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Explain build frontend vs. build backend (#11094)
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We regularly get questions why `uv build` is missing certain files or
using the wrong build tag, when that's done by the build backend and
part of the build backend's docs. I tried to clarify this difference and
to redirect users to look at the tool's docs instead of wondering why
uv's docs don't explain that.

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Co-authored-by: Ed Morley <501702+edmorley@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: Zanie Blue <contact@zanie.dev>
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3 people authored Jan 30, 2025
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Expand Up @@ -8,6 +8,14 @@ distributions (wheels). The former is typically a `.tar.gz` or `.zip` file conta
source code along with some additional metadata, while the latter is a `.whl` file containing
pre-built artifacts that can be installed directly.

!!! important

When using `uv build`, uv acts as a [build frontend](https://peps.python.org/pep-0517/#terminology-and-goals)
and only determines the Python version to use and invokes the build backend. The details of
the builds, such as the included files and the distribution filenames, are determined by the build
backend, as defined in [`[build-system]`](./config.md#build-systems). Information about build
configuration can be found in the respective tool's documentation.

## Using `uv build`

`uv build` can be used to build both source distributions and binary distributions for your project.
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