Joomla 6 is here — and building a site with AI has never been faster. Open a folder in VS Code, tell Claude Code to get the site running, and watch it spin up Docker, install the template, seed the database, and deploy a complete blog — all through conversation.
The setup that powers The AI Director and the Signal Dark demo is now available as a product. One folder. One command. Working site in under 10 minutes.
What Changed from Joomla 5
Joomla 6 ships with Bootstrap 5.3 native dark mode support (data-bs-theme="dark"), a cleaner admin interface, and better CLI tooling. The Docker image is joomla:6 instead of joomla:5. Most extensions that work on J5 work on J6 — but the gotchas are different.
The biggest change for AI-assisted development: Factory::getApplication() crashes on CLI in Joomla 6. If your seed script or automation tries to bootstrap Joomla's framework from the command line, it fails silently. The fix is direct PDO — read the credentials from configuration.php and talk to the database directly. This is documented in the Blueprint and handled automatically in the Starter Kit's seed script.
The AI-First Workflow
The workflow is the same as Joomla 5, but faster because the tooling has matured:
- Drop CLAUDE.md into your project root. Claude Code loads it automatically — 300+ Joomla gotchas, every silent failure, every wrong default, with the exact fix for each.
- Run
docker compose up -d. Joomla 6 + MariaDB, ready in 30 seconds. - Run the seed script. Categories, menus, articles, tags, modules, blog images — all created in one pass.
- Tell Claude Code what you want. "Add a contact page." "Change the blog layout to 3 columns." "Add a newsletter signup to the sidebar." It reads the Blueprint, knows the template, and writes production code.
What's In the Products
The AI Joomla Blueprint — $19
One CLAUDE.md file. 300+ documented gotchas across 14 sections. Drop it in any Joomla project root — Claude Code, Copilot, ChatGPT, and Gemini load it automatically. Works on Joomla 5 and 6.
Get the Blueprint →The AI Joomla Starter Kit — $49
The Blueprint + Docker setup + Signal Dark template + database seed + 8 blog articles with Midjourney images. Open in VS Code, tell Claude Code to get the site running. Complete blog in under 10 minutes.
Get the Starter Kit →The Full Stack — $59
Blueprint + Starter Kit bundled. Save $9. Everything you need — this afternoon and every project after.
Get the Full Stack →CSS Debugging Tip
When something looks wrong on your site, don't screenshot it. Use the debug script — one keyboard shortcut copies the full CSS context (computed styles, matched rules, parent chain) to your clipboard. Paste it to Claude Code and it fixes the issue in one pass instead of going back and forth.
Try It
The demo site runs the exact same template and seed content that ships with the Starter Kit. The blog demo shows the card layout with all 8 Midjourney images. The free Signal Dark template download is available separately if you just want the template without the AI tooling.