From 927eabffed26ca5d243a6c389d62ff28e91c6d1a Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: David Banks <47112877+dbanks12@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Fri, 10 Jan 2025 16:09:25 -0500
Subject: [PATCH] chore: document aztec-nargo in readme (#11173)

---
 aztec-nargo/README.md | 12 ++++++++++++
 aztec-up/README.md    |  2 +-
 2 files changed, 13 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
 create mode 100644 aztec-nargo/README.md

diff --git a/aztec-nargo/README.md b/aztec-nargo/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..79e3187a375
--- /dev/null
+++ b/aztec-nargo/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+## `aztec-nargo`
+
+The `aztec-nargo` utility is packaged with docker and does the following:
+1. If the first argument to `aztec-nargo` is not `compile`, it just forwards args to `nargo` and exits.
+1. If the first argument _is_ `compile`, it forwards args to `nargo` with some added options (like `--inliner-aggressiveness 0 --show-artifact-paths`)
+3. Extracts all artifacts modified by `nargo`
+4. Transpiles each artifact using the `avm-transpiler`
+5. Generates verification keys for each artifact using `bb` (`barretenberg`'s binary)
+
+Example usage: `aztec-nargo compile`
+
+Note: uses versions of each tool from this repository (`nargo` version is from `../noir`).
diff --git a/aztec-up/README.md b/aztec-up/README.md
index d3cc08d04fd..26f5e97ae6f 100644
--- a/aztec-up/README.md
+++ b/aztec-up/README.md
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ the user's `PATH` variable in their shell startup script so they can be found.
 
 - `aztec` - The infrastructure container.
 - `aztec-cli` - A command-line tool for interacting with infrastructure.
-- `aztec-nargo` - A build of `nargo` from `noir` that is guaranteed to be version-aligned. Provides compiler, lsp and more.
+- `aztec-nargo` - A build of `nargo` from `noir` that is guaranteed to be version-aligned. Provides compiler, lsp and more. On `aztec-nargo compile <...>`, automatically transpiles artifacts using `avm-transpiler` and generates verification keys using `bb`.
 - `aztec-sandbox` - A wrapper around docker-compose that launches services needed for sandbox testing.
 - `aztec-up` - A tool to upgrade the aztec toolchain to the latest, or specific versions.
 - `aztec-builder` - A useful tool for projects to generate ABIs and update their dependencies.