Problem installing plugin via path repository

Question

I am starting to play with writing a plugin in Craft 3.0. I have followed the following page. I used Plugin Factory to create my plugin structure (very nice). My folder structure is as follows:

/craft
/craft/vendor/recoveryfinder/nav

I uploaded the files and folders created bt the pluginfactury to /craft/vendor/recoveryfinder/nav folder. My additions to the craft project composer.json look like this:

After:

{
  "name": "craftcms/craft",
  "description": "Craft CMS",

I added:

  "minimum-stability": "dev",
  "prefer-stable": true,

After:

  "scripts": {
    "post-root-package-install": [
      "@php -r \"file_exists('.env') || copy('.env.example', '.env');\""
    ],
    "post-create-project-cmd": [
      "@composer dump-autoload -o",
      "@php craft setup/welcome"
    ]
  },

I added:

  "repositories": [
    {
      "type": "path",
      "url": "./vendor/recoveryfinder/nav"
    }
  ]

I went to the terminal logged in as the user that owns the files and change location to:

/craft

I then ran:

composer require recoveryfinder/nav

The output I am getting is:

Using version ^0.9.0 for recoveryfinder/nav
./composer.json has been updated
Loading composer repositories with package information
Updating dependencies (including require-dev)
Package operations: 1 install, 0 updates, 0 removals


  [RuntimeException]
  Package recoveryfinder/nav cannot install to "/home/recoveryfinder/craft/vendor/recoveryfinder/nav" inside its source at "/home/recoveryfinder/craft/
  vendor/recoveryfinder/nav"


require [--dev] [--prefer-source] [--prefer-dist] [--no-progress] [--no-suggest] [--no-update] [--no-scripts] [--update-no-dev] [--update-with-dependencies] [--update-with-all-dependencies] [--ignore-platform-reqs] [--prefer-stable] [--prefer-lowest] [--sort-packages] [-o|--optimize-autoloader] [-a|--classmap-authoritative] [--apcu-autoloader] [--] [<packages>]...

I have not modified in any way the files created by pluginfactory.io.

Any pointers as to what I did wrong?

Answer 1

The article I wrote So You Wanna Make a Craft 3 Plugin? may help you in terms of figuring out how to properly set up a "host" website to run your plugin development from.

TL;DR your repo shouldn't point to your site's vendor directory, it should point to wherever that plugin exists on your local dev environment.

Answer 2

The composer adds all necessary files into the vendor directory. You should never implement files there on your own so you should create a plugins folder next to your vendor folder and insert the files there. Your path parameter will then be /plugins/recoveryfinder/nav