CommonJSComponentBuilder.Net

Intro

This repo contains a node app for building Component/Component based applications, as well as the F# source for a nuget package to add the Node app as a build task in Visual Studio 2012.

Unlike the standard Component/Component builder (component build) our tooling automatically adds a call to the entry point of the application so that it is self booting.

It also generates two versions of the final script: One that has the contents wrapped in an anonymous function (standard practice to avoid variable leakage) and a 'debug' version that deliberately leaks its variables.

The Debug versions are used for writing tests.

We have a few conventions that must be obeyed when using the Visual Studio build task stuff: A Component/Component Application (as opposed to a basic module) is defined as a Component that has an 'entry.js' as its main script. The .Net part is searching for these entry.js files.

We also have a convention where local modules - these are application unique modules that do not have their own Github repos, are in /local.

The Node application, however, can have the location of local modules configured, and doesn't care about teh entry.js convention.

A typical application file structure might look like...

/myapp
  entry.js
  component.json
  /local
    /module1
      /spec
        module1.spec.js
      index.js
      component.json
    /module2
      /spec
        module2.spec.js
      index.js
      component.json

Each component.json file will be listing dependencies, and each js file will be require(something)ing, most likely.

The builder also builds local modules individually. This is so that there are discrete testable versions of these modules.

After the builder is done, you would have..

/myapp
  /build
    myapp.js
    myapp.debug.js
  entry.js
  component.json
  /components
    /somedependency
      index.js
      component.json
    /someotherdepenency
      index.js
      component.json
  /local
    /module1
      /build
        build.debug.js
      /spec
        module1.spec.js
      /components
        /somedepenency
          index.js
          component.json
      index.js
      component.json
    /module2
      /build
        build.debug.js
      /spec
        module2.spec.js
      /components
        /someotherdepency
          index.js
          component.json
      index.js
      component.json

All dependencies installed for the app. All dependencies installed for the local modules. Local module built and the main application built.

Using the Node App

Clone this repo then

cd js
npm install

Usage

node commonjs-build.js -e /path/to/entry -o /path/to/out -n basename

... where basename is the name of the output file, i.e, -n myapp gets you myapp.js

The paths are to folders, not files.

-c --clean

removes dependencies and builds of local modules

-q --quick

Only builds the main application. Does not build local modules or install dependencies.