- How do I install laravel-inky in a Laravel application?
- Install it with composer require christhompsontldr/laravel-inky. The service provider is auto-discovered on Laravel 5.5 and above, so no manual registration is normally needed, and a config file can optionally be published. After that you author Inky/Blade templates and reference them from your Mailable's build method with ->view(). A single engineer can reach a working proof of concept within a day.
- Which Laravel and PHP versions does laravel-inky support?
- This is not something you should assume, because the package targets the view/compilation layer and that is exactly the area that changes between Laravel majors. Check the composer.json constraints and any CI configuration in the repository for the declared Laravel and PHP floors, including whether Laravel 10/11 and PHP 8.2+ are actually covered. If that cannot be confirmed from the repo quickly, treat compatibility as unverified and test it yourself before planning adoption.
- Does laravel-inky inline CSS or compile Foundation for Emails SCSS?
- No. Inky is a structural compiler only: it turns container, row, columns, and button elements into the table-based HTML that email clients render. It does not ship or compile Foundation's SCSS, does not inline CSS, and does not verify cross-client rendering. You still need a CSS inliner such as tijsverkoyen/css-to-inline-styles, a Foundation for Emails stylesheet pipeline, and a rendering-preview service.
- How does laravel-inky integrate with Laravel Mailables and the Mail facade?
- It attaches at the view and compilation layer and leaves everything else untouched, so Mailables, the Mail facade, queues, events, and transports like SES, Postmark, or SMTP keep working as usual. You point a Mailable at an Inky/Blade template through ->view(), and the package compiles the Inky components into email-safe markup at render time. It composes with your existing mail setup rather than replacing any part of it.
- Is laravel-inky safe to use in production if it has zero stars and no dependents?
- Treat it as unproven rather than merely niche. There are 0 stars, 0 dependents, a single maintainer, no release cadence, no issue-triage expectation, and no documented security disclosure process. A sensible approach is a timeboxed experiment on one Mailable with a one-line rollback, since the wrapper is thin and a view swap back to plain Blade is cheap. Do not treat it as a platform commitment without your own test coverage and a plan to maintain a fork if needed.
- Which Inky implementation does laravel-inky wrap, and does its output match the Node version?
- The wrapper is a thin Laravel service provider around a PHP Inky implementation, plausibly lorenzhs/inky or an equivalent, but you should confirm the exact package and pinned version from composer.json. The canonical implementation is the Node one, and PHP ports tend to trail it, so nested columns, breakpoints, and menu or callout output can diverge. That divergence produces subtly wrong HTML that only shows up in client testing, which is the most expensive kind of defect to find late.
- Does laravel-inky support Blade partials, includes, and variables in email templates?
- Because templates are Blade views, you get Laravel's normal include, component, and variable features for reusable partials and a data layer. What the repository does not make clear from a quick look is whether any additional partial or variable mechanism exists beyond Blade itself. Verify whether each template must be monolithic or whether shared header and footer partials behave as expected in the compiled output.
- Can laravel-inky coexist with Laravel's Markdown mailables?
- There is no documented conflict, since the package hooks into view compilation while Markdown mailables use Laravel's own Markdown rendering path. They are separate authoring routes, so you can keep Markdown mailables for simple transactional messages and use Inky templates where you need component-based responsive layout. Test at least one of each in the same application to confirm nothing interferes with view registration.
- Does laravel-inky cache compiled templates, and can I preview emails in local dev or tests?
- Caching behavior is not established by the project documentation and should be checked in the source: it may recompile on every render rather than caching output. For previews, the practical route is Laravel's standard approach of rendering a Mailable to HTML in a test or a local route, since a dedicated preview helper is not confirmed to exist. Confirm both points before relying on the package in a high-volume mail path.
- What are the alternatives to laravel-inky for responsive HTML emails in Laravel?
- The most direct alternative is MJML with a PHP or Node compile step, which has broader tooling and community support. You can also keep plain Blade with hand-written table markup and a CSS inliner, or build an in-house wrapper around a PHP Inky library. Because the Laravel integration here is only a few hundred lines, switching compilers later is a low-cost, largely mechanical change confined to your view templates.