CARGO-PACKAGE(1)

✨ CARGO-PACKAGE ✨

cargo-package — ok bestie, this is the one that bundles your local package up into a cute lil distributable tarball 🎀 (from the General Commands Manual, section 1, iykyk)

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

cargo package [options]

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

So like, this command makes a distributable, compressed .crate file out of the source code of the package sitting in your current directory. Where does it go? Into the target/package directory, obviously. 💅

And it's not just zipping and dipping — here's the whole little ritual it performs:

1. It loads and checks the current workspace, running some basic checks along the way.
   • Path dependencies are not allowed unless they have a version key. Cargo will straight up ignore the path key for dependencies in published packages. dev-dependencies do not have this restriction tho 🫶
2. It creates the compressed .crate file.
   • The original Cargo.toml file gets rewritten and normalized.
   • The [patch], [replace], and [workspace] sections get removed from the manifest. gone. bye. 💀
   • Cargo.lock is automatically included if the package contains an executable binary or example target. And heads up — cargo-install(1) will use that packaged lock file if the --locked flag is used. 🔥
   • A .cargo_vcs_info.json file is included that holds info about the current VCS checkout hash (if it's available), plus a flag telling you whether the worktree is dirty.
   • Symlinks get flattened to their target files.
   • Files and directories are included or excluded based on the rules mentioned in the [include] and [exclude] fields: https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/manifest.html#the-exclude-and-include-fields
3. It extracts the .crate file and builds it to verify it can actually build. 😤
   • This rebuilds your package from scratch to make sure it can be built from a pristine state. If you're not feeling it, the --no-verify flag skips this whole step.
4. It checks that build scripts did not modify any source files. (rude if they did tbh)

The list of files included can be controlled with the include and exclude fields in the manifest.

See the reference at https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/publishing.html for more deets about packaging and publishing. 📦

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.cargo_vcs_info.json format 🦋

It'll generate a .cargo_vcs_info.json that looks exactly like this:

{
 "git": {
   "sha1": "aac20b6e7e543e6dd4118b246c77225e3a3a1302",
   "dirty": true
 },
 "path_in_vcs": ""
}

• dirty indicates that the Git worktree was dirty when the package was built. (messy era, we've all been there 🙈)
• path_in_vcs will be set to a repo-relative path for packages in subdirectories of the version control repository.

The compatibility of this file is maintained under the same policy as the JSON output of cargo-metadata(1).

⚠️ Note that this file provides a best-effort snapshot of the VCS information. However, the provenance of the package is not verified. There is no guarantee that the source code in the tarball matches the VCS information. no cap, that's just how it is 😭

✨ OPTIONS ✨

Okay bestie, this is the big one. Grab a boba 🧋 because we're going through every single flag like it's a group-chat receipts dump. No skips. Periodt.

📦 Package Options 📦

• -l, --list — Print files included in a package without making one. It's giving window shopping for your crate 🛍️.
• --no-verify — Don't verify the contents by building them. Skipping the vibe check, risky but okay.
• --no-metadata — Ignore warnings about a lack of human-usable metadata (such as the description or the license). Basically "I know I forgot to write a description, leave me alone 😭".
• --allow-dirty — Allow working directories with uncommitted VCS changes to be packaged. Your messy uncommitted era is valid 💅.
• --index index — The URL of the registry index to use.
• --registry registry — Name of the registry to package for; see cargo publish --help for more details about configuration of registry names. The packages will not be published to this registry, but if we are packaging multiple inter-dependent crates, lock-files will be generated under the assumption that dependencies will be published to this registry.

🎯 Package Selection 🎯

By default, when no package selection options are given, the packages selected depend on the selected manifest file (based on the current working directory if --manifest-path is not given). If the manifest is the root of a workspace then the workspace's default members are selected, otherwise only the package defined by the manifest will be selected.

The default members of a workspace can be set explicitly with the workspace.default-members key in the root manifest. If this is not set, a virtual workspace will include all workspace members (equivalent to passing --workspace), and a non-virtual workspace will include only the root crate itself.

• -p spec…, --package spec… — Package only the specified packages. See cargo-pkgid(1) for the SPEC format. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns like *, ? and []. However, to avoid your shell accidentally expanding glob patterns before Cargo handles them, you must use single quotes or double quotes around each pattern.
• --workspace — Package all members in the workspace. The whole squad 👑.
• --exclude SPEC… — Exclude the specified packages. Must be used in conjunction with the --workspace flag. This flag may be specified multiple times and supports common Unix glob patterns like *, ? and []. However, to avoid your shell accidentally expanding glob patterns before Cargo handles them, you must use single quotes or double quotes around each pattern.

🛠️ Compilation Options 🛠️

• --target triple — Package for the given architecture. The default is the host architecture. The general format of the triple is <arch><sub>-<vendor>-<sys>-<abi>. Run rustc --print target-list for a list of supported targets. This flag may be specified multiple times.

This may also be specified with the build.target config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html).

Note that specifying this flag makes Cargo run in a different mode where the target artifacts are placed in a separate directory. See the build cache documentation (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/build-cache.html) for more details.

• --target-dir directory — Directory for all generated artifacts and intermediate files. May also be specified with the CARGO_TARGET_DIR environment variable, or the build.target-dir config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html). Defaults to target in the root of the workspace.

