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acton build compiles every contract declared in Acton.toml, resolves transitive dependencies, and writes build artifacts to the output directory. Pass a contract name to build a single contract and its dependencies. The command supports precompiled .boc sources, optional Fift output, ABI generation, and dependency-graph export.

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Synopsis

acton build [OPTIONS] [CONTRACT_NAME]

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Arguments & options

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Positional

ArgumentDescription
[CONTRACT_NAME]Build only this contract and its transitive dependencies. Must match a [contracts.<name>] key in Acton.toml. Omit to build all contracts.

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Build flags

FlagTypeDefaultDescription
--clear-cacheflagfalseClear the compilation cache before building.
--out-dir <DIR>pathbuild/Output directory for compiled JSON artifacts (<name>.json with code_boc64 and hash). Overrides [build].out-dir.
--gen-dir <DIR>pathgen/Output directory for generated dependency helper files (e.g. gen/<dep>.code.tolk). Overrides [build].gen-dir.
--output-abi <DIR>pathbuild/abi/Output directory for contract ABI JSON files. Overrides [build].output-abi.
--output-fift <DIR>path—Output directory for compiled Fift files. Not written unless this flag or [build].output-fift is set.
--graph <PATH>path—Write the dependency graph for the build set as a DOT file.
--infoflagfalsePrint compiled code and hash information after a successful build.

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Global flags

FlagTypeDefaultDescription
--color <WHEN>auto | always | neverautoControl coloured output.
--manifest-path <PATH>path—Path to Acton.toml. Conflicts with --project-root.
--project-root <PATH>path—Path to project root. Conflicts with --manifest-path.

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Acton.toml configuration

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[contracts] section

Acton.toml
[contracts.Wallet]
display-name = "Wallet Contract"
src           = "contracts/Wallet.tolk"
output        = "Wallet.boc"          # optional: write compiled .boc here
depends       = ["Child"]             # optional: transitive build dep

# Precompiled contract — skip recompilation, optionally emit ABI
[contracts.Precompiled]
src   = "contracts/Precompiled.boc"
types = "contracts/Precompiled.types.tolk"  # for ABI metadata only
Contracts with .boc sources are treated as precompiled inputs. Acton loads their code, includes them in dependency resolution, and skips recompilation. Add depends = ["Precompiled"] on a .tolk contract that imports the precompiled code — do not list it as a dependency on the .boc entry itself.

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[build] section

Acton.toml
[build]
out-dir      = "build"
gen-dir      = "gen"
output-abi   = "build/abi"
output-fift  = "build/fift"
CLI flags override [build] values for the current invocation.

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Build output structure

build/
├── Counter.json          # { code_boc64, hash }
├── Wallet.json
└── abi/
    ├── Counter.json      # ABI metadata
    └── Wallet.json

gen/
├── Child.code.tolk       # dependency helper
└── Precompiled.code.tolk

Wallet.boc               # written to contracts[Wallet].output path

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Dependency kinds

KindBehaviour
.tolk sourceFully compiled; artifacts emitted to --out-dir.
.boc source (precompiled)Code loaded as-is; types file compiled only for ABI.
depends = [...]Listed contracts are built first; their helper files are written to --gen-dir.

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Best-effort behaviour

After dependency resolution succeeds, acton build continues building remaining eligible contracts even when an earlier contract fails — partial artifacts from successful builds stay on disk. Dependency-graph failures (missing contracts, cycles) abort the command before any compilation starts.

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Examples

acton build
Set ACTON_DISABLE_AUTO_STDLIB=1 to skip the automatic .acton/tolk-stdlib refresh before the build — useful in CI environments where you have already initialised the project.

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