browserify-dev-bundler

browserify-dev-bundler

On-demand browserify bundler middleware for development with watchify support

Install

npm install browserify-dev-bundler

It's a dynamic browserify bundler via a middleware request handler that uses watchify internally to keep your bundles cached, and your response times fast in development. You don't have to manage watchify tasks/processes, or temporary files since it's all on-demand via your http server. As the name implies, this is meant for development environments, you should be building your browserify bundles for production, or something other than this.

Examples

var DevBundler = require('browserify-dev-bundler');

// create your bundler
var bundler = DevBundler({
    root: '/where/my/modules/are',
    watchify: true,
    transforms: ['jadeify'],
    debug: true,
    require: function(module) {
        // i want my "apps" files requireable
        return /^\/apps/.test(module);
    },
    expose: function(module) {
        return module;
    },
    options: {
        insertGlobals: true,
        detectGlobals: false,
        noParse: []
    }
});

// attach it to an express server

// by default it will intercept any *.js files, using the full path as the module name
app.use(bundler.middleware());

// you can override this to support your own url structures
app.use(bundler.middleware(/^\/js\/(.+)\.js$/));

// The first capture group of your regex is the module name used for the bundle
// in conjunction with the `root` config option

DevBundler(options)

options config object supports the following:

• root - required - root directory where you modules are located.
• watchify - optional - defaults to false - enabled watchify support/caching
• transforms - optional - Array of transforms to apply. Each entry can be a single transform like you'd pass into bundle.transform(), or an Array that is applied against the transform function if you need to pass in options.
• debug - defaults to false - sets browserify debug flag for sourcemaps.
• require - optional function that receives the module name, and expects a boolean returned that determines if the module is require()'d against the bundle instead of just add()'d
• expose - optional function that receives a module name, and expects a string returned that is used as the expose configuration option for browserify's 'bundle.require()
• options - optional configuration object passed into the browserify() or watchify() call.

events

• pre-bundle - [bundle, moduleName, modulePath] - prior to bundle call
• pre-response - [error, response, moduleName, source] - prior to calling send() on the response
• new-source - [moduleName, source] - whenever the source updates due to files changing.

bundler = DevBundler({ root: '/my/modules' });

// add custom headers
bundler.on('pre-response', function(err, res, module, src) {
    res.setHeader('X-Module-Name', module);
});

// log source updates
bundler.on('new-source', function(module, src) {
    console.log('Source updated: ', module);
});

// manipulate browserify bundle directly
bundler.on('pre-bundle', function(bundle, module, modulePath) {
    // add my own transform manually
    bundle.transform('my-custom-transform');
    // add specific files
    bundle.add('some/random-file.js');
});

Why did I build this?

standalone watchify

For small applications, a simple watchify command can usually cover what you need for development purposes. Subsequent bundle() operations that occur as you update files are extremely fast due to it's ability to cache unchanged files. As you start having multiple top-level files you need bundled by browserify, the management of those tasks, and the processes they require can get verbose and not-simple, especially if you need multiple transforms/configuration for each bundle.

browserify middleware

There are some existing solutions for setting up an http response handler to dynamically build your bundles. It's a fairly nice solution to the problem of managing multiple top-level files you need bundled in development. The benefit is that you don't have to manage watchify tasks / processes. The big drawback is that as your bundle grows in size, it can be time-consuming to generate that on every page load.

combine watchify & dynamic bundler middleware

I worked with both of these approaches on different sized projects, and wanted a better solution. browserify-dev-bundler provides dynamic bundler middleware, but with the added bonus of having seamless watchify support. You don't have to run watchify processes for your files, but your bundles are automatically kept up to date internally with watchify, which means really fast response times for dynamic bundles in development.