sandbox edit

Change an existing file in an app’s sandbox by replacing exact strings. You describe each replacement as an old string and a new string, and the command returns a unified diff of what changed. Pass --dry-run to see the diff without writing anything. This is safer than overwriting the whole file with sandbox write, because you only touch the text you named and you get a reviewable diff back. Your change is committed as part of this command, becomes visible in the Base44 app editor, and is included when you publish. There is no separate deploy or push step. Every path is relative to the app root. sandbox commands don’t require a local project. Target an app by passing --app-id, setting the BASE44_APP_ID environment variable, or running the command from a linked project if you have one.

This command needs the sandbox:write permission, including for --dry-run. The CLI requests it when you sign in, and an existing session cannot gain it afterwards. If the command fails with an authorization error, run base44 login again to start a session that has it.

Usage

base44 sandbox edit <path>

Arguments

Argument	Description	Required
`<path>`	File path relative to the app root.	Yes

Flags

Flag	Description
`--app-id <id>`	Target the specified app. Defaults to the app linked in the current project. See Select a target app.
`--edits-json <json>`	A JSON array of edits. If omitted, the array is read from stdin.
`--dry-run`	Return the unified diff without writing the file.
`--json`	Keep stdout to just the JSON result, without the interactive status line. See JSON output.

Edit format

--edits-json takes a JSON array of one or more edit objects:

[{ "old_text": "Welcome", "new_text": "Welcome back", "replace_all": false }]

Property	Description	Required
`old_text`	The exact text to replace. Cannot be empty, and must appear exactly once in the file unless `replace_all` is `true`.	Yes
`new_text`	The text to put in its place. Can be an empty string, which deletes the matched text.	Yes
`replace_all`	Replace every occurrence of `old_text` instead of requiring a single match. Defaults to `false`.	No

One command can carry up to 100 edits. They apply in order, each one matching against the file as the previous edits left it rather than the original, but the batch is all-or-nothing. If any single edit fails, none of them are written. The file being edited, and the file the edits would produce, can be at most 6 MB. A larger file is rejected with FILE_TOO_LARGE. An edit fails with EDIT_TEXT_NOT_FOUND when old_text is not present in the file, or with EDIT_TEXT_NOT_UNIQUE when it matches more than once and replace_all is not set. Include more surrounding context in old_text to make it unique, or set replace_all. An edit that would leave the file empty fails with EMPTY_EDIT_RESULT, so to delete a file use base44 sandbox run "rm <path>".

Output

The command returns JSON:

{
  "path": "src/pages/Home.jsx",
  "diff": "--- a/src/pages/Home.jsx\n+++ b/src/pages/Home.jsx\n@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@\n-      <h1>Welcome</h1>\n+      <h1>Welcome back</h1>\n",
  "applied": true
}

Field	Description
`path`	Path of the edited file, relative to the app root.
`diff`	Unified diff of the change.
`applied`	`true` when the file was written, `false` for a `--dry-run` preview.

Example

Preview a change before making it:

base44 sandbox edit src/pages/Home.jsx --dry-run --edits-json '[{"old_text":"Welcome","new_text":"Welcome back"}]'

Get Started

Commands

Usage

Arguments

Flags

Edit format

Output

Example

See also

​Usage

​Arguments

​Flags

​Edit format

​Output

​Example

​See also

Usage

Arguments

Flags

Edit format

Output

Example

See also