Waf Spec Files (*.json)

You use Waf spec files to specify which modules to include in a build configuration. All settings are mandatory if not explicitly stated otherwise.

A typical spec includes all modules that are required to build a game project. Lumberyard includes the following with the engine SDK:

• game_and_engine.json – Specs to build the sample game and engine
• resource_compiler.json – Specs to build the Resource Compiler
• pipeline.json – Specs to build the pipeline tools
• all.json – Specs to build all projects

The following is an example *.json file that illustrates a spec file layout:

{
    "description"           : "Configuration to build the my game",
    "visual_studio_name"    : "My Game",
    "comment"               : "This is meant to only compile tools on Windows.",
    "disable_game_projects" : true,
    "platforms" : ["win"],
    "configurations" : ["debug","profile"],

    "modules" :
    [
        "AzCore",
        "AzFramework",        
        "AzToolsFramework",
        "GridMate",
        "LuaIDE",
        "Profiler"
    ]
}

Note
The disable_game_projects keyword does not compile the games specified in the project.json file. The default value is false, which means the specs compile the game projects by default.

Platform-specific Entry Values

You can apply the entry values in the table to targeted platforms and/or configurations. For example, a spec can build specific modules for win_x64 or a spec can build different modules in certain configurations.

• modules – Includes in the build all modules defined by this key, regardless of platform and configuration.
• win_x64_modules – Includes in the win_64 build all modules defined by this key, regardless of configuration.

Overlapping lists are combined into a single list based on the build command.

Spec File Format Specification

The general format of the JSON-based spec file is a dictionary of keyword values. The following table lists the possible keywords and their description.