# Manifest.json

qooxdoo's [Manifest files](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_file) serve to provide meta information for a library in a structured way. Their syntax is in JSON. They have a more informational part (keyed `info`), which is more interesting for human readers, a technical part (named `provides`) that is used in the processing of generator configurations, and a part named `externalResources` to include CSS and Javascript files. Here is a brief sample with all the possible keys:

Manifest files are referenced in application's *config.json* files (in the library), to identify the library they stand for.

## Reference

This is a sample file:

```json
{
  "info" : 
  {
    "name" : "Custom Application",

    "summary" : "Custom Application",
    "description" : "This is a skeleton for a custom application with qooxdoo.",

    "keywords" : ["custom"],
    "homepage" : "http://some.homepage.url/",

    "license" : "SomeLicense",
    "authors" : 
    [
      {
        "name" : "First Author (uid)",
        "email" : "first.author@some.domain"
      }
    ],
    "version" : "trunk",
    "sourceViewUri" : "https://github.com/someuser/custom/blob/master/source/class/%{classFilePath}#L%{lineNumber}"
  },

  "provides" : 
  {
    "namespace"   : "custom",
    "encoding"    : "utf-8",
    "class"       : "source/class",
    "resource"    : "source/resource",
    "translation" : "source/translation",
    "type"        : "application",
    "application": 
    {
      "class": "qxl.apiviewer.Application",
      "theme": "qxl.apiviewer.Theme",
      "name": "apiviewer",
      "title": "Qooxdoo API Viewer"
    }  
  },
  "externalResources" :
  {
    "script": [
      "js/customscript.js"
    ],
    "css": [
      "styles/style.css"
    ]
  },
  "requires": 
  {
     "@qooxdoo/framework": "^6.0.0-alpha",
     "@qooxdoo/compiler": "^0.2.40",
     "qooxdoo/contrib": "^0.1.1"
  }
}
```

## Description of Keys

* **info**: All entries in this section are optional.
  * **name**: Name of the library.
  * **summary**: Short summary of its purpose.
  * **description**: Descriptive text.
  * **keywords**: List of keywords, tags.
  * **homepage**: Homepage URL of the library.
  * **license**: License name(s) of the library.
  * **authors**: Author(s) of the library. A list of maps, each map containing the following fields:
    * **name** : Author name.
    * **email** : Author email address.
  * **version**: Version of  the library.
  * **qooxdoo-versions**: List of versions of the qooxdoo framework this library is compatible with.
  * **sourceViewUri**: URL to view the library's class code online. This URL will be used in generated API documentation. It has a special syntax and allows for placeholders (e.g. for the class name and the source line number).
* **provides**: Entries in this section are mandatory.
  * **namespace**: Library namespace (i.e. the namespace elements all class names in this library are prefixed with, e.g. `foo` for a main application class with name `foo.Application`).
  * **encoding**: File encoding of source code files (should be utf-8).
  * **class**: Path to the library's class code relative to the Manifest.json file, up to but not including the root namespace folder (e.g. `source/class`).
  * **resource**: Path to the library's resources relative to the Manifest.json file, up to but not including the root namespace folder (e.g. `source/resource`).
  * **translation**: Path to the library's translation files relative to the Manifest.json file (e.g. `source/translation`).
  * [**webfonts**]: [see here](../compiler/IconFonts.md) 
  * **type**: One of [`library`, `application`, `add-in`,`contribution`]. 
  * **application**: An application description block as described in 
        [compiler.json](./compile.md). This block will copied to `applications` section in `compile.json` during installation of the contrib.

* **externalResources**: Static Javascript and CSS files that shall be always included without further processing by qooxdoo. All paths are relative to the resource folder stated in the "provides" section.
  * **script**: Array of javascript files.
  * **css**: Array of css files.
-   **requires**: a list of of needed libraries and contribs. Format is 
     `contrib_uri`: `needed_version` where `needed_version` is a semver compatible version description.
     
     Special handling for:
     * @qooxdoo/framework: This checks the version of the used qooxdoo sdk.
     * @qooxdoo/compiler: This checks the version of the used qooxdoo compiler.