Elyra Framework · Course

Freddy Learning Elyra Framework

Freddy has a notes app on the web, built with Laravel and Svelte. In fifteen chapters he builds its desktop half with Elyra Framework 0.16: a compiled app with its own database, then the same app signed in to his Laravel backend, following the web, working offline and showing Laravel's notifications.

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15 chapters · from rata new · free

The 15 chapters
  1. 01 Why a desktop app at all Freddy's notes app works fine in a browser. So why would he want a desktop app, and why this framework? This chapter answers both, and maps what he already knows from Laravel onto what he is about to learn.
  2. 02 rata new and the first window Every Elyra app starts the same way: rata new, a frontend build, rata codegen, and cargo run. Freddy does all four and then looks at what he got.
  3. 03 Commands: Rust that the page can call A command is the compiled equivalent of a Laravel controller action. Freddy writes one, registers it, generates its TypeScript, and calls it from a Svelte page as if it were a local function.
  4. 04 The container, providers, middleware and events Freddy's commands start to need things: a configuration, a way to export, a log of who deleted what. In Laravel he would reach for the container, a service provider, middleware and events. Elyra has all four, with the same names.
  5. 05 A database on the desktop Freddy's notes need to live somewhere. On the desktop that is usually a SQLite file next to the app, and Elyra treats it the way Laravel treats any database: migrations, a schema builder, and an Active Record model.
  6. 06 make:resource, and validation all the way to the form A list to search and page through, a form, a detail view, delete with a confirmation, and the commands and tests behind them. Freddy writes none of it by hand: rata make:resource writes it, and the code is his afterwards.
  7. 07 Live queries: lists that update themselves Freddy opens his notes in two windows, edits one note in the first, and the second one changes by itself. He did not write a refresh anywhere. This chapter is about why.
  8. 08 Being a real desktop app Freddy wants a quick-note window behind a shortcut, a File menu, an icon in the menu bar, and an app that opens a note from a link. None of it is a web page's business, and all of it is a few builder calls.
  9. 09 Settings, secrets and work in the background Freddy's app now remembers his theme, keeps a token where tokens belong, exports without freezing the window and empties the bin on a schedule. Each of these is a Laravel facade he already knows, scaled down to one process on one machine.
  10. 10 AI, MCP, and agents that know the framework AI shows up three times in Freddy's week: inside his app, suggesting tags; outside it, as Claude adding a note for him; and in his editor, as the coding agent writing the app. Elyra Framework has something for each.
  11. 11 A Laravel backend The notes Freddy built so far are his own, on his Mac. His team's notes live in the Laravel app from Freddy the Notetaker. From here on, the desktop app is that app's desktop half: same users, same API, same validation.
  12. 12 Changes on the web, in the open windows Freddy's colleague edits a team note in the browser. On Freddy's desktop the open list changes a moment later, without a refresh and without polling. Laravel announced the change; Elyra listened, the way Echo does in a browser.
  13. 13 Working offline On the train the network comes and goes. Freddy keeps reading his team's notes and writes two new ones. When the network is back, both are sent, once each, and an edit that clashed with a colleague's waits for him to decide.
  14. 14 Laravel's notifications on the desktop When a colleague mentions Freddy in a note, the Laravel app already sends him a notification. Now it also reaches his desktop: in the OS when the app is in the background, as a toast when it is in front, with a count on the icon, and read once wherever he reads it.
  15. 15 Testing, bundling and the updater Freddy's app does a lot now. Before he gives it to his team he wants three things: tests that run the real pipeline without a window, an app his colleagues can double-click, and a way to send them the next version.