FAQ

Is NativeDev a container/VM tool like Docker or Laravel Sail? No. NativeDev deliberately does not bundle PHP, Nginx, a database engine, Redis, Node.js, containers, VMs, or a private server stack. It manages the native services your Linux distribution already provides. See Why NativeDev for the product rationale and Architecture for the technical design.

Does NativeDev replace my distro's PHP the moment I install it? No. NativeDev detects and manages your existing System PHP without changing it. Multi-PHP (multiple side-by-side versions) is an explicit, one-way migration you opt into from the PHP page. See PHP management.

What happens to Composer and other tools that depend on PHP when I enable Multi-PHP? The migration moves existing System PHP package names to the equivalent Multi-PHP candidates in place rather than uninstalling PHP first, specifically to avoid unnecessarily removing reverse dependents such as Composer.

Can I use MySQL instead of MariaDB? NativeDev exposes one MariaDB / MySQL service card and installs MariaDB from your distro's repositories; it does not separately provision Oracle MySQL.

Will uninstalling NativeDev delete my databases or projects? No. Database data/accounts and your projects are never removed by application uninstall, and most native services (PHP, Nginx, databases, phpMyAdmin/Adminer, etc.) are left running/installed on purpose. See Uninstalling for the exact list.

Why did uninstalling a PHP version get blocked? Most likely a developer tool (phpMyAdmin/Adminer) is bound to that version, or APT's own package dependencies would remove one of those tools as a side effect. See Troubleshooting.

Why is HTTPS project.secure.test instead of https://project.test? NativeDev keeps HTTP and HTTPS in separate local namespaces so one trusted wildcard certificate (*.secure.test by default) can cover all parked projects without regenerating the certificate every time a project is added or renamed. HTTP remains project.test; HTTPS is optional at project.secure.test. See Local development.

Does NativeDev support Fedora/Arch? Not yet. The current implemented backend targets Debian/Ubuntu families; the architecture is designed so additional distro backends can be added without changing the GUI or update model. See Architecture and Getting started.

Why does an APT operation fail immediately instead of waiting? NativeDev configures removal operations with DPkg::Lock::Timeout=0 on purpose: if dpkg is already busy, you get an immediate, accurate error instead of an indefinite silent wait. See Security model.

Is my database password stored in plain text? It's stored in ~/.config/nativedev/database-credentials.json with file mode 0600 (readable only by you). See Services & databases.

Can the GUI run arbitrary root commands? No. Every privileged action is a fixed, named operation re-validated on the root side; there is no generic "run this as root" path. See Security model.

How do I report a bug or request a feature? Open a GitHub Issue on sayedsahin/nativedev.