composer/doc/faqs/how-do-i-install-a-package-to-a-custom-path-for-my-framework.md

How do I install a package to a custom path for my framework?

Each framework may have one or many different required package installation paths. Composer can be configured to install packages to a folder other than the default vendor folder by using composer/installers.

If you are a package author and want your package installed to a custom directory, require composer/installers and set the appropriate type. Specifying the package type, will override the default installer path. This is common if your package is intended for a specific framework such as CakePHP, Drupal or WordPress. Here is an example composer.json file for a WordPress theme:

{
    "name": "you/themename",
    "type": "wordpress-theme",
    "require": {
        "composer/installers": "~1.0"
    }
}

Now when your theme is installed with Composer it will be placed into wp-content/themes/themename/ folder. Check the current supported types for your package.

As a package consumer you can set or override the install path for a package that requires composer/installers by configuring the installer-paths extra. A useful example would be for a Drupal multisite setup where the package should be installed into your sites subdirectory. Here we are overriding the install path for a module that uses composer/installers, as well as putting all packages of type drupal-theme into a themes folder:

{
    "extra": {
        "installer-paths": {
            "sites/example.com/modules/{$name}": ["vendor/package"],
            "sites/example.com/themes/{$name}": ["type:drupal-theme"]
        }
    }
}

Now the package would be installed to your folder location, rather than the default composer/installers determined location. In addition, installer-paths is order-dependent, which means moving a package by name should come before the installer path of a type:* that matches the same package.

Note: You cannot use this to change the path of any package. This is only applicable to packages that require composer/installers and use a custom type that it handles.