Webpack
Webpack configuration to help you get started building modern web applications. You write modern javascript using the latest browser features, webpack will optimize your code for production ensure it runs on all supported browsers.
Part of Open Web Components: guides, tools and libraries for modern web development and web components
Configuration
The input for webpack is the same index.html
you use for development. Any module scripts in your index are run through webpack and your index is updated with the output from rollup.
See 'config features' for all details. See the extending section for customization, such as supporting non-standard syntax or adding babel plugins.
Setup
New project
npm init @open-wc
Existing project
npm init @open-wc
Manual setup
- Install the required dependencies:
npm i -D @open-wc/building-webpack webpack webpack-cli es-dev-server
- Create a file called
webpack.config.js
and pass in your app's js entry point and index.html. Pick the config you need below:
const path = require('path');
const { createDefaultConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
module.exports = createDefaultConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
});
- Create an
index.html
:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head></head>
<body>
<your-app></your-app>
<script type="module" src="./src/your-app.js"></script>
</body>
</html>
We use webpack-index-html-plugin. Contrary to other webpack plugins, you do need to include your app's module entrypoint in your index.html
. This allows you to use the same index during development and when building.
- Add the following commands to your
package.json
:
{
"scripts": {
"build": "webpack --mode production",
"start:build": "es-dev-server --app-index dist/index.html --open"
}
}
start
runs your app for development, reloading on file changesstart:build
runs your app after it has been built using the build commandbuild
builds your app and outputs it in your dist
directory
Browser support
createDefaultConfig
creates a single build of your app for modern browsers (by default last 2 of major browsers). This is recommended if you only need to support modern browsers, otherwise you will need to ship compatibility code for browsers which don't need it.
createCompatibilityConfig
creates two builds of your app. A modern build like the above, and a legacy build for IE11. Additional code is injected to load polyfills and the correct version of your app. This is recommended if you need to support IE11.
Config features
All configs:
- resolve bare imports (
import { html } from 'lit-html'
) - preserve
import.meta.url
value from before bundling - minify + treeshake js
- minify html and css in template literals
createDefaultConfig
:
- single build output
- compatible with any browser which supports Web Components
createCompatibilityConfig
:
- Two build outputs:
- Modern:
- compatible with modern browsers (default: last 2 chrome, firefox safari and edge)
- does not penalize users with modern browser with compatibility code for IE11
- Legacy:
- compatible down to IE11
- babel transform down to IE11 (es5)
- core js babel polyfills (
Array.from
, String.prototype.includes
etc.) - webcomponentsjs polyfills
- URL polyfill
- fetch polyfill
See below for more configuration options.
Customizing the babel config
You can define your own babel plugins by adding a .babelrc
or babel.config.js
to your project. See babeljs config for more information.
For example to add support for class properties:
{
"plugins": ["@babel/plugin-proposal-class-properties"]
}
Adjusting browser support for the modern build
The legacy build targets IE11, which is the earliest browser supported by the webcomponents polyfill. For the modern build we target the lates 2 versions of the major browsers (chrome, firefox, safari and edge).
You can adjust this by adding a browserslist configuration. For example by adding a .browserslistrc
file to your project, or adding an entry to your package.json. See the browserslist documentation for more information.
Note: you should not add IE11 or other very early browsers as a target in your browserslist, as it would result in a broken modern build because it makes some assumptions around browser support. Use the --legacy
flag for legacy builds.
Extending the webpack config
A webpack config is an object. To extend it, we recommend using webpack-merge
to ensure plugins are merged correctly. For example to adjust the output folder:
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createDefaultConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
const config = createDefaultConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
});
module.exports = merge(config, {
output: {
path: 'build',
},
});
If you use createCompatibilityConfig
, it is actually an array of configs so that webpack outputs a modern and a legacy build. Simply map over the array to adjust both configs:
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createCompatibilityConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
const configs = createCompatibilityConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
});
module.exports = configs.map(config =>
merge(config, {
output: {
path: 'build',
},
}),
);
Common extensions
::: warning
Some extensions or plugins add non-native or experimental features to your code. This can be bad for the maintenance of your code in the long term, we therefore don't recommend it unless you know what you're doing.
