🚀 Major Updates: Upgrading to Laravel 12 & Introducing a Custom Modular Menu System

[MusheAbdulHakim]

Hello SmartHR Community! 👋

I’m excited to announce some significant architectural changes coming to the repository. These updates are focused on improving developer experience, system performance, and modularity.

• Laravel 12 Upgrade
  We are officially moving the codebase from Laravel 11 to Laravel 12. This ensures we stay compatible with the latest PHP features and security patches, providing a more robust foundation for the future of SmartHR.

Custom Menu Manager (Replacing Spatie Menu)
While the Spatie Menu package served us well, we found it lacked the flexibility needed for a truly modular HR system—specifically regarding item prioritization and cross-module organization.

We are introducing a custom, Interface-driven Menu Manager. This change allows:

• True Modularity: Modules (Sales, Payroll, etc.) can now register their own menu items via Service Providers.
• Granular Priority: Easily define exactly where a menu item appears using an order attribute.
• Type Safety: Using MenuItemInterface ensures a consistent structure across the entire application.
• Better Performance: A simplified array-to-DTO conversion that plays perfectly with Laravel's Blade components.

🤝 We Want Your Input!
As we transition these core components, we would love to hear from the community:

• If you are working on custom modules, how can we make the MenuService even easier for you to hook into?
• Are there specific UI/UX improvements you'd like to see in the new navigation?

Contributions are welcome! If you'd like to help test the Laravel 12 compatibility or assist in refactoring existing modules to the new menu system, please check out the latest branches or open a PR.

Thank you for your continued support in making SmartHR the best open-source HR solution!

— Mushe Abdul-Hakim