API.md

connect-cachify API

The README for this project has a good tutorial on using connect-cachify. This documents the API and goes deep on all the options.

setup(assets, [options])

Creates the cachify middleware and allows you to customizes how you'll use it in your Node.js app.

assets is a dictionary where the keys are your production urls, and the value is a list of development urls that produce the same asset. See the example below for format.

options is an optional dictionary with the following optional values:

• debug - Boolean indicating we should always re-write urls with a hash. (Default: false)
• prefix - String to prepend to the hash in links. (Default: none)
• production - Boolean indicating if your in development or production mode. Effects how links for js and css files are generated. (Defaults to true)
• root - A fully qualified path which is a root where static resources are served up. This is the same value you'd send to the static middleware. (Default: '.')
• url_to_paths - an associative array of URLs to absolute filename paths. Useful to specify paths to files that are not in the root directory. (Default: {})

Example use of setup

var assets = {
  '/js/main.min.js': ['/js/jquery.js', '/js/widget.js', '/js/main.js'],
  '/js/dashboard.js': ['/js/jquery.js', '/js/dashboard.js'],
  '/css/main.min.css': ['/css/reset.css', '/main.css'] };
app.use(cachify.setup(assets, { root: __dirname }));

Using url_to_paths and root in setup

url_to_paths is an associative array that specifies the absolute path of an asset. This is useful for files that are not located under the root directory. In the following example, both jquery.js and reset.css are located outside of the root directory and would not normally be found by connect-cachify.

var assets = {
  '/js/main.min.js': ['/js/jquery.js', '/js/widget.js', '/js/main.js'],
  '/js/dashboard.js': ['/js/jquery.js', '/js/dashboard.js'],
  '/css/main.min.css': ['/css/reset.css', '/main.css'] };

// specify paths outside of the root directory to find files.
var url_to_paths = {
  '/js/jquery.js': '/home/development/jquery/jquery.js',
  '/css/reset.css': '/home/development/css-reset/reset.css'
};

app.use(cachify.setup(assets, {
  root: __dirname,
  url_to_paths: url_to_paths
}));

Both root and url_to_paths are optional, though it is safe to use them together.

Middleware Helper Functions

The setup middleware will expose several helpers to your views:

• cachify_js
• cachify_css
• cachify

Using the optional prefix will slightly improve middleware performance when attempting to detect if a request is safe to re-write it's request url.

cachify_js(production_js_url, [options])

Helper function for generating script tags for your Javascript files.

production_js_url is a url to your minified, production ready Javascript.

options is an optional dictionary with the following optional value:

• hash - MD5 hash to use instead of calculating from disk (Default: none)
• defer - if true, adds the defer attribute to scripts in production mode. (Default: false)
• async - if true, adds the async attribute to scripts in production mode. (Default: false)

In production mode, a single script tag is generated, with a cache-busting url. In development mode (production: false), Multiple script tags are generated, one per dependent file from the assets argument to the setup function.

Example EJS template:

  </p>
  <%- cachify_js('/js/main.min.js') %>
</body>
</html>

cachify_css(production_css_url, [options])

Helper function for generating link tags for your CSS files.

production_css_url is a url to your minified, production ready CSS.

options is an optional dictionary with the following optional value:

• hash - MD5 hash to use instead of calculating from disk (Default: none)

In production mode, a single link tag is generated, with a cache-busting url. In development mode (production: false), Multiple link tags are generated, one per dependent file from the assets argument to the setup function.

Example EJS template:

  </p>
  <%- cachify_css('/css/main.min.css') %>
</body>
</html>

cachify(production_url, [options])

Lower level Helper function for generating HTML tags for your urls.

production_url is a url to your minified, production asset.

options is an optional dictionary with the following optional values:

• hash - MD5 hash to use instead of calculating from disk (Default: none)
• tag_format - String with one '%s' placeholder, which will be replaced each time with your production_url or development urls.

In production mode, a single HTML tag is generated, with a cache-busting url. In development mode (production: false), Multiple tags are generated, one per dependent file from the assets argument to the setup function.

Example EJS template:

  </p>
  <%- cachify('/js/login.min.js', {
        tag_format: '<script src="%s" defer></script>'}) %>
</body>
</html>