The beans.pot manifest

beans.pot is the manifest file at the root of a Beans module. It names the module, says whether the module is an application or a library, pins Git dependencies, and passes native linker directives. It is parsed in compiler/beans/module.b.

Syntax

The manifest is line-based. It is not TOML and not JSON. Each line is one directive. Blank lines are ignored. A line starting with // is a comment and is ignored.

The smallest real manifests are one line. The example project ships a beans.pot that is just:

module shop

The compiler’s own manifest is just module compiler.

Create a minimal manifest in the current directory with beansc pot init <module-name>. The command does not overwrite an existing manifest.

Fields

module <name> (required)

Names the module. Exactly one module line is required. The name is the module path: the root that local packages and the lock file hang off of.

module shop

kind application or kind library (optional)

Says what the module builds. The default is application.

• kind application: the module needs an fn main().
• kind library: the module must not have a main.

module shop
kind application

See Building for how a library build produces a .a, a .dylib/.so, and an optional C header.

require <host/owner/repo> <ref> (repeatable)

Pins one Git dependency. The path is a Git host path; the ref is a tag, branch, or commit-like reference.

require github.com/acme/http v1.2

Requiring the same path at two different refs is an error. Full detail, and how this feeds beans.lock, is on Dependencies and the lock file.

link <selector> <search|library|framework> "<value>" (repeatable)

Passes a native linker directive, for modules that link against C libraries.

• selector is all, an OS name (for example macos, linux, windows), or an exact target triple (for example x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu).
• The kind is one of:
  • search: a library search directory. Search paths are relative to the beans.pot file.
  • library: a library to link (by name).
  • framework: a framework to link (macOS).
• The value is a quoted string.

Entries pass to the linker in the order you declare them.

A fuller example

module shop
kind application
require github.com/acme/http v1.2
link all search "native/lib"
link all library "shop_native"
link macos framework "CoreFoundation"
link x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu library "platform_helper"

This module is an application, pulls in one Git dependency, and links a native library it ships under native/lib, plus a macOS framework and one Linux-only helper.

See Dependencies and the lock file for how require feeds beans.lock, and the FFI guide for how link fits with C interop.