Refractor is a lightweight, robust, and extensible syntax highlighter that works in both Node.js and the browser. It is built on top of the Prism syntax highlighter and provides a way to highlight code syntax in various programming languages.
Syntax Highlighting
This feature allows you to highlight code syntax for a given programming language. The example highlights a simple JavaScript code snippet.
const refractor = require('refractor');
const html = refractor.highlight('const x = 42;', 'javascript');
console.log(html);Registering Languages
You can register additional languages for syntax highlighting. This example registers the Python language and highlights a Python code snippet.
const refractor = require('refractor');
const python = require('refractor/lang/python');
refractor.register(python);
const html = refractor.highlight('print("Hello, World!")', 'python');
console.log(html);Syntax Highlighting with Plugins
Refractor supports plugins to extend its functionality. This example uses the line-numbers plugin to add line numbers to the highlighted code.
const refractor = require('refractor');
const lineNumbers = require('refractor/plugins/line-numbers');
refractor.use(lineNumbers);
const html = refractor.highlight('const x = 42;', 'javascript');
console.log(html);Highlight.js is a popular syntax highlighter written in JavaScript. It automatically detects the language of the code and applies syntax highlighting. Compared to Refractor, Highlight.js is more automatic in language detection but may not be as customizable.
Prism is a lightweight, extensible syntax highlighter, built with modern web standards in mind. Refractor is built on top of Prism, so they share many similarities. However, Refractor provides a more modular approach and additional features like plugins.
CodeMirror is a versatile text editor implemented in JavaScript for the browser. It is specialized for editing code and comes with syntax highlighting capabilities. While CodeMirror is more of a full-fledged code editor, Refractor focuses solely on syntax highlighting.
Lightweight, robust, elegant virtual syntax highlighting using Prism. Useful for virtual DOMs and non-HTML things. Perfect for React, VDOM, and others.
refractor is built to work with all syntaxes supported by Prism,
that’s 120 languages (as of prism@1.6.0) (and all
7 themes).
Want to use highlight.js instead? Try lowlight!
npm:
npm install
var refractor = require('refractor');
var result = refractor.highlight('"use strict";', 'js');
console.dir(result, {depth: null});
Yields:
[ { type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'string' ] },
children: [ { type: 'text', value: '"use strict"' } ] },
{ type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'punctuation' ] },
children: [ { type: 'text', value: ';' } ] } ]
Or, stringified with rehype:
var rehype = require('rehype');
var html = rehype().stringify({type: 'root', children: result}).toString();
console.log(html);
Yields:
<span class="token string">"use strict"</span><span class="token punctuation">;</span>
Tip: Use
hast-to-hyperscriptto transform to other virtual DOMs, or DIY.
refractor.register(syntax)Register a syntax. Needed in the browser.
refractor.highlight(value, language)Parse value (string) according to the language (name or alias)
grammar.
Virtual nodes representing the highlighted value (Array.<Node>).
I do not suggest using the pre-built files or requiring refractor in
the browser as that would include a 250kb (90kb GZipped) file.
Instead, require refractor/core.js, and include only the used
highlighters. For example:
var refractor = require('refractor/core.js');
var jsx = require('refractor/lang/jsx.js');
refractor.register(jsx);
var result = refractor.highlight('<Dropdown primary />', 'jsx');
console.dir(result, {depth: null});
Yields:
[ { type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'tag' ] },
children:
[ { type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'tag' ] },
children:
[ { type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'punctuation' ] },
children: [ { type: 'text', value: '<' } ] },
{ type: 'text', value: 'Dropdown' } ] },
{ type: 'text', value: ' ' },
{ type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'attr-name' ] },
children: [ { type: 'text', value: 'primary' } ] },
{ type: 'text', value: ' ' },
{ type: 'element',
tagName: 'span',
properties: { className: [ 'token', 'punctuation' ] },
children: [ { type: 'text', value: '/>' } ] } ] } ]
…When using browserify and minifying the result, this results in just 19kb of code (7.62kb with GZip).
refractor does not support Prism plugins. Prism is built using global
variables instead of a module format. All the syntaxes below are custom made
to work with CommonJS so you can require just what you want to make things
work. Additionally, Prism plugins often deal with the real DOM instead of the
tokens created by Prism, making them hard to get to work in virtual DOMs.
All syntaxes are included if you require('refractor'). Checked items are
always included in the core (core.js), but unchecked items are not and must
be required and registered if core.js is used.
Unlike in Prism, cssExtras and phpExtras are camel-cased instead of
dash-cased.
Prism syntaxes are built to work with global variables and without module
format. All below syntaxes are custom made to work with CommonJS. Only
these custom built syntaxes will work with refractor.
clikecssjavascript — alias: jsmarkup — alias: xml, html, mathml, svgabapactionscriptadaapacheconfaplapplescriptasciidocaspnetautohotkeyautoitbashbasicbatchbisonbrainfuckbroccoffeescriptcppcrystalcsharpcssExtrasddartdiffdockereiffelelixirerlangfortranfsharpgherkingitglslgographqlgroovyhamlhandlebarshaskellhaxehttpiconinform7inijjadejavajoliejson — alias: jsonpjsxjuliakeymankotlinlatexlesslivescriptlolcodeluamakefilemarkdownmatlabmelmizarmonkeynasmnginxnimnixnsisobjectivecocamlozparigpparserpascalperlphpExtrasphppowershellprocessingprologpropertiesprotobufpuppetpurepythonqqorerreasonrestriproboconfrubyrustsassassscalaschemescsssmalltalksmartysqlstylusswifttcltextiletwigtypescript — alias: tsverilogvhdlvimwikixojoyamllowlight — Same, but based on highlight.jsFAQs
Lightweight, robust, elegant virtual syntax highlighting using Prism
The npm package refractor receives a total of 2,238,014 weekly downloads. As such, refractor popularity was classified as popular.
We found that refractor demonstrated a not healthy version release cadence and project activity because the last version was released a year ago. It has 1 open source maintainer collaborating on the project.
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