stop referring to composer.phar by its full name and abbreviate it as an executable (that you just renamed with the mv command). So this:

$ php composer.phar update friendsofsymfony/elastica-bundle

Becomes this:

$ composer update friendsofsymfony/elastica-bundle

Percept

The thing to remember is that if you installed it correctly (on Windows) and added it to your environment's PATH variable then you do not need to type php composer.phar and use composer instead. – Supportive

@Chris Moschini Seems you can help me. Look at this : #52092327 – Ronaronal

do we have to install composer in each project , I installed the composer using their installer – Taggart

Answer 2

I had the same problem on Windows and used a different solution. I used the Composer_Setup.exe installation file supplied by the composer website and it does a global install.

After installing, make sure your PATH variable points to the directory where composer.phar is stored. This is usually C:\ProgramData\ComposerSetup\bin (ProgramData might be a hidden directory). It goes without saying, but also be sure that the PHP executable is also in your PATH variable.

You can then simply call

composer install

instead of

php composer.phar install

Pangaro

This finally works, I don't understand why I can't find this info anywhere on the composer website ... . – Bunnie

Thank you! That is not mentioned in the "basic usage" section in the Composer docs.. getcomposer.org/doc/01-basic-usage.md#installing-dependencies – Helenahelene

It's been over two years since this answer, and the docs still haven't been updated, so I had the same problem. Thanks! – Corky

Answer 3

Background

It is helpful to know that there are two ways to install (and use) Composer: locally as a file in your project directory, or globally as a system-wide executable.

Installing Composer locally simply means that you are downloading a file (composer.phar - which is a PHP Archive) into your project directory. You will have to download it for every project that requires Composer.

Like a regular PHP file that you want to execute on the command line, you will have to run it with PHP:

php composer.phar update

Which basically tells the php executable to run the file composer.phar with update as argument.

However, if you install it globally, you can make composer itself executable, so you can call it without php (and don't have to download it for every project). In other words, you can use composer like this:

composer update

Since you are executing php composer.phar update, and you are getting the error Could not open input file: composer.phar, you probably don't have composer.phar in your current directory.

Solution

If you have Composer installed globally, simply run composer update instead of php composer.phar update.

If you don't have Composer installed yet, download the PHAR using the following command:

curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

This will download the installer and run it using php. The installer will download the actual Composer PHAR to your current working directory, and make it executable.

To install Composer globally (I recommend this), copy the file to a location in your PATH. The exact location differs per operating system and setup, see https://getcomposer.org/doc/00-intro.md#globally for more information.

Personally, I prefer to install Composer in my home directory so I don't need sudo to install or update the composer executable (which can be a security risk). As I'm on Linux, I use the following command:

mv composer.phar ~/.local/bin/composer

Metternich

I wish I could update this answer more than once. Besides answering the question, it clarifies the question of the difference between local and global installation of Composer. Thank you for this. – Phthalocyanine

Answer 4

If anyone else came this low on the page and still didn't find a working answer (like I did), use this:

$ curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php
$ mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer.phar
$ alias composer='/usr/local/bin/composer.phar'
$ composer --version

et voila! A working composer :-)

Marshland

Thank you, Agent Smulders. ;) – Bedroll

Worked for me, but I had to change one line so that it would work properly $alias composer='/usr/local/bin/composer' – Pairoar

On my Mac OS X I added the alias command to my .bash_profile. This will make the alias persistent for new terminal sessions. – Pen

The second line does not work mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer.phar. I get an error: mv: regular File '/usr/local/bin/composer.phar' could not be installed: missing rights. – Dysgenic

@Dysgenic I got missing rights as well while trying the command in integrated VS Code Terminal. Instead I opened Git Bash (or any terminal you use) as Administrator and all commands worked properly. – Ser

after tons of attempts, finally this worked for me. Thanks buddy – Slambang

Answer 5

To solve this issue the first thing you need to do is to get the last version of composer :

curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

I recommend you to move the composer.phar file to a global “bin” directoy, in my case (OS X) the path is:

mv composer.phar /usr/local/bin/composer.phar

than you need to create an alias file for an easy access

alias composer='/usr/local/bin/composer.phar'

If everything is ok, now it is time to verify our Composer version:

composer --version

Let's make composer great again.

