Version control for different deployment methods

[DuyTr]

We want to build the build script npm run production into our deployment pipeline. GMD2024_VERSION never changes so cache busting files not working.

[gregsullivan]

Hello—Thanks for posting this!

npm run production builds production versions of all of the CSS and JavaScript files associated with your theme. _tw's built-in cache busting is part of npm run bundle, which creates a production-ready zip file for upload to a WordPress installation.

If you want cache busting, but you don't want to use (or can't use) npm run bundle and the resulting zip file, you can add your own versioning as part of your deployment pipeline. This is the relevant code:

_tw/node_scripts/zip.js

Lines 40 to 45 in fd500cc

	const updatedContent = originalContent.replace(
	/(define\( '[A-Z0-9_]*_VERSION', ')(.*)(' \);)/g,
	'$1' +
	parseInt(Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000), 10).toString(36) +
	'$3'
	);

During the process of creating the zip file, it does a search-and-replace for the constant definition containing the version and replaces its value with the current time (converted to seconds) in base 36. (This is based on how Drupal does—did?—cache busting on similar resources.)

I have seen people do cache busting by calculating an MD5 hash for the files each time they're enqueued, but that approach always made me uncomfortable. I'm sure it's not that computationally expensive a process, but I'd still prefer to do it as part of a build or deployment process.

Hope that helps! I'm going to convert this to a discussion, but please feel free to let me know if you have any other questions.