Importing from Laravel Sail

lerd import sail migrates a Laravel Sail project into lerd in one command, database and S3/MinIO storage included.

cd ~/Projects/myapp   # the Sail project root
lerd sail import
# or equivalently:
lerd import sail

Automatic prompt on lerd link

When you run lerd link on a project that has laravel/sail in composer.json, lerd automatically asks whether to run the import before setup, so you don't have to remember the command.

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Prerequisites

• Docker (Docker Desktop, Docker Engine) or Podman with the compose plugin, whichever you used to run Sail
• The Sail project must have a docker-compose.yml in the current directory
• lerd must be running (lerd start)

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What it does

1. Reads the compose file and remaps any ports that conflict with lerd's running services (MySQL, Redis, MinIO/RustFS, etc.) so Sail can start alongside lerd without clashes
2. Strips non-essential ports from app / proxy services (nginx, traefik, Vite dev server, etc.) so only data services are exposed on the host
3. Starts only the data services (DB, and MinIO when S3 is needed) with compose up -d --no-deps, so Sail's app container is never built. A broken or slow app image build (Node/npm quirks, missing build args, private registry auth, etc.) doesn't block the import because lerd only needs the database and storage volumes.
4. Waits for the database to be ready, then auto-detects the correct database name (handles the case where lerd env has already overwritten DB_DATABASE)
5. Dumps the database from the Sail container and imports it into lerd's MySQL or PostgreSQL
6. Mirrors S3/MinIO files from the Sail MinIO container into lerd's RustFS (skipped automatically when S3 is not configured)
7. Stops Sail when the import is complete (unless --no-stop is passed)

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Example output

Stripping ports from app services: app, traefik, mailhog
Remapping conflicting ports for Sail:
  3306  to 23306
  6379  to 26379
  9000  to 29000
Starting Sail services: mysql, minio
Waiting for Sail mysql to be ready...
Dumping database "laravel" from Sail...
Importing into lerd (mysql / myapp)...
Database imported.
Importing S3/MinIO files into lerd RustFS...
`sail/local/avatars/abc.jpg` becomes `lerd/myapp/avatars/abc.jpg`
...
S3 import complete.

Import complete.
Stopping Sail...

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Flags

Flag	Description
--no-stop	Leave Sail running after the import completes
--skip-s3	Skip S3/MinIO file mirroring
--sail-db-name <name>	Database name in the Sail environment (default: auto-detected)
--sail-db-user <user>	Database username in the Sail environment (default: sail)
--sail-db-password <pass>	Database password in the Sail environment (default: password)

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Credential handling

After lerd env has already run

lerd env overwrites DB_* and AWS_* keys with lerd's connection values. The import handles this transparently:

• Database credentials: The command tries Sail's default credentials (sail / password) and queries the MySQL container directly to auto-detect the database name, so DB_DATABASE=recruitireland in a lerd-overwritten .env is no obstacle when the actual Sail volume contains a database called laravel
• MinIO credentials: Read from the MINIO_ROOT_USER / MINIO_ROOT_PASSWORD environment keys in the docker-compose.yml service definition, not from .env, so lerd's AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=lerd never interferes

Use --sail-db-* flags only when your project uses non-default Sail credentials.

.env.before_lerd

When lerd env first modifies a project's .env (before lerd has written any values to it), it saves the original file as .env.before_lerd. The import command reads S3 detection keys (FILESYSTEM_DISK, AWS_ENDPOINT, AWS_BUCKET) from this backup when it exists, so the original Sail S3 configuration is used even after lerd has overwritten .env.

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Restoring after import

If you want to switch back to Sail after importing:

lerd env:restore   # restores .env from .env.before_lerd

Then run lerd env again to re-apply lerd settings if you change your mind.

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Docker vs Podman

The command auto-detects which runtime is available:

1. Tries docker compose version, uses Docker if it works
2. Falls back to podman compose version, works for users running Sail with Podman Compose

No configuration needed.

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Troubleshooting

docker compose / podman compose not found

Install Docker Desktop, Podman Desktop, or the relevant compose plugin and ensure it is on your PATH.

Database dump fails with access denied

The Sail MySQL volume was created with different credentials. Pass the correct credentials:

lerd sail import --sail-db-user root --sail-db-password secret

S3 import fails

Run the import with --skip-s3 and mirror the files manually using mc:

lerd sail import --skip-s3

lerd env has already set DB_DATABASE to something else

The command auto-detects the correct database from the container. If it picks the wrong one (multiple user databases in the same container), specify it explicitly:

lerd sail import --sail-db-name myapp