Laravel setup failed to open stream - laravel

Question

I'm trying to setup laravel but its proving to be a right mere! I've cloned it from github and also used composer to clone laravel and I've got both of these techniques working which is good because its something I really wanted to learn. Simpler than I thought.
However when I try to navigate to my laravel directory which is called iProject so I type into my browser localhost/iProject I get a list of directories which is not what I expected, I expected to be directed to at least the hello.php page.
I've tired another technique as described in a Net-tuts tutorial which is setting up a listening port and there I am then going through localhost:8888, but when using this technique the following error message appears:
Warning: Unknown: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in Unknown on line 0
Fatal error: Unknown: Failed opening required 'public/' include_path='.;C:\xampp\php\PEAR') in Unknown on line 0
Setting up Virtual Host (as per responses received)
When I setup the virtual host I am redirected to xampp the url goes to iproject.dev/xampp
I've setup a virtual host as so:
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts
127.0.0.1 iproject.dev
<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot "C:/xampp/htdocs/iProject/public"
ServerName iproject.dev
ServerAlias iproject.dev
ErrorLog "logs/iProject.liog"
CustomLog "logs/custom.iProject.log" combined
<Directory "C:/xampp/htdocs/iProject/public">
AllowOverride All
Order Allow,Deny
Allow from all
Require all granted
</Directory>
</VirtualHost>

Answer 1

You can simply use (I've same setup for all of my projects) in httpd-vhosts.conf file
<VirtualHost iproject.dev>
DocumentRoot "C:/xampp/htdocs/iProject/public"
ServerName iproject.dev
</VirtualHost>
Also, add the following line in you C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts file
127.0.0.2 iproject.dev # 127.0.0.2 could be 127.0.0.3 or ...4/...5
For example, this is a part of my hosts file in win-7
127.0.0.1 localhost
127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1
127.0.0.2 alimsearch.dev # alimsearch.co.uk
127.0.0.3 laravel4.dev
# ...
And part of my httpd-vhosts.conf file
<VirtualHost alimsearch.dev>
DocumentRoot "D:/xampp/htdocs/alimsearch/public"
ServerName alimsearch.dev
</VirtualHost>
<VirtualHost laravel4.dev>
DocumentRoot "D:/xampp/htdocs/laravel4/public"
ServerName laravel4.dev
</VirtualHost>