create-env-file | Magento PWA Documentation

Whether its a new storefront project or a fresh PWA Studio repository clone, PWA Studio requires a .env file to set up the environment for your site.

The create-env-file subcommand for the buildpack CLI command automatically creates this file using pre-defined environment variables and default values.

Usage example with npx:

npx @magento/pwa-buildpack create-env-file <dir>

This command generates a .env file in the specified directory.

The .env file follows the dotenv file format and includes documentation comments for the environment variable declarations. The create-env-file command uses the envVarDefinitions.json file in the PWA Studio source code to create this file.

Command flags

Name	Description
`--use-examples`	Use `example` values for all variables in the generated `.env` file.

Defining variables for the `.env` file

Use any of the following methods to define the generated variables in the .env file:

Set one or more variables defined in the envVarDefinitions.json file before running create-env-file to override the default values written to the .env file. These values can be set using shell scripting or other OS-specific methods.
Call create-env-file with the --use-examples flag to use the example values for variables declared in the envVarDefinitions.json file. Calling the create-env-file command without this flag still writes the example values to the .env file, but the entry is commented out.

Variables with no environment definitions nor example values in the envVarDefinitions.json file are declared in the .env file with an empty value.

Example:

MAGENTO_BACKEND_URL=

Programmatic API

Adding the @magento/pwa-buildpack dependency to your project gives you access to the programmatic API for creating the .env file.

`createDotEnvFile(directory, options)`

Uses the current environment variables and envVarDefinitions.json file to generate the contents of a .env file.

Example

const { createDotEnvFile } = require('@magento/pwa-buildpack');

const fileContents = createDotEnvFile(process.cwd());

Parameters

Parameter	Data type	Description
`dirOrEnv`	`string` path or a `process.env`-like object	Provides the path to the project root.
`options`	`object`	An object containing additional options.
`options.logger`	`object`	The object to use for logging.
`options.useExamples`	`boolean`	Whether to populate the `.env` file with `example` values.

If dirOrEnv is a string and the specified directory contains a .env file, it is read before being overwritten to preserve existing variables.

If dirOrEnv is a process.env-like object, the .env file is not parsed before being overwritten.

Return value

The return value is the string value of a .env file.

Parse this value using the dotenv API or write it out to the filesystem.