Win 11 install using Apache Lounge & PHP 8.5 -- almost there!

I'm a total newbie but want to test Grav to see if I can migrate away from Wordpress. I am running Win 11 and installed Apache Lounge to C:\Apache24 (added C:\Apache24\bin to Path) and PHP 8.5 to C:\PHP (added it to Path). I also installed a Microsoft redistributable that was required for Apache Lounge.

I renamed php.ini-development to php.ini, then I copied a Grav skeleton folder to C:\Apache24\htdocs.

When I start the httpd server and go to localhost/grav I see "Index of /grav" and a bunch of directories and files but am not sure where to go from here. Am I supposed to edit the php.ini file or something else to get access to the Grav admin page and begin my exploration? Any pointers would be greatly appreciated.

You're trying to glue several pieces together, while tools like Laragon install a complete working local development environment for you. See the docs Basics:Requirements:Webservers:Windows for a list of servers used on Windows.

Laragon seems to be very easy to use according other forum members. Others have struggled with XAMPP...

Thanks for the help! Unfortunately, with Laragon I find myself at exactly the same spot -- a page showing "Index of /grav". I also tried IIS and yeah -- the same thing. I'm not a developer, obviously, but this is way more complicated than setting up a Wordpress site, of which I can do in 10 seconds using the Local app. The Grav instructions say getting Grav up and running is "trivial". I guess I'm putting that to the test.

Grav was build with developers in mind and is therefor lean and mean and very performant. That comes with a price for non developers though... Eg. when a theme doesn't fit your needs, you'll soon find yourself editing Twig files using a code editor.

I cannot reproduce your issue using the following steps to install Laragon and Grav using skeleton "Quark Blog Site":

- Download Laragon
- Start installer
- Use default location
- Deselect "Run Laragon when Windows starts" and "Auto virtual hosts"
- Allow installer to start Laragon app
- Check "Apache" to start Apache
- Go to your skeleton zip, right click, extract all into folder C:/laragon/www
- Allow "Replace file in destination:" index.php
- Point browser to "http://localhost"
- Grav shows problem page. You're missing PHP ZIP extension
- Go to Laragon app
- Open menu -> PHP -> Extensions -> check zip
- Refresh browser and Admin2 will ask for a new administrator account

Hi and thanks for helping out! I'm away from home and don't have access to my Windows machine, I only have my laptop that runs Fedora.

I'm pretty sure I did exactly what you suggested. However, I remember that every time I tried to enable the PHP zip extension nothing would happen after refreshing the page (zip extension remained unchecked).

I'm pretty sure I did exactly what you suggested. However, I remember that every time I tried to enable the PHP zip extension nothing would happen after refreshing the page (zip extension remained unchecked).

I would have appreciated it if you had shared this in your first post. It would have saved me from testing the Laragon installation and Grav installation and the write up... Writing what one has tried is one of the sections mentioned in The art of asking great questions..

Remember, we're all volunteers sharing our knowledge and sparse free time...

In my original post I mentioned as much info as I could remember, but forgot to mention the PHP zip extension. My bad 😔