Updates
Updated 2026-09-08 · Pharos 0.5.10
php artisan pharos:update --check # what is available php artisan pharos:update # install it
Pharos fetches a signed manifest once an hour. It carries
purpose: pharos-release, which is why a licence key can never be replayed as an
update manifest even though the same key signs both. A release server that cannot be reached
reads as no news, never as an error on a status page.
| Install | How it updates |
|---|---|
| PHP host (cPanel, DirectAdmin, Plesk) | The app downloads the release, checks it against the signed checksum, copies the current version into storage/app/backups, replaces its files and migrates. |
| Docker | The host owns the image. The app shows what the host reported and drops a trigger file when you press the button. |
| Neither | The directory is not writable — update over SSH. |
Your .env, database and uploads are never touched, and a downgrade is refused —
an older build may not survive migrations the current one already ran.
Backups, rollback and retention
Before it replaces anything, Pharos snapshots the version it is about to overwrite — the code, the
installed vendor/ tree, and, on SQLite, a consistent copy of the database taken with
VACUUM INTO so it is safe to copy a live file. On MySQL the files are captured but the
database is not, so keep your own database backups there.
The same snapshots are yours to make and manage under Updates:
- Back up now — take a snapshot by hand before a manual change. Installing a release, making a backup and rolling back each open a dialog that shows every step as it happens — download, checksum, unpack, backup, install, migrations — with a live file count.
- Download — pull any snapshot down as a single
.zip. - Roll back — put a kept snapshot back over the running install. What it replaces is itself backed up first, so a rollback is never a one-way door. Because the database can come back with it, you are signed out and sign in again with the password you had at the time of that snapshot.
- Delete — remove one you no longer want.
How many are kept is the Backups kept setting under Settings → General:
the newest N are held and the oldest is removed when a new one is made. 0 keeps every snapshot.
The one you would roll back to is never pruned out from under you.