:::
Customizing index.html output
If you need to customize the output of your index.html
you can pass extra options to webpack-index-html-plugin:
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createDefaultConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
module.exports = createDefaultConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
webpackIndexHTMLPlugin: {
polyfills: {
fetch: false,
intersectionObserver: true,
},
},
});
See the documentation for all options.
non index.html entrypoint
By default we look for an index.html
as entrypoint. If want to use regular entrypoints you will need to provide your index.html
for output manually:
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createDefaultConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
module.exports = createDefaultConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './my-app.js'),
webpackIndexHTMLPlugin: {
template: ({ assets, entries, legacyEntries, variation }) => `
<html>
<head></head>
<body></body>
</html>
`,
},
});
Adding or removing polyfills
By default we polyfill core-js
, webcomponentsjs
and fetch
. It is possile to add or remove polyfills by passing webpack-index-html
configuration like above:
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createDefaultConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
module.exports = createDefaultConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
webpackIndexHTMLPlugin: {
polyfills: {
fetch: false,
intersectionObserver: true,
customPolyfills: [
{
name: 'my-feature',
test: "'myFeature' in window",
path: require.resolve('my-feature-polyfill/dist/bundled.js'),
},
],
},
},
});
See the documentation for more information.
Copy assets
Web apps often include assets such as css files and images. These are not part of your regular dependency graph, so they need to be copied into the build directory.
copy-webpack-plugin is a popular plugin fo this.
const path = require('path');
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const CopyWebpackPlugin = require('copy-webpack-plugin');
const { createCompatibilityConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
const configs = createCompatibilityConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
});
module.exports = [
merge(configs[0], {
plugins: [new CopyWebpackPlugin(['images/**/*.png'])],
}),
configs[1],
];
Support typescript
Make sure to prevent any compilation done by the typescript compiler tsconfig.json
, as babel and webpack do this for you:
{
"compilerOptions": {
"target": "ESNEXT",
"module": "ESNext"
}
}
Within webpack there are two options to add typescript support.
1. Babel
We recommend using the babel typescript plugin. Add this to your .babelrc
:
{
"presets": ["@babel/preset-typescript"]
}
This the fastest method, as it strips away types during babel transformormation of your code. It will not perform any type checking though. We recommend setting up the type checking as part of your linting setup, so that you don't need to run the typechecker during development for faster builds.
Supporting decorators
::: warning
Please note that decorators will add non standard syntax to your code.
:::
{
"presets": ["@babel/preset-typescript"],
"plugins": [
["@babel/plugin-proposal-decorators", { "decoratorsBeforeExport": true }],
"@babel/plugin-proposal-class-properties"
]
}
2. Plugin
It is also possible to add the webpack typescript plugin, which does typechecking and compiling for you:
const path = require('path');
const merge = require('webpack-merge');
const { createCompatibilityConfig } = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
const configs = createCompatibilityConfig({
input: path.resolve(__dirname, './index.html'),
});
module.exports = configs.map(config =>
merge(config, {
module: {
rules: [{ test: /\.ts$/, loader: 'ts-loader' }],
},
}),
);
Progressive Web App
Making your app installable
Make sure your PWA meets the installable criteria, which you can find here. You can find a tool to generate your manifest.json
here. When your app has a service worker with a fetch
handler (generated by this configuration), a manifest.json
, and is served over HTTPS, your app is ready to be installed.
Enabling the service worker
This configuration will by default generate a service worker for you, using workbox-webpack-plugin. The service worker will only be generated for production. To opt-in to using this service worker, you can add the following code snippet to your index.html
:
<script>
if ('serviceWorker' in navigator) {
window.addEventListener('load', () => {
navigator.serviceWorker.register('./sw.js');
});
}
</script>
Overriding the workbox config
If you want to override the default config with your own workbox configuration, you can disable the default workbox configuration by setting options.plugins.workbox
to false in the options
object that you pass to createBasicConfig
, and then you can override the plugins
const merge = require('deepmerge');
const { InjectManifest } = require('workbox-webpack-plugin');
const createDefaultConfig = require('@open-wc/building-webpack');
const defaultConfig = createDefaultConfig({
plugins: {
workbox: false,
},
});
module.exports = merge(defaultConfig, {
plugins: [new InjectManifest()],
});
You can find the options for configuring Workbox here.
Disabling service worker generation
To opt out of using workbox to generate a service worker, you can disabled it by overriding the options in the createBasicConfig
function:
module.exports = createBasicConfig({
plugins: {
workbox: false,
},
});
A note on skipWaiting
By default, the service worker generated will not call skipWaiting
. The reason for this is that it becomes very painful very quickly if you're lazyloading code in your application.
If you want to add a user-friendly 'Add To Home Screen' experience, you can use the pwa-update-available web component.