datahihi1/tiny-env

A simple environment variable loader for PHP applications

1.0.14 2025-11-18 17:02 UTC

Requires

• php: >=7.1

Suggests

• datahihi1/tiny-env-validator: Validation helpers for tiny-env: rules and helpers to validate .env values

MIT

• datahihi1

README

A lightweight .env loader for PHP projects.

Fast, Safe, Simple — designed for small to medium projects.

Installation

composer require datahihi1/tiny-env:^1.0.14

Quick Start

require 'vendor/autoload.php';

use Datahihi1\TinyEnv\TinyEnv;

$env = new TinyEnv(__DIR__);
$env->load();

echo env('DB_HOST', 'localhost');

.env file:

DB_HOST=127.0.0.1
DB_PORT=3306

Features

1. load() – Standard load

$env->load();              // Load all
$env->load(['DB_HOST']);   // Load specific keys
$env->load(noFile:true);   // Load but skip checking .env file existence

2. Fast load

$env = new TinyEnv(__DIR__, true); // Load immediately
# $env->load(); // No need to call load() again

3. Multiple .env files

$env = new TinyEnv(__DIR__.'/to/path/env');
$env->envfiles(['.env', '.env.local', '.env.production']);
$env->load(); // Load from multiple files but .env is always first

TinyEnv always loads .env first, then any additional files in the order specified.

Populate Superglobals

$env = new TinyEnv(__DIR__);
$env->populateSuperglobals(); // Enable superglobals population
$env->load();

Or use fastLoad which will always populate superglobals - But not recommended for production.

• Getting Values

echo env('NAME');                // Get value
echo env('NOT_FOUND', 'backup'); // With default
print_r(env());                  // Get all (in .env file)
print_r(sysenv());               // Get all system variables

• Validation

Using tiny-env-validator

Variable Interpolation

TinyEnv supports shell-style interpolation inside .env values:

DB_HOST=localhost
DB_PORT=3306
DB_URL=${DB_HOST}:${DB_PORT}

USER_NAME=
USER=${USER_NAME:-guest}   # default if unset or empty
ALT_USER=${USER_NAME-guest} # default if unset only
REQUIRED=${MISSING?Missing variable MISSING}

Result:

DB_URL = "localhost:3306"

USER = "guest" (because USER_NAME is empty)

ALT_USER = "" (because USER_NAME exists but empty)

REQUIRED → throws Exception

Notes

• Comments start with #.
• Variable names: A-Z, 0-9, _.
• Values are auto-parsed into correct types:
  • "true", "yes", "on" → true
  • "false", "no", "off" → false
  • "123" → int
  • "12.3" → float
  • "null" or empty → null
• TinyEnv considers yes/no, on/off to be boolean values.