After new developers have familiarized themselves with TYPO3 and successfully set up their first project locally, they are often faced with a major challenge: How do I deploy my project to a live server?
There is a lack of clear and structured information to facilitate the transition from the local development environment to a productive hosting setup.
Many questions remain unanswered:
What does a suitable hosting provider have to offer?
What technical requirements must be met?
What steps are necessary to publish a TYPO3 project securely and quickly?
What do you want to achieve by the end of Q2 2025?
To facilitate this entry, two central areas of the official documentation should be revised and expanded:
The deployment section in the “Getting Started” documentation
A step-by-step guide to deploying a TYPO3 project
To achieve the transition from the local development environment to a productive hosting setup, there is a lack of answers to the following questions that arise in this context:
→ System requirements from the server for TYPO3 to run on it
→ What does a hosting provider need to provide if the TYPO3 project is not self-hosted?
The admin area in “TYPO3 Explained”
Instructions on user management and authorizations
Best practices for secure access to the TYPO3 backend
Expansion to include important basic topics Areas
In addition to general deployment strategies, basic technologies and tools that play an important role in the TYPO3 environment should also be explained:
Container technologies such as Docker and DDEV: Simplification of local development and deployment.
What is the potential impact of your idea for the overall goal?
A targeted revision of the documentation will enable new integrators and developers to work faster and more securely with TYPO3. An improved structure and practical instructions help to avoid typical stumbling blocks and get TYPO3 projects up and running efficiently.
Which budget do you need for your idea?
10.000 Euro
Please note: After the start of the voting we can not change the idea description nor the idea outcome. If this idea is selected by the members, it must be archived as described.
I admire everyone who wants to put so much time and love into improving the TYPO3 documentation. And I also think the topic chosen to improve the documentation on deployment is very important!
Nevertheless, a budget request for € 10,000 seems quite high to me. Based on the general hourly rate of the TYPO3 Association of € 55, the budget would be enough for 4 1/2 weeks of full-time work.
Can you provide a more detailed breakdown of the planned content and the estimated time required for the individual sections?
We - as the documentation team - have been trying since years to find someone willing to write documentation in this area.
It is one of the topics that a new TYPO3 Administrator will struggle with most. Expecially in countries that do not have specialized TYPO3 hosting offers. It is also an area where we get much feedback that our current content is incomplete and hard to find.
When somone is willing to spend hours over hours writing about complicated topics they will usually describe their area of expertise: How to use a certain deployment tool, how to install TYPO3 on DDEV or WAMP, …
What we are missing is a birds eye view on this topic and someone who is willing to do reasearch and write about topics and tools they are not using in their daily life. And that is work.
Even during the 20% of my work time that Web Commerce - the company making this offer and employing me - is already donating to the Documentation Team writing such a documentation would not be possible to me personally. It is not my area of expertise and I have too many other tasks.
One has to understand first that “Legacy installation” is the droid-term you’d be looking for (going to Legacy Installation — TYPO3 Explained main documentation) - and getting there, a big warning basically says “you’re all wrong”.
Maybe if this budget proposal could also cover a concept to describe the composer benefits less “offending” and describe in which cases a ‘legacy/class mode’ is still used, this could all come together?
The planned documentation update will definitely cover a more streamlined installation process for Classic mode, both for local development and deployment. Right now, if you download the tarball, you’re pointed straight to the Composer installation docs without clear guidance on what to do next if you’re opting for the Classic approach. We’re going to fix that by making sure both installation paths are clearly visible and well-documented from the start.
We also want to ensure that both installation methods are presented in a way that’s informative, not discouraging. That means improving the visibility of the Classic installation path, making sure users understand why Composer is the recommended approach—without making them feel like they’re making a mistake by choosing Legacy mode. Instead of the current messaging, which can feel like a roadblock, we’ll present Composer as the modern best practice while also acknowledging that Classic installations still have valid use cases.
Additionally, the update will include guidance on how to locally install TYPO3 using the Classic mode—not just for deployment. That way, developers who prefer or need to work without Composer will have a structured, step-by-step process for setting up their local environment correctly.
Overall, this update will ensure that TYPO3’s documentation is more welcoming, structured, and practical for all users, making it easier to get started, regardless of installation method.
Considering the fact that the association is a Swiss-based organization that runs its own business in Germany, a general hourly rate of €55 (before tax!) seems quite low to me.
Based on the average market rate charged for most projects we have worked on recently, the estimated time for a budget of 10.000 € would be 2 to 3 working weeks, which is not that much if you expect a properly planned, written, elaborated and quality assured documentation.