What's this then?
A micro module that helps you require or import (versions of) modules
that might not be there.
Useful to test for the availability of optional and peer dependencies
before working with them.
Examples
See ESM below if you're using this in an ESM only context.
Commonjs
So you made the typescript compiler (v2) an optional dependency.
But you just want to keep running if it ain't there.
Do this:
const tryRequire = require("semver-try-require");
const typescript = tryRequire("typescript", ">=2");
const lProgram = "const cube = x => x*x*x; console.log(cube(42))";
if (typescript !== false) {
console.log(typescript.transpileModule(lProgram, {}).outputText);
} else {
console.log(lProgram);
}
ESM
In ESM it's almost the same, except there dynamic imports are always
asynchronous, so you'll have to await
it (or use promises):
import tryImport from "semver-try-require";
const typescript = await tryImport("typescript", >=5);
const lProgram = "const cube = x => x*x*x; console.log(cube(42))";
if (typescript !== false) {
console.log(typescript.transpileModule(lProgram, {}).outputText);
} else {
console.log(lProgram);
}
History
This module started to try a few non-run-of-the-mill things with the
npm registry (deprecate, beta publishing, renaming). The tryRequire
function in
dependency-cruiser
seemed like a good candidate as it was not a thing that'd be unique
to dependency-cruiser, and would probably be easier to maintain on its
own anyway. I named it tigerclaws-try-require
until I realized the
semver check was what distinguished it from the other try-require
like npm modules out there.
dependency-cruiser
now uses semver-try-require in the transpiler wrappers
and it enables it to cruise typescript, coffeescript and livescript
code without having to ship the heavy duty compilers for these
languages.
License
MIT
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Made with :metal: in Holland