Laravel Specialist skill

Laravel Specialist

Senior Laravel specialist with deep expertise in Laravel 10+, Eloquent ORM, and modern PHP 8.2+ development.

Core Workflow

1. Analyse requirements — Identify models, relationships, APIs, and queue needs
2. Design architecture — Plan database schema, service layers, and job queues
3. Implement models — Create Eloquent models with relationships, scopes, and casts; run php artisan make:model and verify with php artisan migrate:status
4. Build features — Develop controllers, services, API resources, and jobs; run php artisan route:list to verify routing
5. Test thoroughly — Write feature and unit tests; run php artisan test before considering any step complete (target >85% coverage)

Reference Guide

Load detailed guidance based on context:

Topic	Reference	Load When
Eloquent ORM	references/eloquent.md	Models, relationships, scopes, query optimization
Routing & APIs	references/routing.md	Routes, controllers, middleware, API resources
Queue System	references/queues.md	Jobs, workers, Horizon, failed jobs, batching
Livewire	references/livewire.md	Components, wire:model, actions, real-time
Testing	references/testing.md	Feature tests, factories, mocking, Pest PHP

Constraints

MUST DO

• Use PHP 8.2+ features (readonly, enums, typed properties)
• Type hint all method parameters and return types
• Use Eloquent relationships properly (avoid N+1 with eager loading)
• Implement API resources for transforming data
• Queue long-running tasks
• Write comprehensive tests (>85% coverage)
• Use service containers and dependency injection
• Follow PSR-12 coding standards

MUST NOT DO

• Use raw queries without protection (SQL injection)
• Skip eager loading (causes N+1 problems)
• Store sensitive data unencrypted
• Mix business logic in controllers
• Hardcode configuration values
• Skip validation on user input
• Use deprecated Laravel features
• Ignore queue failures

Code Templates

Use these as starting points for every implementation.

Eloquent Model

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace App\Models;

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Factories\HasFactory;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\BelongsTo;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\HasMany;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\SoftDeletes;

final class Post extends Model
{
    use HasFactory, SoftDeletes;

    protected $fillable = ['title', 'body', 'status', 'user_id'];

    protected $casts = [
        'status' => PostStatus::class, // backed enum
        'published_at' => 'immutable_datetime',
    ];

    // Relationships — always eager-load via ::with() at call site
    public function author(): BelongsTo
    {
        return $this->belongsTo(User::class, 'user_id');
    }

    public function comments(): HasMany
    {
        return $this->hasMany(Comment::class);
    }

    // Local scope
    public function scopePublished(Builder $query): Builder
    {
        return $query->where('status', PostStatus::Published);
    }
}

Migration

<?php

use Illuminate\Database\Migrations\Migration;
use Illuminate\Database\Schema\Blueprint;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;

return new class extends Migration
{
    public function up(): void
    {
        Schema::create('posts', function (Blueprint $table): void {
            $table->id();
            $table->foreignId('user_id')->constrained()->cascadeOnDelete();
            $table->string('title');
            $table->text('body');
            $table->string('status')->default('draft');
            $table->timestamp('published_at')->nullable();
            $table->softDeletes();
            $table->timestamps();
        });
    }

    public function down(): void
    {
        Schema::dropIfExists('posts');
    }
};

API Resource

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace App\Http\Resources;

use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Illuminate\Http\Resources\Json\JsonResource;

final class PostResource extends JsonResource
{
    public function toArray(Request $request): array
    {
        return [
            'id'           => $this->id,
            'title'        => $this->title,
            'body'         => $this->body,
            'status'       => $this->status->value,
            'published_at' => $this->published_at?->toIso8601String(),
            'author'       => new UserResource($this->whenLoaded('author')),
            'comments'     => CommentResource::collection($this->whenLoaded('comments')),
        ];
    }
}

Queued Job

<?php

declare(strict_types=1);

namespace App\Jobs;

use App\Models\Post;
use Illuminate\Bus\Queueable;
use Illuminate\Contracts\Queue\ShouldQueue;
use Illuminate\Foundation\Bus\Dispatchable;
use Illuminate\Queue\InteractsWithQueue;
use Illuminate\Queue\SerializesModels;

final class PublishPost implements ShouldQueue
{
    use Dispatchable, InteractsWithQueue, Queueable, SerializesModels;

    public int $tries = 3;
    public int $backoff = 60;

    public function __construct(
        private readonly Post $post,
    ) {}

    public function handle(): void
    {
        $this->post->update([
            'status'       => PostStatus::Published,
            'published_at' => now(),
        ]);
    }

    public function failed(\Throwable $e): void
    {
        // Log or notify — never silently swallow failures
        logger()->error('PublishPost failed', ['post' => $this->post->id, 'error' => $e->getMessage()]);
    }
}

Feature Test (Pest)

<?php

use App\Models\Post;
use App\Models\User;

it('returns a published post for authenticated users', function (): void {
    $user = User::factory()->create();
    $post = Post::factory()->published()->for($user, 'author')->create();

    $response = $this->actingAs($user)
        ->getJson("/api/posts/{$post->id}");

    $response->assertOk()
        ->assertJsonPath('data.status', 'published')
        ->assertJsonPath('data.author.id', $user->id);
});

it('queues a publish job when a draft is submitted', function (): void {
    Queue::fake();
    $user = User::factory()->create();
    $post = Post::factory()->draft()->for($user, 'author')->create();

    $this->actingAs($user)
        ->postJson("/api/posts/{$post->id}/publish")
        ->assertAccepted();

    Queue::assertPushed(PublishPost::class, fn ($job) => $job->post->is($post));
});

Validation Checkpoints

Run these at each workflow stage to confirm correctness before proceeding:

Stage	Command	Expected Result
After migration	php artisan migrate:status	All migrations show Ran
After routing	php artisan route:list --path=api	New routes appear with correct verbs
After job dispatch	php artisan queue:work --once	Job processes without exception
After implementation	php artisan test --coverage	>85% coverage, 0 failures
Before PR	./vendor/bin/pint --test	PSR-12 linting passes

Knowledge Reference

Laravel 10+, Eloquent ORM, PHP 8.2+, API resources, Sanctum/Passport, queues, Horizon, Livewire, Inertia, Octane, Pest/PHPUnit, Redis, broadcasting, events/listeners, notifications, task scheduling

Maintained by @jeffallan, Principal Consultant at Synergetic Solutions

Documentation