About component file structure
One of the first things you can do to get started with component development is to understand and set up the file system. Each type of component has a different file structure, although all components require certain files.
In addition, you can choose the component root directory to start development. The following sections have more information.
Root directory location
A component’s root directory is the top-level directory for that component under which its folders and files are located. Depending on how your Magento development environment was installed, your component’s root directory can be located in two places:
-
<Magento install directory>/app: This is the recommended location for component development. You can easily set up this type of environment by Cloning the Magento 2 GitHub repository.- For modules, use
app/code. - For storefront themes, use
app/design/frontend. - For Admin themes, use
app/design/adminhtml. - For language packages, use
app/i18n.
- For modules, use
-
<Magento install directory>/vendor: This location is found in the alternative setups where thecomposer create-projectcommand was used to get a Magento 2 metapackage (which downloads the CE or EE code), or a compressed Magento 2 archive was extracted in order to install Magento.Any third party components (and the Magento application itself) are downloaded and stored under the
vendordirectory. If you are using Git to manage project, this directory is typically added to the.gitignorefile. Therefore, we recommend you do your customization work inapp/code, notvendor.
Required files
The following files are required for all components:
registration.php: Among other things, this file specifies the directory in which the component is installed by vendors in production environments. By default, composer automatically installs components in the<Magento root dir>/vendordirectory. For more information, see Component registration.etc/module.xml: This file specifies basic information about the component such as the components dependencies and its version number. This version number is used to determine schema and data updates whenbin/magento setup:upgradeis run.composer.json: Specifies component dependencies and other metadata. For more information, see Composer integration.