File Architect

File Architect is a desktop application that allow users to create file and folder structures from plain text. Available on filearchitect.com.

Development

This repository contains the core functionality for File Architect. The app is built using:

• Tauri (Rust + TypeScript)
• React
• Vite
• shadcn/ui components

Building from Source

1. Install dependencies:

pnpm install

2. Create a local env file:

cp .env.example .env

3. Run in development:

pnpm run tauri dev

to rebuild with filearchitect/core

pnpm run tauri:dev

Windows Development Setup

On Windows (especially ARM64), additional setup is required due to native compilation dependencies:

Prerequisites

1. Visual Studio Build Tools 2022 with:

   • "Desktop development with C++" workload
   • "C++ ARM64 build tools" component (for ARM64 Windows)

2. LLVM (includes clang) - Install via:

   winget install LLVM.LLVM

3. Native bindings for Windows ARM64 - Required packages:

   pnpm add -D @tauri-apps/cli-win32-arm64-msvc@^2.9.6 @rollup/rollup-win32-arm64-msvc@^4.57.1

Running on Windows

Due to MSVC environment requirements, use the provided batch file:

npm run tauri:dev:msvc

Or directly:

.\tauri-dev.bat

This batch file will:

• Set up the MSVC environment for ARM64
• Add LLVM/clang to PATH (required for the ring crate)
• Configure compiler environment variables
• Build the monorepo and start the Tauri dev server

Notes:

• If you encounter "clang not found" errors, restart your terminal after installing LLVM to refresh the PATH, or the batch file will attempt to add it automatically.
• If you see "Cannot find native binding" errors, ensure @tauri-apps/cli-win32-arm64-msvc is installed (see Prerequisites above).

Testing License Types (Development Only)

During development, you can override the license type to test different user experiences without needing actual licenses:

1. Create a .env file in the project root
2. Add the following variables:

VITE_OVERRIDE_LICENSE=trial
VITE_MAX_LINES_FREE_VERSION=10

Valid VITE_OVERRIDE_LICENSE values:

• trial - Creates a trial license that expires in 7 days (shows line limits)
• once - Creates a lifetime license (never expires, no limits)
• yearly - Creates a yearly license that expires in 1 year (no limits while active)

The VITE_MAX_LINES_FREE_VERSION variable controls how many lines trial users can create before hitting the limit.

Note: These overrides only work in development mode (npm run tauri dev) and will be ignored in production builds.

Build and deploy

scripts/build.sh

Building Windows on macOS (cross-compile)

You can build the Windows x64 executable from macOS using the provided script. This uses xwin for the Windows CRT/SDK and LLVM (clang-cl, lld-link) for cross-compilation.

Prerequisites

1. Rust Windows target

   rustup target add x86_64-pc-windows-msvc

2. LLVM and LLD (Homebrew; keg-only, so not on PATH by default)

   brew install llvm lld

   • llvm provides clang-cl and llvm-lib (C/C++ compiler and archiver for the Windows target).
   • lld provides lld-link (linker). The main llvm formula does not include it.

3. xwin (downloads and unpacks the Windows CRT and SDK for use by clang)

   cargo install xwin

First run

The first time you run the build, xwin splat will download and extract the Windows CRT and SDK to ~/.xwin (or $XWIN_DIR if set). This is one-time.

Build

From the project root:

./scripts/build_windows.sh

The script will:

• Ensure LLVM and LLD are on PATH.
• Run xwin splat if ~/.xwin is not set up.
• Set cross-compilation env vars (CC, AR, CFLAGS, RUSTFLAGS, etc.) for x86_64-pc-windows-msvc.
• Clean dist/ and src-tauri/target/, then run the production Tauri build with --target x86_64-pc-windows-msvc --no-bundle.
• Optionally deploy: upload the .exe to Backblaze B2 and notify the website API (same flow as the macOS build script).

Output: The Windows executable is produced at:

src-tauri/target/x86_64-pc-windows-msvc/release/filearchitect-app.exe

Note: The NSIS/MSI installer is not created when cross-compiling from macOS (--no-bundle). Only the .exe is built. To generate installers, build on Windows.

Deploy (optional)

When the script asks “Do you want to deploy this build?”, answering Y will:

1. Ask for the version (defaults to the one in package.json).
2. Upload the exe to B2 as releases/File Architect_<version>_x64.exe.
3. If a minisign signature file exists (filearchitect-app.exe.sig), upload it too (for the in-app updater).
4. POST the version and download URL to https://filearchitect.com/api/updates-.../windows.

Deploy prerequisites: b2 CLI installed and authorized, and UPDATE_API_PASSWORD must be set in your environment. For in-app updater support, sign the exe with minisign and place the .sig file next to the exe before deploying.

Additional notes

Machine ID

Licensing works by sending the the machine unique id to filearchitect.com/api/v1/machine. It is used to identify the machine to the server.

The settings can be overridden by creating a file at ~/Documents/fa.json with the following content:

{
  "machineId": "my-machine-name"
}

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

To build for debug version

pnpm run tauri build --debug