🎛️ Feature Selection 🎛️

The feature flags allow you to control which features are enabled. When no feature options are given, the default feature is activated for every selected package.

See the features documentation (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/features.html#command-line-feature-options) for more details.

• -F features, --features features — Space or comma separated list of features to activate. Features of workspace members may be enabled with package-name/feature-name syntax. This flag may be specified multiple times, which enables all specified features.
• --all-features — Activate all available features of all selected packages. All the sparkles ✨.
• --no-default-features — Do not activate the default feature of the selected packages.

📜 Manifest Options 📜

• --manifest-path path — Path to the Cargo.toml file. By default, Cargo searches for the Cargo.toml file in the current directory or any parent directory.
• --locked — Asserts that the exact same dependencies and versions are used as when the existing Cargo.lock file was originally generated. Cargo will exit with an error when either of the following scenarios arises:
  • The lock file is missing.
  • Cargo attempted to change the lock file due to a different dependency resolution.

It may be used in environments where deterministic builds are desired, such as in CI pipelines.

• --offline — Prevents Cargo from accessing the network for any reason. Without this flag, Cargo will stop with an error if it needs to access the network and the network is not available. With this flag, Cargo will attempt to proceed without the network if possible.

Beware that this may result in different dependency resolution than online mode. Cargo will restrict itself to crates that are downloaded locally, even if there might be a newer version as indicated in the local copy of the index. See the cargo-fetch(1) command to download dependencies before going offline.

May also be specified with the net.offline config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html).

• --frozen — Equivalent to specifying both --locked and --offline. Two flags in a trench coat 🧥.
• --lockfile-path PATH — Changes the path of the lockfile from the default (<workspace_root>/Cargo.lock) to PATH. PATH must end with Cargo.lock (e.g. --lockfile-path /tmp/temporary-lockfile/Cargo.lock). Note that providing --lockfile-path will ignore existing lockfile at the default path, and instead will either use the lockfile from PATH, or write a new lockfile into the provided PATH if it doesn't exist. This flag can be used to run most commands in read-only directories, writing lockfile into the provided PATH.

This option is only available on the nightly channel (https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/appendix-07-nightly-rust.html) and requires the -Z unstable-options flag to enable (see #14421 https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo/issues/14421).

🧩 Miscellaneous Options 🧩

• -j N, --jobs N — Number of parallel jobs to run. May also be specified with the build.jobs config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html). Defaults to the number of logical CPUs. If negative, it sets the maximum number of parallel jobs to the number of logical CPUs plus provided value. If a string default is provided, it sets the value back to defaults. Should not be 0.
• --keep-going — Build as many crates in the dependency graph as possible, rather than aborting the build on the first one that fails to build.

For example if the current package depends on dependencies fails and works, one of which fails to build, cargo package -j1 may or may not build the one that succeeds (depending on which one of the two builds Cargo picked to run first), whereas cargo package -j1 --keep-going would definitely run both builds, even if the one run first fails.

🖥️ Display Options 🖥️

• -v, --verbose — Use verbose output. May be specified twice for "very verbose" output which includes extra output such as dependency warnings and build script output. May also be specified with the term.verbose config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html).
• -q, --quiet — Do not print cargo log messages. May also be specified with the term.quiet config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html).
• --color when — Control when colored output is used. Valid values:
  • auto (default): Automatically detect if color support is available on the terminal.
  • always: Always display colors.
  • never: Never display colors.

May also be specified with the term.color config value (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html).

🌍 Common Options 🌍

• +toolchain — If Cargo has been installed with rustup, and the first argument to cargo begins with +, it will be interpreted as a rustup toolchain name (such as +stable or +nightly). See the rustup documentation (https://rust-lang.github.io/rustup/overrides.html) for more information about how toolchain overrides work.
• --config KEY=VALUE or PATH — Overrides a Cargo configuration value. The argument should be in TOML syntax of KEY=VALUE, or provided as a path to an extra configuration file. This flag may be specified multiple times. See the command-line overrides section (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/config.html#command-line-overrides) for more information.
• -C PATH — Changes the current working directory before executing any specified operations. This affects things like where cargo looks by default for the project manifest (Cargo.toml), as well as the directories searched for discovering .cargo/config.toml, for example. This option must appear before the command name, for example cargo -C path/to/my-project build.

This option is only available on the nightly channel (https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/appendix-07-nightly-rust.html) and requires the -Z unstable-options flag to enable (see #10098 https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo/issues/10098).

• -h, --help — Prints help information. The classic "help me bestie" button 🙈.
• -Z flag — Unstable (nightly-only) flags to Cargo. Run cargo -Z help for details.

🌱 ENVIRONMENT 🌱

See the reference (https://doc.rust-lang.org/cargo/reference/environment-variables.html) for details on environment variables that Cargo reads.

🚦 EXIT STATUS 🚦

• 0: Cargo succeeded. Slay ✅.
• 101: Cargo failed to complete. Not slay 😭.

🧪 EXAMPLES 🧪

1. Create a compressed .crate file of the current package:

cargo package

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

cargo(1), cargo-publish(1)

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That's the whole vibe. This was your girl signing off from CARGO-PACKAGE(1) — go package something iconic, bestie 💖✨🦋.