Configuration / Setting up Bolt

Note: You are currently reading the documentation for Bolt 4.0. Looking for the documentation for Bolt 5.2 instead?

After installation you can run the bin/console bolt:setup command, that will set up the database and the first user. You can then log in to the Bolt backend. You should now see Bolt's Dashboard screen.

Tip: By default, the Bolt backend is located at /bolt, relative from the 'home' location of your website.

If you get an error, see below for a number of possible causes and solutions.

Internal Server Errors¶

If you're getting unspecified "Internal Server Errors", the most likely cause is a missing or malfunctioning .htaccess file. See the section Tweaking the .htaccess file for tips.

If you still encounter errors, check your vhost configuration and be sure that the AllowOverride option is enabled.

Permissions errors¶

Bolt needs to write data to a number of folders like var/ and files/, where uploaded images and other files will be saved.

If you get an error when opening your new install in a browser window, your server might need to have the permissions set manually. See our File System Permissions page on how to fix this.

Database¶

By default, Bolt is configured to use an SQLite database. See configure the database, if you want to change this to MySQL or MariaDB.

Tip When you first open any Bolt page in your browser, you will be redirected to a page like /bolt/login.
If you get a 'File not found'-error, you'll most likely have a rewrites error. See this page on .htaccess and mod_rewrite on apache for help.

Note If you're using SQLite, ensure the database file is writable for the webserver's user. Read more about it on the File system permissions page.

Fill with test content¶

You can generate some test content using the built-in Fixtures (also known as "Dummy content") tool. This is a simple method to test-drive your theme quickly. You can add these fixtures with this command:

bin/console doctrine:fixtures:load

Configuration Files¶

Where the important files are located¶

When the basic installation is finished, these are the files where you edit the Bolt configuration to build your website according to your specifications. All files use the same YAML syntax, and can also be edited via the Bolt backend.

There are a few other locations where configuration files can be found:

To use the values in these files in your templates or PHP code, you'll need to access them. See Accessing & Reading Configuration for more info.

Different configurations per environment¶

Create a config_local.yaml in the config/bolt/ folder for settings that are only used on specific environments.

Shared settings: Put all settings you share over all environments in the default config.yaml, you can commit this in your version control system if wanted.

Specific settings: Every setting which is different per environment, or which you do not want in version control (like database and debug info), you put in config_local.yaml. First config.yaml is loaded and then config_local.yaml, so that config_local.yaml can override any setting in config.yaml.

Bolt will load config_local.yaml if it's available, and silently disregard it otherwise. Committing it to version control isn't recommended, and be sure not to deploy it to a server it is not needed on.

Tip: Set APP_ENV=prod and APP_DEBUG=0 in .env on development servers!

Dynamic values for config settings¶

You can also set the value of a config setting dynamically at the application runtime, rather than have it hardcoded in a config file.

This way you define settings either in the .env file and their ilk, or in a server's environment settings. This is used for the database settings, as well as for toggling the 'environments'.

You can also use Symfony's methods to use different configurations per environment. See the Symfony docs on Managing Multiple .env Files.

Example¶

If you've added a setting to your environment, you can make it avaliable for use in Bolt (both for extensions, as well as in templates), by adding it to config.yaml. It might sound like a bit of extra work, but this way you have the benefit of using an ENV variable, but ease of use of a normal configuration setting. For example:

FOO=bar

To use it as a dynamic config variable add the following to config.yaml:

foo: '%env(FOO)%'

This setting will now be available for use in your code using $config->get('general/foo'), and you can access it in your Twig templates as {{ config.get('general/foo') }}.

For more information regarding this, see the Bolt Internals documentation.