Development and Build

Vegas uses the same project model and build planning across development, preview, and production builds, but each workflow has a different lifecycle.

Workflow	Build mode	Local web app	Watches project files	Starts the local runtime	Writes output.dir
vegas, vegas dev, vegas serve	development	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
vegas preview	production	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
vegas build	production	No	No	No	Yes

The build mode controls the Vite mode and environment values used while Vegas builds client and server artifacts. It is separate from whether artifacts are written to the production output directory.

Development

vegas, vegas dev, and vegas serve start the same development workflow.

Vegas resolves and scans the project, creates a development-mode builder, builds the initial client and server artifacts, and keeps those artifacts in memory for the local web application.

While the local application is running, Vegas watches the configured client, server, and runtime-data directories:

• Changes to client or server sources rebuild the affected application artifacts.
• Adding or removing application sources refreshes the build topology.
• Changes to runtime-data sources reload the Local Runtime data.

Client rebuilds and build-topology changes reload the browser when needed.

See Local Runtime for runtime-data lifecycle and supported Apps Script behavior.

Preview

vegas preview uses the same local application lifecycle as development, including project watching and the Local Runtime, but creates the builder in production mode.

This makes preview useful for checking production-mode client and server output through the Vegas local application before creating deployment artifacts.

Preview does not read from or write to output.dir. Its client and server artifacts are built in memory, so running vegas preview does not refresh dist.

Production Build

vegas build creates deployment artifacts using production mode without starting the local web application or file watchers.

Vegas first builds the application artifacts in memory. It then adds the generated Apps Script manifest and replaces the configured production output only after artifact generation succeeds.

The default output directory is dist. See Project Structure and Shared Options for output configuration and safety rules.

Typical Workflow

A normal local-to-Apps-Script workflow is:

vegas
vegas preview
vegas build
vegas push

Use development while editing, preview when you want to exercise the local application with production-mode builds, and build when you want to refresh the production output that vegas push uploads.

vegas push does not run vegas build automatically. See Command Line Interface for push behavior and authentication options.