How to remove unused dependencies from composer?
PhpComposer PhpPhp Problem Overview
I installed a package with composer, and it installed many other packages as dependencies.
Now I uninstalled the main package with composer remove packageauthor/packagename, but all the old dependencies were not removed. I expected composer to clean up and only keep packages that are required according to composer.json and their dependencies.
How can I force composer to clean up and remove all unused packages ?
Php Solutions
Solution 1 - Php
The right way to do this is:
composer remove jenssegers/mongodb --update-with-dependencies
I must admit the flag here is not quite obvious as to what it will do.
Update
composer remove jenssegers/mongodb
As of v1.0.0-beta2 --update-with-dependencies is the default and is no longer required.
Solution 2 - Php
In fact, it is very easy.
composer update
will do all this for you, but it will also update the other packages.
To remove a package without updating the others, specifiy that package in the command, for instance:
composer update monolog/monolog
will remove the monolog/monolog package.
Nevertheless, there may remain some empty folders or files that cannot be removed automatically, and that have to be removed manually.
Solution 3 - Php
following commands will do the same perfectly
rm -rf vendor
composer install
Solution 4 - Php
Just run composer install - it will make your vendor directory reflect dependencies in composer.lock file.
In other words - it will delete any vendor which is missing in composer.lock.
Please update the composer itself before running this.