Laravel Upgrade for PHP 8.1

I need my existing Laravel site refactored so it runs smoothly on PHP 8.1. The project involves updating the framework itself, refreshing Composer dependencies, and resolving any deprecation warnings or breaking changes introduced by the newer PHP version. There are no third-party packages to worry about, so you can focus purely on the core Laravel codebase and its built-in components. Please back up the project, perform the upgrade locally, then deploy to a staging branch where I can verify that routes, queues, scheduled tasks, and basic CRUD features still behave exactly as they do now. Provide a concise change log and any environment or server tweaks required for production. Acceptance criteria • Application loads without errors on PHP 8.1 • All existing functionality, including authentication and database interactions, remains intact • Clear upgrade documentation and updated composer.lock committed to the repo