BakeKit — A Starter Kit for CakePHP Developers

bakewizard — Tue, 24 Jun 2025 20:56:25 +0000

Modern web development moves fast. When starting a new application, developers usually have a clear goal in mind: build a SaaS platform, an internal business tool, an e-commerce solution, or a custom portal.

Frameworks like CakePHP provide an excellent foundation, but every project still requires a set of common features before any business-specific functionality can be delivered:

User authentication and password recovery
Role-based access control
Administration interfaces
Navigation menus
Application settings
Media management
Dashboard widgets
Theming support
Localization and logging

These features are essential, but they are rarely unique to the project itself. Rebuilding them for every application consumes time that could be spent on solving actual business problems.

Introducing BakeKit — If you can make it, bake it!

BakeKit is an open-source starter kit built on top of CakePHP.

Its purpose is simple: provide the infrastructure that most applications need from day one, while staying as close as possible to standard CakePHP conventions.

BakeKit is not a framework replacement. It is not a CMS. It is a foundation for developers who want to start building features immediately instead of spending days or weeks recreating the same administrative functionality over and over again.

Designed for CakePHP developers

One of BakeKit's goals is to feel familiar to anyone who already knows CakePHP.

Plugins, themes, models, controllers, views, and cells work exactly as CakePHP developers expect. There is no proprietary architecture to learn and no custom plugin ecosystem to adapt to.

You only need to make small adjustments when you want to integrate with BakeKit-specific features such as:

Managing plugin settings through the administration interface
Registering plugin actions in the administrative navigation
Exposing CakePHP cells as configurable content blocks

This approach allows developers to continue writing standard CakePHP code while benefiting from additional tooling provided by BakeKit.

Flexible content blocks and regions

BakeKit includes a powerful block and region system that allows content areas to be assembled dynamically.

Blocks can contain:

Plain text
HTML content
Dynamic CakePHP cells

Each block instance can have its own configuration, making it possible to build reusable and configurable widgets without creating custom administration interfaces for every use case.

This provides flexibility for developers while remaining easy to manage for administrators.

Composer integration

BakeKit ships with Composer support built directly into the project setup.

A local bin/composer executable is available, ensuring that dependency management works consistently across environments without relying on a global Composer installation.

When plugins or themes are loaded, BakeKit automatically updates Composer's autoloader, ensuring that newly added classes become available immediately while keeping optimized production autoloading intact.

The result is a workflow that remains familiar to PHP developers while reducing maintenance overhead.

Why CakePHP?

CakePHP continues to be an excellent choice for developers who value productivity, convention-based development, and long-term maintainability.

BakeKit builds on CakePHP because it offers:

✅ Convention Over Configuration

✅ Powerful ORM and database tooling

✅ Authentication, authorization, validation, and testing support

✅ Rapid development without excessive complexity

✅ Long-term stability and mature architecture

Rather than introducing a new way of building applications, BakeKit embraces the CakePHP way and extends it with practical tools that many projects need.

What BakeKit provides

✅ Administration Panel

A modern AdminLTE-based administration interface ready to use from the first installation.

✅ Authentication & Authorization

Users, roles, permissions, and access control are already integrated.

✅ Plugin & Theme Architecture

Build modular applications using familiar CakePHP concepts.

✅ Content Blocks & Regions

Create dynamic layouts powered by text, HTML, or CakePHP cells.

✅ Developer-Friendly Architecture

Clean code, predictable behavior, and complete control over customization.

Who is BakeKit for?

BakeKit is designed for developers who:

Build custom web applications
Want to start with a solid administrative foundation
Prefer CakePHP conventions over proprietary abstractions
Need flexibility without sacrificing maintainability
Value clean architecture and long-term project stability

Whether you're creating internal tools, SaaS products, e-commerce solutions, or client projects, BakeKit helps you focus on the unique parts of your application rather than rebuilding common infrastructure.

🚀 What's New in BakeKit 2.0

BakeKit 2.0 is the biggest release so far and introduces numerous architectural improvements, new developer tools, and a simplified administration experience.

✨ New Features

Themes now define available regions through config/regions.php
Blocks are managed directly from the theme view via the Blocks button
Two system menus (Plugins Menu and Custom Menu) are automatically created during installation
A plugin page can now be configured as the site's homepage via App.defaultHomepage
New #[Link(summary: '...', description: '...')] PHP attribute for menu integration
New #[Resource(label: '...')] PHP attribute for permission resources
Simplified region management with fewer administrative steps

🔧 Improvements

Updated to CakePHP 5.3
Improved breadcrumb and navigation behavior throughout the admin panel
Refactored image processing layer
Refactored access control system
Upgraded to AdminLTE 4
Migrated frontend tooling from Gulp to Vite

🧪 Quality & Testing

Test coverage increased from 57.75% to 74.11%
Added dereuromark/cakephp-ide-helper for improved IDE support
Continued focus on maintainability, stability, and developer experience

⚠️ Breaking Changes

Updated CakePHP dependency to 5.3.*
Removed alias field from blocks table
Added label column to resources table
Added theme column to regions table
Added unique index on (alias, theme) for regions
Added #[Link] PHP attribute
Added #[Resource] PHP attribute
Renamed CmsPlugin to BasePlugin
Renamed addCrumb() to addBreadcrumb()
Renamed configuration key Cms to System
Removed mobiledetect/mobiledetectlib dependency

Get Started

BakeKit is open source and available on GitHub:

👉 https://github.com/bakewizard/BakeKit

If you're building a CakePHP application and want to start with a production-ready foundation, BakeKit can help you get there faster.

If you can make it, bake it.

BakeKit — a starter kit for building modern CakePHP applications.

DEV Community: bakewizard