bundlee

A CLI to bundle source code and node modules into a distribution folder

bundlee was created to make projects with local dependencies easier to deploy. Developing code with local dependencies usually requires using relative paths to load modules. A devloper could get around this by publishing their local packages to the npm registry. This means that whenever the support packages can be installed into the main package, and added to the package.json so that when the main package is intalled the support packages come along with it. However this can be alot of work for a package that is still in development, private, or changing often. This devloper might avoid publishing the package and use npm install [local-package] to bring the local support package into the main packages, node_modules folder, but this is also a hassle - especially if the support package in in development, since every time the support package is changed the main package needs to update itself. While this can be automated with file watchers and some scripting, it doesn't change the fact that the support package is still local, so will not be accessible to a remote deployment, likewise linking to local packages can also be a pain since sybmbolic links can cause issue in some packages. bundlee aims to solve all these problems, by automatically collecting and updating these local packages, and bundling them with the main source code and other node packages into a single folder, which can be deployed without needing to publish the local packages or copy them into the main package.

bundlee requires all the package's source code to be in one folder. Likewise, all installed node modules should be contained within a single folder. The contents of these folders are copied into the dist folder with their internal structure preserved. Any local libraries used in the module should be packaged into a node package (with npm init) and installed as a local dependency so they will be contained within the main package's node modules.

ignore.json uses glob syntax

NOTE: if the user desires specific files/folders within local packages to be ignored, the files/folders need to added to the local package's ignore.json before the bundler's local package update is run. During the first local package update, the files/folders will be brought into the main package's node_modules/ folder so will end up being copied into the output folder from then on. This is because bundlee WILL NOT delete from node_modules/ so if the user wants these files/folders not to be in the output folder (after they've already been brought in) they will need to manually delete them from the main package's node_modules/ folder and add them to the local package's ignore.json. This will prevent them being copied back into the main package's node_modules/ folder, therefore preventing them from being in the output folder.

NOTE: files/folders to be ignored need to be prefixed with the appropriate src/ or node_modules/ appropriately in the ignore.json

TODO

• publish
• typescript?
• when parents is set to false in src/bundler.js's copyOptions, the cpy function copies all the files from the source folders flatly into the destination folder without maintaining any of the original folder structure. Does this form of the code still run? If yes consider adding it to fast mode because it really cuts down on bundle time and if no, what would it take to make it work?
• code parser: parses source code to find relative require()s, takes the path and copies it into package.json, then changes the require() to a normal dependency one (replace the path the the package name, but leave any slashes after). It doesnt need to actualy install the package because as long as it is run first, the new package will be picked up by the updater afterwards. This means npm install [local-package] never has to be used, the user can just write relative imports in their code and the parser will do the rest.
• keep in mind should the parser convert all the code or just the dist code, leaving the original source code alone?