Setting up without PHP on the host

podman:setup and podman:generate only render files, so the server that runs your services doesn't need PHP or this package. There are three ways to get the rendered files onto it.

Render elsewhere and copy the files

This is the usual way. Render on your dev machine or in CI, copy the podman/ folder to the server, and install it there with lpod:

php artisan podman:setup
rsync -a podman/ server:my-app/podman/

Render on the server with lpod setup

lpod setup runs Composer and Artisan in throwaway containers on the server. Add --install to install the rendered services right away, and --secrets to also set their secrets:

lpod setup --install --secrets

Run it from a checkout of the project. It installs vendor/ itself with composer install --no-dev, then runs php artisan podman:setup.

Render by hand in containers

This is what lpod setup does for you. It uses the same composer and php:8.5-cli images:

# vendor/ must exist before "podman:setup" can run
podman run --rm --userns=keep-id -u "$(id -u):$(id -g)" \
    -v "$PWD":/app:Z -w /app docker.io/library/composer:2 \
    install --no-dev --optimize-autoloader --no-interaction

podman run --rm --userns=keep-id -u "$(id -u):$(id -g)" \
    -e PODMAN_WORKING_PATH="$PWD" \
    -v "$PWD":/var/www/html:Z -w /var/www/html docker.io/library/php:8.5-cli \
    php artisan podman:setup --preset=production

# Back on the host: install and set secrets
lpod install production/pgsql.quadlets --replace
lpod my-app-pgsql secrets

For an app named acme, this is what podman/production/valkey.quadlets looks like:

# FileName=acme-valkey
[Unit]
Description=Valkey container

[Container]
Image=docker.io/valkey/valkey:9
AutoUpdate=registry
Exec=valkey-server --save --loglevel warning
Volume=acme-valkey:/data:rw,Z,U
Network=acme.network
ExposeHostPort=6379

[Service]
Restart=always
RestartSec=5
TimeoutStartSec=120
TimeoutStopSec=60
---
# FileName=acme-valkey
[Volume]
Label=acme-valkey
VolumeName=acme-valkey

lpod install production/valkey.quadlets --replace

Notes:

• PODMAN_WORKING_PATH (or --working-path=) sets the host path written into the rendered files. The container itself always renders from /var/www/html.
• --userns=keep-id -u "$(id -u):$(id -g)" makes you, not root, the owner of the generated files. Keep :Z on SELinux hosts.

See lpod CLI for all commands.