Installation

Meet Bunyad

Bunyad runs on Bun. The starter copies a working application into a new directory. You install its packages and start the HTTP server.

Every web starter ships the same features: sign up, log in with remember me, two-factor authentication, password reset, email verification, password confirmation, a sidebar dashboard, and settings for profile, password, two-factor, appearance, and account deletion. They share one stylesheet, DaisyUI on Tailwind. What differs is how pages are built:

The saas template adds billing, queued mail, and an admin area on top of a web app. Pick the starter that matches how you want to write pages. You can add packages later.

Creating an application

Install Bun

Install Bun, then open a new terminal so bun is on your path.

curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash

powershell -c "irm bun.sh/install.ps1 | iex"

curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash

Confirm the install:

bun --version

Create the project

bun create bunyad my-app
cd my-app
bun run dev

bun create bunyad asks which starter kit to use (Views, Live, React, Vue, Svelte, or API), which database (SQLite, PostgreSQL, or MySQL), whether to install the packages now, and whether to start a git repository. It copies the kit without build output or local databases, copies .env.example to .env, sets APP_KEY, and prints the next commands.

Skip the questions with options:

bun create bunyad my-app --kit=react --database=pgsql --install --git

To use the bunyad command anywhere, install the CLI globally with bun add -g @bunyad/cli. bunyad new then asks the same questions. Inside an app, bunyad runs the app's own copy of the framework.

If you are working from a checkout of the Bunyad repository, bun run bunyad new views my-app does the same.

The development server listens on http://localhost:3000 unless PORT is set.

bun run dev starts the server with hot reload (bunyad serve --hot) and the asset watchers side by side: Tailwind for every web starter, plus the frontend bundle for React, Vue, and Svelte. Each output line is prefixed with the process it came from. The server loads server.ts:

import { serve } from "@bunyad/core";
import { createApplication } from "./bootstrap/app.ts";

const app = await createApplication();
serve(app);

Stop everything with Ctrl+C. bun run build builds the assets once for production.

Initial configuration

Environment based configuration

The starter reads the environment when it boots. Create a .env file next to package.json when a machine needs its own values:

APP_NAME="Bunyad"
APP_ENV=local
APP_DEBUG=true
APP_URL=http://localhost:3000
PORT=3000

APP_DEBUG controls how much of an error is shown to the client. It does not follow APP_ENV. Set APP_DEBUG=false on any machine that should not show source code. The configuration and error handling pages go into detail.

Databases and migrations

Every starter ships config/database.ts and migrations under database/migrations (users, password reset tokens, and two-factor columns). Point DB_CONNECTION at the database you want. SQLite is the default used by the CLI when DB_CONNECTION is unset: the file is database/database.sqlite.

Run the migrations after the database exists:

bunyad migrate

Directory configuration

bootstrap/app.ts is the file that creates the application, registers middleware, and loads routes/web.ts. You rarely change the path of that file. When you add another route file, load it from the same function with loadRouteModule. The directory structure page lists every folder the starter creates.

Next steps

The full stack application

After bun run dev, open / for the welcome page, then /register and /login. Routes live in routes/web.ts, routes/auth.ts, and routes/settings.ts. In the views, react, vue, and svelte starters, controllers live in app/Http/Controllers; in live, pages are components in app/Live. React, Vue, and Svelte pages live in resources/js/pages.

Password reset and verification links go out as mail; .env.example sets MAIL_MAILER=log for local work. Email verification is off until the User model takes @MustVerifyEmail(). See email verification and two-factor authentication.

The API

Create the API starter when the client is another program. It serves JSON with bearer tokens. It does not start a session or render views. Mail, file storage, queues, notifications, broadcasting, and dump stay available.

bun run bunyad new api my-api
cd my-api
bun install
bun run dev

Routes live in routes/api.ts. They get the api middleware group and the /api prefix automatically, and no session middleware. Routing shows the group.