Meet LampRabit: a local stack that gets out of your way
Why LampRabit exists, what it does today for PHP and Node.js projects, and where it's going next.
The LampRabit team2 min read
If you’ve used XAMPP or Laragon, you know the idea: a local web stack you don’t have to assemble by hand. LampRabit keeps that simplicity and adds what modern work needs.
What you get
- Every folder is a site. Put a project in
wwwand openhttps://project.test. No virtual-host files, no hosts-file editing, and HTTPS with a certificate your browser trusts. - Several PHP versions at once. PHP 8.1 to 8.5 side by side, and each site picks its own. In a terminal,
phpandcomposerfollow the site’s version too. - Apache, Nginx, or both, chosen per site. MariaDB and MySQL next to each other, Redis and Memcached, and a Mailpit inbox that catches every email your app sends.
- Node.js projects at their own domain. Vite, Next.js, Nuxt, Astro, Express or NestJS on the Node version you choose. Run the dev server from LampRabit or from your own terminal: the domain follows whatever port the project listens on, and falls back to its files when it stops.
- New projects in seconds. Templates for Laravel, Symfony, WordPress, Drupal, Statamic, Magento and more, asking the same questions their own installers do. Templates are YAML, so you can write your own.
When things go wrong
Most of the time spent on a local stack isn’t spent on setup; it’s spent on figuring out why something stopped working. LampRabit checks every service every few seconds, names the program holding a port, catches config errors with the file and line, and puts every log in one place. When you need help, the diagnostics report has what a bug report needs, with your user name hidden.
Where it runs
Windows and Linux are fully supported. On Linux, Apache, Nginx, PHP, Redis and Memcached come from LampRabit’s own builds, made in the open by a GitHub workflow, so you choose versions the same way you do on Windows. macOS is in preview while the same builds arrive there.
What’s next
The roadmap is public in PLAN.md. Next up: extra domains and several processes per project (a queue worker, the scheduler and Vite next to the site), Caddy and FrankenPHP, more databases and services, and a lamprabit command-line tool.
LampRabit is free and MIT-licensed. Download it, and if something doesn’t work the way you expect, tell us.
