SMAPI is an open-source modding API for Stardew Valley. It takes care of loading mods into the game context, and exposes events they can use to interact with the game. It's safely installed alongside the game's executable, and doesn't change any of your game files.

For players

• How to install SMAPI & use mods
• Support forums
• Stardew Valley Discord (chat with players and developers)

For mod developers

• How to develop mods
• Release notes
• SMAPI/Farmhand Discord (chat with SMAPI developers)

For SMAPI developers

This section is about compiling SMAPI itself from source. If you don't know what that means, this section isn't relevant to you; see the previous sections to use or create mods.

Compiling from source

Using an official SMAPI release is recommended for most users.

If you'd like to compile SMAPI from source, you can do that on any platform using Visual Studio or MonoDevelop. SMAPI uses build configuration derived from the crosswiki mod config to detect your current OS automatically and load the correct references. Compile output will be placed in a bin directory at the root of the git repository.

Preparing a release

To prepare a crossplatform SMAPI release, you'll need to compile it on two platforms. See crossplatforming a SMAPI mod for the first-time setup.

For simplicity, all paths are relative to the root of the repository (the directory containing src).

1. Update the version number in AssemblyInfo.cs and Constants::Version. Make sure you use a semantic version. Recommended format:

   build type	format	example
   dev build	<version>-alpha-<timestamp>	1.0.0-alpha-201611300500
   beta	<version>-beta<incrementing ID>	1.0.0-beta2
   release	<version>	1.0.0

2. In Windows:

   1. Rebuild the solution in Release mode.
   2. Transfer the bin/Release/~Package directory to Linux or Mac.
      This adds the installer executable and Windows files. We'll do the rest in Linux or Mac, since we need to set Unix file permissions that Windows won't save.

3. In Linux or Mac:

   1. Rebuild the solution in Release mode.
   2. Copy bin/Release/~Package/Mono into the package directory you transferred from Windows.
   3. Open a terminal in your package directory and run chmod 755 Mono/StardewModdingAPI.
   4. Rename your package directory to SMAPI-<version>-installer.
   5. Compress it into a SMAPI-<version>.zip file.

If you did everything right, you should have a release file like this:

SMAPI-1.0.zip
   SMAPI-1.0-installer/
      Mono/
         Mods/*
         Newtonsoft.Json.dll
         StardewModdingAPI
         StardewModdingAPI.exe
         StardewModdingAPI.exe.mdb
         System.Numerics.dll
         steam_appid.txt
      Windows/
         Mods/*
         StardewModdingAPI.exe
         StardewModdingAPI.pdb
         steam_appid.txt
      install.exe
      readme.txt