Kurd

Yes, your solution help me much.! My problem: - After used brew to install composer (anything is perfect and easy). - But I idioted when used command (alias composer="php /usr/bin/composer.phar") Then everything terrible. - After used your solution my life come back, manythank <3 – Bowline

Answer 6

I found this worked as I did not have curl installed. On Windows 8 with XAMPP installed. It will add it to your local build I use .gitignore to avoid the repo

php -r "readfile('https://getcomposer.org/installer');" | php

I got it from here: https://getcomposer.org/download/

Pung

Answer 7

This worked for me:

composer install

Without

php composer install

Pharmaceutical

even without extension? Also, please add 4 spaces indetation to your code lines so that they are formatted as code – Dardar

Answer 8

Run the following in command line:
curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

Toothpick

Answer 9

Yesterday I was trying to install Yii2 framework on Windows 10 and I have same problem(Could not open input file: composer.phar) running this command:

php composer.phar create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-advanced advanced 2.0.9

Issue is composer.phr file is not in current directory,you need to give full path composer.phr like

php C:\ProgramData\Composer\bin\composer.phar create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-advanced advanced 2.0.9

Or you can create yii2 project using this command:

 composer create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-advanced advanced 2.0.9

Or

composer.phar create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-advanced advanced 2.0.9

Pren

Answer 10

Hi friends, follow the steps to fix this issue in MAC OS

• Step 1: first run the command in Terminal with your project directory

  $ curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

• Step 2: Move the composer.phar in your project directory

  $ mv composer.phar /Applications/MAMP/htdocs/bashrushAPI/composer.phar

• Step 3: Setup alias the composer

  $ alias composer='/Applications/MAMP/htdocs/bashrushAPI/composer.phar'

• Step 4: Check the composer version now

  $ composer --version

  Composer version 1.7.2 2018-08-16 16:57:12

• Step 5: Confirm the project folders and file placed on bellow

  $ ls

  CONTRIBUTING.md docker-compose.yml templates README.md logs tests composer.json phpunit.xml vendor composer.lock public composer.phar src

• Step 6: Now update composer

  $ composer.phar update

  Loading composer repositories with package information Updating dependencies (including require-dev) Nothing to install or update Generating autoload files

• Step 7: Run your sample project

  $ php composer.phar start

  php -S localhost:8080 -t public [Thu Sep 27 03:16:11 2018] ::1:51177 [200]: / [Thu Sep 27 03:16:11 2018] ::1:51178 [404]: /favicon.ico - No such file or directory

Kosey

Answer 11

I had the same issue. It is solved when I made composer globally available. Now I am able to tun the commands from any where in the folder.

composer update

composer require "samplelibraryyouwant"

Querulous

This does not provide an answer to the question. To critique or request clarification from an author, leave a comment below their post. – Envision

@BasvanStein It does seem like an attempt to answer. If you think this answer is wrong, then you can downvote it. – Aerograph

Answer 12

Use this :

php -r "readfile('https://getcomposer.org/installer');" | php

Leff

Answer 13

Easy answer, navigate to the directory where you already have the composer.json file that you want to run (ideally your project folder) then download composer into the same folder, then instantly run the install command like so:

 php composer.phar install

This will automatically find the composer.json and run your required scripts. Good luck. This stuff is a breeze for terminal wizards and totally bizarre to the rest of us

Mindi

Answer 14

I am using windows 8.0. In my case to install or update i just use composer install or something else instead of php composer.phar. This worked for me like

composer require google/apiclient:1.*

Icefall

Answer 15

To googlers who installed composer via HomeBrew: make a symbolic link for /usr/local/bin/composer

ln -s /usr/local/bin/composer /usr/local/bin/composer.phar

Naamann

Answer 16

I got this error "Could not open input file: composer.phar" while installing Yii2 using below mentioned command.

php composer.phar create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-basic basic

Solutions which worked for me was, I changed the command to

composer create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-basic basic

I hope it help!

Sophistic

This is the correct solution – Semitic

Answer 17

If you are using Ubuntu/Linux and you are trying to run

php composer.phar require intervention/image on your command line.

