A file named `angular.json` at the root level of an Angular [workspace](guide/glossary#workspace) provides workspace-wide and project-specific configuration defaults for build and development tools provided by the Angular CLI.
Path values given in the configuration are relative to the root workspace folder.
At the top level of `angular.json`, a few properties configure the workspace, and a `projects` section contains the remaining per-project configuration options. CLI defaults set at the workspace level can be overridden by defaults set at the project level, and defaults set at the project level can be overridden on the command line.
*`defaultProject`: Default project name to use in commands, where not provided as an argument. When you use `ng new` to create a new app in a new workspace, that app is the default project for the workspace until you change it here.
*`schematics` : A set of [schematics](guide/glossary#schematic) that customize the `ng generate` sub-command option defaults for this workspace. See [Generation schematics](#schematics) below.
| `root` | The root folder for this project's files, relative to the workspace folder. Empty for the initial app, which resides at the top level of the workspace. |
| `schematics` | A set of schematics that customize the `ng generate` sub-command option defaults for this project. See [Generation schematics](#schematics) below. |
The JSON schemas for the default schematics used by the CLI to generate projects and parts of projects are collected in the package [`@schematics/angular`](https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/blob/7.0.x/packages/schematics/angular/application/schema.json).
The schema describes the options available to the CLI for each of the `ng generate` sub-commands, as shown in the `--help` output.
Architect is the tool that the CLI uses to perform complex tasks, such as compilation and test running.
Architect is a shell that runs a specified [builder](guide/glossary#builder) to perform a given task, according to a [target](guide/glossary#target) configuration.
You can define and configure new builders and targets to extend the CLI.
Angular defines default builders for use with specific CLI commands, or with the general `ng run` command.
The JSON schemas that the define the options and defaults for each of these default builders are collected in the [`@angular-devkit/build-angular`](https://github.com/angular/angular-cli/blob/8.0.x/packages/angular/cli/lib/config/schema.json) package.
The schemas configure options for the following builders.
Each target object specifies the `builder` for that target, which is the npm package for the tool that Architect runs.
In addition, each target has an `options` section that configures default options for the target, and a `configurations` section that names and specifies alternative configurations for the target.
See the example in [Build target](#build-target) below.
* The `architect/serve` section overrides build defaults and supplies additional serve defaults for the `ng serve` command. In addition to the options available for the `ng build` command, it adds options related to serving the app.
* The `architect/test` section overrides build-option defaults for test builds and supplies additional test-running defaults for the `ng test` command.
* The `architect/lint` section configures defaults for options of the `ng lint` command, which performs code analysis on project source files. The default linting tool for Angular is [TSLint](https://palantir.github.io/tslint/).
* The `architect/extract-i18n` section configures defaults for options of the `ng-xi18n` tool used by the `ng xi18n` command, which extracts marked message strings from source code and outputs translation files.
* The `architect/server` section configures defaults for creating a Universal app with server-side rendering, using the `ng run <project>:server` command.
* The `architect/app-shell` section configures defaults for creating an app shell for a progressive web app (PWA), using the `ng run <project>:app-shell` command.
In general, the options for which you can configure defaults correspond to the command options listed in the [CLI reference page](cli) for each command.
| `builder` | The npm package for the build tool used to create this target. The default builder for an application (`ng build myApp`)is `@angular-devkit/build-angular:browser`, which uses the [webpack](https://webpack.js.org/) package bundler. Note that a different builder is used for building a library (`ng build myLib`). |
| `options` | This section contains default build target options, used when no named alternative configuration is specified. See [Default build targets](#default-build-targets) below. |
| `configurations` | This section defines and names alternative configurations for different intended destinations. It contains a section for each named configuration, which sets the default options for that intended environment. See [Alternate build configurations](#build-configs) below. |
By default, a `production` configuration is defined, and the `ng build` command has `--prod` option that builds using this configuration. The `production` configuration sets defaults that optimize the app in a number of ways, such as bundling files, minimizing excess whitespace, removing comments and dead code, and rewriting code to use short, cryptic names ("minification").
You can define and name additional alternate configurations (such as `stage`, for instance) appropriate to your development process. Some examples of different build configurations are `stable`, `archive` and `next` used by AIO itself, and the individual locale-specific configurations required for building localized versions of an app. For details, see [Internationalization (i18n)](guide/i18n#merge-aot).
You can also pass in more than one configuration name as a comma-separated list. For example, to apply both `stage` and `fr` build configurations, use the command `ng build --configuration stage,fr`. In this case, the command parses the named configurations from left to right. If multiple configurations change the same setting, the last-set value is the final one.
If the `--prod` command line flag is also used, it is applied first, and its settings can be overridden by any configurations specified via the `--configuration` flag.
The configurable options for a default or targeted build generally correspond to the options available for the [`ng build`](cli/build), [`ng serve`](cli/serve), and [`ng test`](cli/test) commands. For details of those options and their possible values, see the [CLI Reference](cli).
| `assets` | An object containing paths to static assets to add to the global context of the project. The default paths point to the project's icon file and its `assets` folder. See more in [Assets configuration](#asset-config) below. |
| `styles` | An array of style files to add to the global context of the project. Angular CLI supports CSS imports and all major CSS preprocessors: [sass/scss](http://sass-lang.com/), [less](http://lesscss.org/), and [stylus](http://stylus-lang.com/). See more in [Styles and scripts configuration](#style-script-config) below. |
| `stylePreprocessorOptions` | An object containing option-value pairs to pass to style preprocessors. See more in [Styles and scripts configuration](#style-script-config) below. |
| `scripts` | An object containing JavaScript script files to add to the global context of the project. The scripts are loaded exactly as if you had added them in a `<script>` tag inside `index.html`. See more in [Styles and scripts configuration](#style-script-config) below. |
| `budgets` | Default size-budget type and threshholds for all or parts of your app. You can configure the builder to report a warning or an error when the output reaches or exceeds a threshold size. See [Configure size budgets](guide/build#configure-size-budgets). (Not available in `test` section.) |
| `fileReplacements` | An object containing files and their compile-time replacements. See more in [Configure target-specific file replacements](guide/build#configure-target-specific-file-replacements).|
The options `assets`, `styles`, and `scripts` can have either simple path string values, or object values with specific fields.
The `sourceMap` and `optimization` options can be set to a simple Boolean value with a command flag, but can also be given a complex value using the configuration file.
The following sections provide more details of how these complex values are used in each case.
*`output`: A path relative to `outDir` (default is `dist/`*project-name*). Because of the security implications, the CLI never writes files outside of the project output path.
In Sass and Stylus you can make use of the `includePaths` functionality for both component and global styles, which allows you to add extra base paths that will be checked for imports.
* The flag `--optimization="true"` applies to both scripts and styles. You can supply a value such as the following to apply optimization to one or the other:
