How to create a stand-alone application using the Joomla! Platform

Revision as of 10:01, 14 April 2009

[This is based on my experiments, I expect more knowledgeable people to jump in!]

In order to use the Joomla! Framework alone, you would have to follow the following guidelines:

• Keep this folder/files from a normal Joomla! install:

• includes/
• libraries/
• configuration.php

• Edit configuration.php to match your server database/username/password/paths/etc.
• Create the required tables in the database

Note: Normally only the table #__session is needed, but if you want to stay safe, just use the whole structure of a Joomla! install (without the samples!)

• Create an index.php file in the root with the following starting code:

/* Initialize Joomla framework */
define( '_JEXEC', 1 );
define('JPATH_BASE', dirname(__FILE__) );
define( 'DS', DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR );
/* Required Files */
require_once ( JPATH_BASE .DS.'includes'.DS.'defines.php' );
require_once ( JPATH_BASE .DS.'includes'.DS.'framework.php' );
/* To use Joomla's Database Class */
require_once ( JPATH_BASE .DS.'libraries'.DS.'joomla'.DS.'factory.php' );
/* Create the Application */
$mainframe =& JFactory::getApplication('site');
/**************************************************/
// Your code starts here...
/**************************************************/

Note: It is possible to use Joomla! framework without a database. To do that, pass a config array containing session as a key with the value of false in the call to JFactory::getApplication() like this:

/* Create the Application */
$mainframe =& JFactory::getApplication('appname', array('session' => false));

After that, you can still use a file based authentication system if you want.