Sitemap Laravel Package

Getting Started

• composer require thedragoncode/sitemap, then publish config: php artisan vendor:publish --provider="TheDragonCode\Sitemap\SitemapServiceProvider" --tag=config (add --tag=views if you want to customise the XSL stylesheet).
• Open config/sitemap.php first — it holds use_cache, cache_key, cache_duration, max_size, max_file_size, sitemap_path, sitemap_url and escaping, and most day-to-day surprises live here.
• Resolve the service (Sitemap facade or injected TheDragonCode\Sitemap\Sitemap) and use add($url, $lastmod, $priority, $changefreq) to build, then store('xml', 'sitemap') to write public/sitemap.xml or render('xml') to stream it from a route.
• First use case: a scheduled command that pulls Post::published()->get() and emits one <url> per record, storing to public/, plus a GET /sitemap.xml route that serves it. That single flow covers 80% of real projects.

Implementation Patterns

• Command-driven generation. Put the build in app/Console/Commands/GenerateSitemap.php and schedule it ($schedule->command('sitemap:generate')->daily()), rather than generating on every request. Keeps web requests fast and makes failures observable.
• Model → URL mapping. Loop results and call $sitemap->add(route('posts.show', $post), $post->updated_at, 0.8, 'weekly'). Using route() keeps you honest about locale/domain handling; hardcoded strings drift.
• Sitemap indexes for scale. When you exceed ~50,000 URLs or 50MB, split by section (posts, products, categories), store each as its own file, then build a second sitemap that references them as child sitemaps. Submit only the index to search engines.
• On-the-fly render for small sites. Route::get('sitemap.xml', fn () => $sitemap->render('xml')) with the package cache enabled is fine for a few hundred URLs; skip it once generation takes more than a second.
• Cache discipline. With use_cache on, the rendered output is cached under cache_key. After content changes, either bump the key, call the cache-forget helper, or disable caching and rely on the scheduled job.
• Custom tags and alternates. Use the extra add() parameters (images, title, alternates) for image sitemaps and hreflang; they pass through to the generated XML without needing a custom template.
• Robots integration. If the package's robots hook is enabled in config, point Sitemap: at your index URL and let it manage the line instead of hand-editing robots.txt.

Gotchas and Tips

• v5.5.0 is a Laravel 9 compatibility bump. It is the release line to use on Laravel 9 / PHP 8.0+. If you are pinned to Laravel 8 or older, stay on 5.4.x — do not assume 5.5.0 is a drop-in there. Verify your composer.json constraint before composer update.
• max_file_size only applies on store(). render() streams whatever you built; it will not split for you. If you rely on automatic splitting, generate and store, don't render.
• Paths are relative to public/. sitemap_path resolves from the public directory, so on deployments with a symlinked public_html confirm files land where the web server expects. Add the generated XML to .gitignore and generate on deploy.
• Escaping bites on query strings. URLs with & or non-ASCII slugs need escaping enabled in config; otherwise validators reject the file with cryptic XML errors.
• Memory, not CPU, is the usual failure. Use chunk()/cursor() over get() for large tables, and raise set_time_limit in the command — a sitemap job that dies silently usually hit the memory limit, not an exception.
• Debug by inspecting the XML. When search engines complain, open the generated file directly and check <lastmod> format (Y-m-d or full ISO 8601) and that every <loc> is absolute and reachable without a redirect.
• Extension points are the config and published views. Custom XSL styling and per-environment overrides belong in config/sitemap.php and the published view, not in a fork — that keeps future upgrades (like this one) painless.