Use sudo composer require intervention/image instead. This will give you want you are looking for.

Rabelaisian

Answer 18

your composer.phar should be placed in above way.

Begga

I am using windows8 and installed exe of composer as on getcomposer.org/download. Then I copied the composer.phar file to my project as per the structure shown by you. composer.json and composer.lock files were already there as it was default symfony package download. After doing this when I run composer udpate command, it took around half an hour but not completed yet. What's wrong? Please suggest. Thanks in advance! – Eras

ok, do you use cmd for command? so you should change directory right way. Better provide your directory structure with screen shot. – Begga

Stackoverflow do not allows me to upload image as I am just new born user with less points or reputation. I am running composer update command in C:\wamp\www\Symfony\ directory and in that directory I can see composer.phar, composer.json, composer.lock folders app, bin, vendor, src and web. – Eras

C: cd wamp\www\Symfony – Begga

in this regard developer always suggest linux for php/python/ruby. :) – Begga

Answer 19

For windows, I made composer.cmd and used the below text:

php c:\programs\php\composer.phar %*

where composer.phar is installed and c:\programs\php\ is added to my path.

Not sure why this isn't done automatically.

Dictator

Answer 20

For Windows10 Pro, Following steps fix the issue. select properties check the Unblock program option. run the installer, run the command CMD with Admin rights. At command promp run composer --version to make sure it is globally installed. you should be able to now run composer require drush/drush This is for drush dependency using composer.

Chimb

Answer 21

Command like this :

composer.phar require intervention/image

error: composer.phar: command not found

I solved the problem by following this process

i set the composer globally and renamed composer.phar to composer then run this command composer require intervention/image . and now it's working fine

Albuminous

Answer 22

Just open cmd as Administrator and go into your project folder and check it is working or not using composer command.

The above error is because of the composer is not accessible globally. So you need to run "cmd" as Administrator.

This is working fine for me.

Empathize

Answer 23

I had an issue getting a package.json's script to run composer dumpautoload.

I had the file /usr/local/bin/composer.phar, and also the file ~/.bash_profile (on OSX) contained:

alias composer="php /usr/local/bin/composer.phar"

This allowed composer to work from the command line, but it didn't allow scripts to execute composer.

The fix was this:

$ cd /usr/local/bin
$ mv composer.phar composer
$ sudo chmod +x composer // +x allows the file to be executable, such as by CLI scripts

But that yielded this error Could not open input file: /usr/local/bin/composer.phar

The fix was to update ~/.bash_profile (sudo nano ~/.bash_profile), and change the composer alias to:

alias composer="php /usr/local/bin/composer"

# ie: `.phar` extension removed

Now everything is behaving as expected.

Mendes

Answer 24

Your composer.phar must be in Source files. I had same problem and I just cut my composer.phar into mine framework-standard-edition folder, where is my whole strong textproject.

Ileneileo

Answer 25

if the composer is already install all you need is to know where the composer.phar file is (its directory) after that you move to your symfony project where you have the composer.json and from that directory you execute your composer.phar file. In windows here is what you have to do.

symfony project directory_where_composer.json_is>php the_directory_where_composer.phar_is/composer update 

That's all

Giga

Answer 26

use two steps .

curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

sudo php composer.phar update

Shrader

Answer 27

You can do

curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

The -sS flag meaning don't show progress, do show errors

and then

php composer.phar install

from: How do I get cURL to not show the progress bar?

https://packagist.org/

Lombardo

Answer 28

I've reach to this problem when trying to install composer on a Window 7 machine from http://getcomposer.org/download page. As there was an existing compose version (provided by acquia Dev Desktop tool) the installation fails and the only chance was to fix this issue manually. (or to remove Dev Desktop tool composer).

Anyway the error message is quite straightforward (Could not open input file: composer.phar), we should then tell the system where the file is located.

Edit composer.bat file and should look like:

@SET PATH=C:\Program Files (x86)\DevDesktop\php5_4;%PATH%
php.exe composer.phar %*

See that composer.phar doesn´t have a file path. When standing in a different folder than the one where composer.phar is located the system won´t be able to find it. So, just complete the composer.phar file path:

@SET PATH=C:\Program Files (x86)\DevDesktop\php5_4;;%PATH%
SET composerScript=composer.phar
php.exe "%~dp0%composerScript%" %*

Reopen your window console and that should do the trick.

