How to download, install and serve Drupal 8

The easiest way to try Drupal 8 in your local machine is by executing the quick:start command.

drupal quick:start

This is a chain command provided by DrupalConsole core project, the content of this file is:

# How to use
# quick:start --directory="/path/to/drupal-project/"
# quick:start --directory="/path/to/drupal-project/" --profile="minimal"
# quick:start --repository="acquia/lightning-project:^8.1" --directory="/path/to/drupal-project/" --profile="lightning"
command:
  name: quick:start
  description: 'Download, install and serve a new Drupal project'
vars:
  repository:
    - drupal-composer/drupal-project:8.x-dev
    - acquia/lightning-project
    - acquia/reservoir-project
  profile: standard
commands:
  # Create Drupal project using DrupalComposer
  - command: exec
    arguments:
      bin: composer create-project %{{repository}} %{{directory}} --prefer-dist --no-progress --no-interaction
  # Install Drupal
  - command: exec
    arguments:
      bin: drupal site:install %{{profile}} --root=%{{directory}} --db-type="sqlite" --no-interaction
  # Start PHP built-in server
  - command: exec
    arguments:
      bin: drupal server --root=%{{directory}}ß

The previous definition will execute several commands, in this case commands that will download and install Drupal using SQLite, and finally start the PHP's built in server, now you only need to open your browser and point it to 127.0.0.1:8088.

For more information about chain commands you can visit What is a chain command