Artisan commands for compiling and releasing assets. I version control my production-ready compiled assets, but not the everyday compiled assets for local development. I made these two Laravel artisan commands for compiling for production and then releasing those assets in a deployment hook.

AssetsCompile.php

<?php

namespace App\Console\Commands;

use Illuminate\Console\Command;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\File;

class AssetsCompile extends Command
{
    /**
     * The name and signature of the console command.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $signature = 'assets:compile';

    /**
     * The console command description.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $description = 'Compile assets for next release';

    /**
     * Execute the console command.
     *
     * @return mixed
     */
    public function handle()
    {
        $this->ensureCompiledFoldersExist();

        $this->info('Compiling assets for production via `yarn run production`');
        passthru('yarn run production');

        $this->info('Copying compiled assets to ./resources/compiled');
        collect($this->moveManifestAndGetContents())->keys()->each(function ($path) {
            File::copy(public_path($path), resource_path('compiled' . $path));
        });
    }

    public function ensureCompiledFoldersExist()
    {
        $resourcePaths = ['compiled', 'compiled/js', 'compiled/css'];

        foreach ($resourcePaths as $path) {
            if (!File::exists(resource_path($path))) {
                File::makeDirectory(resource_path($path));
            }
        }
    }

    public function moveManifestAndGetContents()
    {
        $manifest = File::get(public_path('mix-manifest.json'));

        File::put(resource_path('compiled/mix-manifest.json'), $manifest);

        return json_decode($manifest, true);
    }
}

AssetsRelease.php

<?php

namespace App\Console\Commands;

use Illuminate\Console\Command;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\File;

class AssetsRelease extends Command
{
    /**
     * The name and signature of the console command.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $signature = 'assets:release';

    /**
     * The console command description.
     *
     * @var string
     */
    protected $description = 'Move compiled assets to public folder';

    /**
     * Execute the console command.
     *
     * @return mixed
     */
    public function handle()
    {
        $this->ensurePublicFoldersExist();

        $this->info('Moving compiled assets:');
        collect($this->moveManifestAndGetContents())->keys()->each(function ($path) {
            $this->line($path);
            File::copy(resource_path('compiled' . $path), public_path($path));
        });
        $this->info('Moved compiled assets to public folder');
    }

    public function ensurePublicFoldersExist()
    {
        foreach (['js', 'css'] as $path) {
            if (!File::exists(public_path($path))) {
                File::makeDirectory(public_path($path));
            }
        }
    }

    public function moveManifestAndGetContents()
    {
        $manifest = File::get(resource_path('compiled/mix-manifest.json'));

        File::put(public_path('mix-manifest.json'), $manifest);

        return json_decode($manifest, true);
    }
}