In this episode, we start fresh and set up a new Laravel project from scratch, just in case you're new to Laravel or Livewire. We'll be walking through the whole installation process together so you won't feel lost, even if this is your first time.

We'll use Laravel Breeze as our starter kit for a super clean setup, but instead of letting Breeze handle everything automatically, we'll manually install Livewire ourselves. The reason? Breeze includes Alpine.js by default, but Livewire v3 already comes bundled with its own copy of Alpine. Having both could cause conflicts, especially with features we'll use later like the Intersection Observer API. So, we carefully disable Alpine in Breeze to keep things smooth and avoid future headaches.

We'll spin up a demo project, create the necessary database, and walk through creating a basic Livewire component to make sure everything works correctly. We even set up a quick property and rendering example, so you'll see Livewire in action right away.

Finally, we'll double-check the JavaScript setup, prune out any unnecessary Alpine imports from the build, and get npm scripts running so everything is up and ready. By the end of this episode, you'll have a brand new Laravel + Livewire project—with the tricky parts handled—and be set for the rest of the course!