How to set environment via `ng serve` in Angular 6

Question

I am trying to update my Angular 5.2 app to Angular 6. I successfully followed instructions in the Angular update guide (including the update of angular-cli to v6), and now I am trying to serve the app via

ng serve --env=local

But this gives me error:

Unknown option: '--env'

I use multiple environments (dev/local/prod), and this is the way it was working in Angular 5.2. How can I set the environment now in Angular 6?

Lovelorn

its v6, you update angular-cli alongside with the whole app, so i thought its obvious :] – Porosity

Very helpful, Martin. Thanks for sharing your insight. In fact it isn't in the least obvious. – Sailmaker

Answer 1

You need to use the new configuration option (this works for ng build and ng serve as well)

ng serve --configuration=local

or

ng serve -c local

If you look at your angular.json file, you'll see that you have finer control over settings for each configuration (aot, optimizer, environment files,...)

"configurations": {
  "production": {
    "optimization": true,
    "outputHashing": "all",
    "sourceMap": false,
    "extractCss": true,
    "namedChunks": false,
    "aot": true,
    "extractLicenses": true,
    "vendorChunk": false,
    "buildOptimizer": true,
    "fileReplacements": [
      {
        "replace": "src/environments/environment.ts",
        "with": "src/environments/environment.prod.ts"
      }
    ]
  }
}

You can get more info here for managing environment specific configurations.

As pointed in the other response below, if you need to add a new 'environment', you need to add a new configuration to the build task and, depending on your needs, to the serve and test tasks as well.

Adding a new environment

Edit: To make it clear, file replacements must be specified in the build section. So if you want to use ng serve with a specific environment file (say dev2), you first need to modify the build section to add a new dev2 configuration

"build": {
   "configurations": {
        "dev2": {

          "fileReplacements": [
            {
              "replace": "src/environments/environment.ts",
              "with": "src/environments/environment.dev2.ts"
            }
            /* You can add all other options here, such as aot, optimization, ... */
          ],
          "serviceWorker": true
        },

Then modify your serve section to add a new configuration as well, pointing to the dev2 build configuration you just declared

"serve":
      "configurations": {
        "dev2": {
          "browserTarget": "projectName:build:dev2"
        }

Then you can use ng serve -c dev2, which will use the dev2 config file

Preselector

do you know if it's possible to also add base-href in the configurations? or just in ng build --c staging --base-href = /yyy/ – Anglim

@EduardoTolino: Yes you can, there is a baseHref option – Preselector

Where could I specify the remote debugging port for the dev environment ? So as to debug with VSCode. In Angular 6 of course. So that the ng serve command includes the remote debugger port when launching the Chrome browser. – Misguide

info link updated: github.com/angular/angular-cli/wiki/… – Nole

ng serve -c local take time to compile the application comparing to "ng serve" – Sneakers

ng serve in angular-cli 6 don't work with file replacement github.com/angular/angular-cli/issues/… – Damask

Be sure that in your component, you import import { environment } from './../environments/environment'; instead of import { environment } from './../environments/environment.prod' The "intelligent" code help imported the latter for me. – Hood

The "serve" part saved my day, thank you. I didn't noticed that migrating environments only to the "build" section is not enough. – Srinagar

Is anyone here aware how to enable debugging while working with multiple environments ? I am unable to debug while using QA Environment, check this out - #56045774 – Kopeisk

Thanks for this, I always wanted to have custom configurations on serve, but just now I had the time to do some research and found this! :) – Janicejanicki

Answer 2

This answer seems good.
however, it lead me towards an error as it resulted with
Configuration 'xyz' could not be found in project ...
error in build.
It is requierd not only to updated build configurations, but also serve ones.

So just to leave no confusions:

1. --env is not supported in angular 6
2. --env got changed into --configuration || -c (and is now more powerful)
3. to manage various envs, in addition to adding new environment file, it is now required to do some changes in angular.json file:
   • add new configuration in the build { ... "build": "configurations": ... property
   • new build configuration may contain only fileReplacements part, (but more options are available)
   • add new configuration in the serve { ... "serve": "configurations": ... property
   • new serve configuration shall contain of browserTarget="your-project-name:build:staging"

Knisley

Thank you for your answer. It makes a nice addition to the one above. Cheers! – Regeniaregensburg

Answer 3

Angular no longer supports --env instead you have to use

ng serve -c dev

for development environment and,

ng serve -c prod 

for production.

NOTE: -c or --configuration

Rihana

This was asked & answered year ago, also your answer is wrong, its -c (with single dash) or --configuration (with double dashes). – Porosity

how can we do same for SSR version ? – Wojak

Answer 4

You can try: ng serve --configuration=dev/prod

To build use: ng build --prod --configuration=dev

Hope you are using a different kind of environment.

Manymanya

ng serve --configuration=dev/prod command takes time comparing to ng serve why? – Sneakers

ng serve --configuration=prod takes more time then ng serve --configuration=prod because of file minimization and due to production ready code. – Manymanya

ok if i use "ng serve --configuration=dev" command means its also taking more time – Sneakers

No, it shouldn't take more time. The prod environment has extra steps to minify, uglify and optimize the code for production. The other environments should take the normal time, unless you explicitly activate these extra steps. – Cheesecloth

Answer 5

For Angular 2 - 5 refer the article Multiple Environment in angular

For Angular 6 use ng serve --configuration=dev

Note: Refer the same article for angular 6 as well. But wherever you find --env instead use --configuration. That's works well for angular 6.

Naught

Answer 6

You can use command ng serve -c dev for development environment ng serve -c prod for production environment

while building also same applies. You can use ng build -c dev for dev build

Trent

Answer 7

Use this command for Angular 6 to build

ng build --prod --configuration=dev

Sponge

Answer 8

This works on Angular 12

step 1:

"serve":
  "configurations": {
    "staging": {
      "browserTarget": "projectName:build:staging"
    }

Step 2: npx ng run myapp:serve --configuration=staging

Dauphine