js-makedepend

js-makedepend

A makedepend for javascript ES6, CommonJS and AMD (/ RequireJS).

For all two of you using Makefiles to build JavaScript (TypeScript/ CoffeeScript/ ...) based projects.

Installation and basic usage

(1) Install with npm

npm install -g js-makedepend

(2) Include this target in your Makefile (assuming your javascript is in src/):

depend:
	js-makedepend src/

(3) Run make depend
js-makedepend will have added the dependencies in src/ to your Makefile. See the examples below to see how that looks.

All options

Usage: js-makedepend [options] <directory-or-file>

  Options:

    -h, --help                  output usage information
    -V, --version               output the version number
    -f, --output-to <file>      Makefile to output to
                                 default: -f Makefile
                                 use -f - to output to stdout
    -x, --exclude <regex>       a regular expression for excluding modules
    -s, --delimiter <string>    starting string delimiter
    -d, --flat-define <string>  outputs a define with flat dependencies
    -a, --append                append dependencies instead of replacing them
    -M, --system <items>        list of module systems (default: amd,cjs,es6)
	-i, --info                  show what is supported in your project folder

Features by example

The default: recursive

Let's say you have a cool project going with this source tree:

    src/root_one.js
    src/root_two.js
    src/one_only_one.js
    src/one_only_two.js
    src/shared.js
    src/two_only_one.js
    src/sub/depindir.js
    src/sub/dir.js

On a directory

Running js-makedepend src with no options will append all dependencies present in source files in that directory to your Makefile:

# DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -- js-makedepend depends on it.

# amd dependencies
# cjs dependencies
src/root_one.js: \
	../../node_modules/commander/index.js \
	src/one_only_one.js \
	src/one_only_two.js \
	src/shared.js \
	src/sub/dir.js

src/root_two.js: \
	src/shared.js \
	src/two_only_one.js

src/sub/dir.js: \
	src/sub/depindir.js

src/two_only_one.js: \
	src/sub/dir.js

# es6 dependencies

On a file

You can also pass a file as an argument. js-makedepend src/root_two.js will only emit the (recursive) dependencies of src/root_two.js:

# DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -- js-makedepend depends on it.

# amd dependencies
# cjs dependencies
src/root_two.js: \
	src/shared.js \
	src/two_only_one.js

src/two_only_one.js: \
	src/sub/dir.js

src/sub/dir.js: \
	src/sub/depindir.js

# es6 dependencies

Flattened in a DEFINE: --flat-define

Sometimes all you need is just all sources in one define. js-makedepend --system cjs --flat-define ROOT_ONE_ALL_SRC src/root_one.js will do just that:

# DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -- js-makedepend depends on it.

# cjs dependencies
ROOT_ONE_ALL_SRC=src/root_one.js \
	../../node_modules/commander/index.js \
	src/one_only_one.js \
	src/one_only_two.js \
	src/shared.js \
	src/sub/depindir.js \
	src/sub/dir.js

(You might want to pick one module system here - otherwise you'll end up with three very similar lookin defines).

Replacing & appending: --append

You might have noted the # DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -- js-makedepend depends on it. there. In next runs js-makedepends by default will replace everything below that line.

If you want to have the output of multiple runs of js-makedepend in your Makefile use --append e.g.

depend:
	js-makedepend --flat-define ROOT_ONE_ALL_SRC src/root_one.js
	js-makedepend --append --flat-define ROOT_TWO_ALL_SRC src/root_two.js

Excluding stuff to walk through: --exclude

In the above samples you'll notice the presence of a dependency in the node_modules tree: ../../node_modules/commander/index.js. If you don't want that, add the --exclude with a regular expression, e.g.

depend:
	js-makedepend --exclude node_modules --flat-define ALL_SRC src/

Output to something else: --output-to

If your depency tree is big, you might want to put your dependencies in a separate file, using make's include.

include jsdependencies.mk

depend:
	js-makedepend --output-to jsdependencies.mk src/

Note: running this when jsdepencies.mk doesn't exist yet will make make stop with an error. Either create it before running make (e.g. touch jsdependencies.mk) or include the include jsdepencies in your Makefile only after running the depend target for the first time.

If you pick - as a filename, js-makedepend will emit to stdout.

Selecting module systems: --system

By default js-makedepend runs through your sources thrice, once for every module system it knows. If you don't want that, specify the systems your interested in, in a comma-separated list:

	js-makedepend --system amd,es6 src/

Use your own delimiter string: --delimiter

By default js-makedepend emits a demarcation line so it can find its output on a next run:

# DO NOT DELETE THIS LINE -- js-makedepend depends on it.

If you want it to use something else, you can do that:

js-makedepend --delimiter "# Aren't you a little short for a stormtrooper?"

or even

js-makedepend --delimiter "MY_COOL_DEFINE=achoo!"

Advanced example

Include these snippets to your Makefile to

• Add dependencies to a separate depencies.mk include
• Only traverse CommonJS dependencies
• don't include any source that resides in node_modules
• besides all dependencies
  • define a ROOT_ONE_SRC with a flattened list of all files on which src/root_one.js depends
  • define a ROOT_TWO_SRC with a flattened list of all files on which src/root_two.js depends

MAKEDEPEND=node_modules/.bin/js-makedepend \
	--output-to dependencies.mk \
	--exclude node_modules \
	--system cjs
include dependencies.mk

depend:
	$(MAKEDEPEND)
	$(MAKEDEPEND) --append --flat-define ROOT_ONE_SRC src/root_one.js
	$(MAKEDEPEND) --append --flat-define ROOT_TWO_SRC src/root_wo.js

Support for TypeScript, CoffeeScript and LiveScript

As of version 2.1.0 js-makedepend supports TypeScript, CoffeeScript and LiveScript. If any of these transpilers (or 'compilers' as they like to be called) are installed in your project folder's node_modules, js-makedepend will use them.

js-makedepend does not need any switches to work with any of these languages. It just works when the transpilers are in node_modules. This means everything works for TypeScript, CoffeeScript and LiveScript like it does for JavaScript.

js-makedepend does not ship with the transpilers for these languages themselves to keep install size reasonable (e.g. typescript is ~22Mb). Moreover, when you're developing in any of these alt-JS languages, your project folder probably already contains the transpiler anyway.

Support for other alt-js languages

Providing support for other alt-js languages should prove straightforward - have a peek in the transpile folder for samples on how to write a wrapper.

Pull requests welcome.

De-supported stuff + alternatives for them

Visualizing the dependency graph

This was part of js-makedepend until version 1.1.0. It's fun functionality, but not core to why I wrote js-makedepend.

If you're interested in visualizing a dependency graph nonetheless - dependency-cruiser does that quite well.

Send the dependency graph as JSON to stdout

Also removed from js-makedepend with the 2.0.0 release. For this also dependency-cruiser will probably do a better job.

License

MIT

Thanks

• Marijn Haverbeke and other people who colaborated on acorn - the excelent javascript parser js-makedepend uses to infer the dependencies.