Command line tutorial

.. highlight:: shell

Some developers like using the command line extensively. Redot is designed to be friendly to them, so here are the steps for working entirely from the command line. Given the engine relies on almost no external libraries, initialization times are pretty fast, making it suitable for this workflow.

Command line reference

Legend

• |release| Available in editor builds, debug export templates and release export templates.
• |debug| Available in editor builds and debug export templates only.
• |editor| Only available in editor builds.

Note that unknown command line arguments have no effect whatsoever. The engine will not warn you when using a command line argument that doesn't exist with a given build type.

General options

Run options

Display options

Debug options

Standalone tools

Path

It is recommended to place your Redot editor binary in your PATH environment variable, so it can be executed easily from any place by typing Redot. You can do so on Linux by placing the Redot binary in /usr/local/bin and making sure it is called Redot (case-sensitive).

To achieve this on Windows or macOS easily, you can install Redot using Scoop (on Windows) or Homebrew (on macOS). This will automatically make the copy of Redot installed available in the PATH:

# Add "Extras" bucket
scoop bucket add extras

# Standard editor:
scoop install Redot

# Editor with C# support (will be available as `Redot-mono` in `PATH`):
scoop install Redot-mono

# Standard editor:
brew install Redot

# Editor with C# support (will be available as `Redot-mono` in `PATH`):
brew install Redot-mono

Setting the project path

Depending on where your Redot binary is located and what your current working directory is, you may need to set the path to your project for any of the following commands to work correctly.

When running the editor, this can be done by giving the path to the project.Redot file of your project as either the first argument, like this:

Redot path_to_your_project/project.Redot [other] [commands] [and] [args]

For all commands, this can be done by using the --path argument:

Redot --path path_to_your_project [other] [commands] [and] [args]

For example, the full command for exporting your game (as explained below) might look like this:

Redot --headless --path path_to_your_project --export-release my_export_preset_name game.exe

When starting from a subdirectory of your project, use the --upwards argument for Redot to automatically find the project.Redot file by recursively searching the parent directories.

For example, running a scene (as explained below) nested in a subdirectory might look like this when your working directory is in the same path:

Redot --upwards nested_scene.tscn

Creating a project

Creating a project from the command line can be done by navigating the shell to the desired place and making a project.Redot file.

mkdir newgame
cd newgame
touch project.Redot

The project can now be opened with Redot.

Running the editor

Running the editor is done by executing Redot with the -e flag. This must be done from within the project directory or by setting the project path as explained above, otherwise the command is ignored and the Project Manager appears.

Redot -e

When passing in the full path to the project.Redot file, the -e flag may be omitted.

If a scene has been created and saved, it can be edited later by running the same code with that scene as argument.

Redot -e scene.tscn

Erasing a scene

Redot is friends with your filesystem and will not create extra metadata files. Use rm to erase a scene file. Make sure nothing references that scene. Otherwise, an error will be thrown upon opening the project.

rm scene.tscn

Running the game

To run the game, execute Redot within the project directory or with the project path as explained above.

Redot

Note that passing in the project.Redot file will always run the editor instead of running the game.

When a specific scene needs to be tested, pass that scene to the command line.

Redot scene.tscn

Debugging

Catching errors in the command line can be a difficult task because they scroll quickly. For this, a command line debugger is provided by adding -d. It works for running either the game or a single scene.

Redot -d

Redot -d scene.tscn

Exporting

Exporting the project from the command line is also supported. This is especially useful for continuous integration setups.

# `Redot` must be a Redot editor binary, not an export template.
# Also, export templates must be installed for the editor
# (or a valid custom export template must be defined in the export preset).
Redot --headless --export-release "Linux/X11" /var/builds/project
Redot --headless --export-release Android /var/builds/project.apk

The preset name must match the name of an export preset defined in the project's export_presets.cfg file. If the preset name contains spaces or special characters (such as "Windows Desktop"), it must be surrounded with quotes.

To export a debug version of the game, use the --export-debug switch instead of --export-release. Their parameters and usage are the same.

To export only a PCK file, use the --export-pack option followed by the preset name and output path, with the file extension, instead of --export-release or --export-debug. The output path extension determines the package's format, either PCK or ZIP.

Running a script

It is possible to run a .gd script from the command line. This feature is especially useful in large projects, e.g. for batch conversion of assets or custom import/export.

The script must inherit from SceneTree or MainLoop.

Here is an example sayhello.gd, showing how it works:

#!/usr/bin/env -S Redot -s
extends SceneTree

func _init():
    print("Hello!")
    quit()

And how to run it:

# Prints "Hello!" to standard output.
Redot -s sayhello.gd

If no project.Redot exists at the path, current path is assumed to be the current working directory (unless --path is specified).

The script path will be interpreted as a resource path relative to the project, here res://sayhello.gd. You can also use an absolute filesystem path instead, which is useful if the script is located outside of the project directory.

The first line of sayhello.gd above is commonly referred to as a shebang. If the Redot binary is in your PATH as Redot, it allows you to run the script as follows in modern Linux distributions, as well as macOS:

# Mark script as executable.
chmod +x sayhello.gd
# Prints "Hello!" to standard output.
./sayhello.gd

If the above doesn't work in your current version of Linux or macOS, you can always have the shebang run Redot straight from where it is located as follows:

#!/usr/bin/Redot -s