EDIT: this has an issue because it always uses %~dp0%composerScript% folder as composer execution. Then all configurations are done in that folder (besides standing on your current project folder) and not in your project folder.

So far I haven't found a was to make a manual composer installation to work globally on Windows. Perhaps you should go ahead with composer for windows installation mentioned above.

Galileo

Answer 29

Do not access the composer by composer composer.pher install

use composer install

Goode

Answer 30

You can just try this command if you're already installed the Composer :

composer update 

or if you want add some bundle to your composer try this :

composer require "/../"

Claudetteclaudia

Answer 31

use composer alone without php

like :

composer create-project --prefer-dist --stability=dev developeruz/yii-vue-app basic

Jhvh

Answer 32

I have fixed the same issue with below steps

1. Open project directory Using Terminal (which you are using i.e. mintty )
2. Now install composer within this directory as per given directions on https://getcomposer.org/download/

php -r "copy('https://getcomposer.org/installer', 'composer-setup.php');"

php -r "if (hash_file('SHA384', 'composer-setup.php') === 'the-provided-hash-code') { echo 'Installer verified'; } else { echo 'Installer corrupt'; unlink('composer-setup.php'); } echo PHP_EOL;"

php composer-setup.php php -r "unlink('composer-setup.php');"

3. Now run your command.

Everything is working fine now because the composer.phar file is available within the current project directory.

thanks

Septuagesima

Answer 33

With me it works just you need the file composer.phar and composer.json in the current project. The command is

php composer.phar update 

Grisham

Answer 34

I know that maybe my answer is too specific for a embedded QNAP server, but I ended here trying to install Yii:

For me, inside a QNAP NAS through PuTTY, after trying all tricks above, and updating PATH to no avail, the only cmd line that works is:

 /mnt/ext/opt/apache/bin/php /usr/local/bin/composer create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-basic basic

Of course, adapt your path accordingly...

If I do a which composer, I have a correct answer, but if I do a which php nothing returns.

Besides that, trying to run

/mnt/ext/opt/apache/bin/php composer create-project yiisoft/yii2-app-basic basic

or referring to

composer.phar

didn't worked too...

Ursas

Answer 35

the simple straight way i went about this similar was - navigate to my project folder using cd command prompt - type in composer inside cdm to be sure its installed - if yes then type composer require ../the extension u intended to install

Fjord

Answer 36

IF want to create composer.phar file in any folder follow this command.

php -r "copy('https://getcomposer.org/installer', 'composer-setup.php');"

php -r "if (hash_file('sha384', 'composer-setup.php') === 'c5b9b6d368201a9db6f74e2611495f369991b72d9c8cbd3ffbc63edff210eb73d46ffbfce88669ad33695ef77dc76976') { echo 'Installer verified'; } else { echo 'Installer corrupt'; unlink('composer-setup.php'); } echo PHP_EOL;"

php composer-setup.php

php -r "unlink('composer-setup.php');"

Pourparler

Answer 37

I have been facing the same issue till I used the following command.

composer self-update

Hope this works for you too!

If not, You can check on the entire release here https://blog.packagist.com/composer-2-0-is-now-available/

Hogg

Answer 38

This is very easy, just run without the 'PHP' prefix.

composer.phar update

This should work.

Mohun

Answer 39

for windows :)

composer update
composer self-update 

you'd been asked for user permission,

and one more command:

composer require that_extention_you_want 

(instead of your first one: php composer.phar that_extention_you_want)

Stereochemistry

Answer 40

I also face this problem.

when I use to run this command

php composer.phar require intervention/image

Could not open input file: composer.phar

then I solve this problem just run this command: -> composer.phar require intervention/image

so open your project and open git bash or cmd

and remove php and run just this command :-> composer.phar update or composer.phar install

Thank you

Kr

Answer 41

Windows 10 :

1. Make sure installed PHP

2. XAMPP or other

3. Open XAMPP Control Panel, then open Shell

4. type ;

   curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

5. Then ;

   php composer.phar

Jimjimdandy