After adding packages to composer.json - you need to run "composer update" from your command line in order to actually download the files into your project.

Now when I run composer update I get:

Liu997$ ./composer.phar update
Loading composer repositories with package information
Updating dependencies (including require-dev)
Nothing to install or update
Generating autoload files
{"error":{"type":"Symfony\\Component\\Debug\\Exception\\FatalErrorException","message":"Class 'Former\\FormerServiceProvider' not found","file":"\/Users\/Liu997\/Dropbox\/Development\/SwiftStartup\/vendor\/laravel\/framework\/src\/Illuminate\/Foundation\/ProviderRepository.php","line":158}}{"error":{"type":"Symfony\\Component\\Debug\\Exception\\FatalErrorException","message":"Class 'Former\\FormerServiceProvider' not found","file":"\/Users\/Liu997\/Dropbox\/Development\/SwiftStartup\/vendor\/laravel\/framework\/src\/Illuminate\/Foundation\/ProviderRepository.php","line":158}}Script php artisan clear-compiled handling the post-update-cmd event returned with an error


                      
  [RuntimeException]  
  Error Output:       
                      


update [--prefer-source] [--prefer-dist] [--dry-run] [--dev] [--no-dev] [--lock] [--no-plugins] [--no-custom-installers] [--no-scripts] [--no-progress] [--with-dependencies] [-v|vv|vvv|--verbose] [-o|--optimize-autoloader] [packages1] ... [packagesN]

Let's start from the beginning. Try:

composer.phar require anahkiasen/former

It'll ask you for the version, type dev-master

Then add the Service Provider and Facade to app.php.

Remove the facade/service providers before running composer update, or, easiest, run composer update --no-scripts

After that, run composer dump-autoload, and that should work.

After following koomai's instructions, it no longer has a problem on pages that I don't use former. But on pages that I use former the web page loads up with

Class 'Former\Facades\Illuminate' not found