I recently started building a small project with TypeScript. It is a small application that runs some workflows based on received Webhook calls. This means that it exposes an Express app to handle these requests.
Currently I have an npm script that builds this project and transpiles it into JavaScript which can be then interpreted by Node.js. (The script runs: tsc --build --clean)
My question is, since this is not meant to be a library/package that will be published on NPM, is there any reason to transpile the project at all since I can just run it with ts-node?
I've been looking around for some information regarding this but couldn't find anything.
Are there any security, performance or any other implications when running the project directly with ts-node in a production environment instead of building it and running it with node?
It depends on the size of your project. Most people transpile because it improves performance, consumes less system resources and provides more stability.
But in a small project this won't make much difference, so using ts-node may be sufficient.
Related
I have been using webpack to build a server side app using express. This code is harder to debug since I don't have the immediate comfort of a web browser and if I use something like VS Code to debug, it won't accept breakpoints inside request handlers when using source maps. Besides it takes no time to compile if I just stick to Node compatible JS and skip all transpiling and whatnot. Further, if I use treeshaking, I can reduce the size, but what is the point of that when it is running on the server (no client will ever download it).
My point is that I don't see why one would want to create a bundle of server side code if the server don't have any issues with memory or other limiting factors. It's easier to read, takes no time to compile and is easier to debug.
So a question. Is it ok to have the server app as an npm package and deploy that? Is that what is common or what do people do?
The project my team works on is a TypeScript monorepo that includes a web application and server-side daemon processes. We use webpack for producing build artefacts for all targets.
I've read some posts saying there's no point using webpack server-side because it was designed for web (obv), and I can understand that point of view.
However, even if our code was JavaScript and didn't require any transpiling, we'd still use webpack for the server-side. I want a single, minimal set of files and no node modules to deploy to the servers.
Size itself doesn't matter that much for server side (though every bit helps), but running 'yarn install' on servers is out of the question IMO.
I was learning babel and webpack and then it turns out I need to install node.js to run them both and I asked myself WHY? Then according to my research, we need node.js for webpack and babel since both of them were written in JS and to run that JS code which transpiles( for babel) and bundles up the code(for webpack). Also, another reason is that since both babel and webpack handles our JS code outside of the browser, this is the reason to use Node.js. Are these reasons true?
According to the Node.js website -
Node.js® is a JavaScript runtime built on Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine.
Webpack and babel (along with many other tools you might use for frontend development) are written in javascript and since they are command line tools, they need a way to run outside of the browser (directly on your machine).
They could have used some other language to write the tools but since they chose to write them in javascript, Node.js is the only feasible options right now.
In case you are interested, the original creator of nodejs
Ryan Dahl has built another secure runtime environment for Javascript/Typescript called Deno
Yes, at the moment the node.js project is non-portable by full open source disclosure nor extension to port node.js commonjs without a just in time transpiler with a service worker on a server.
Definitions: FHC = "from half court"
Babel and webpack
(1) transpile/move (write&read, not ln -s sym...bolic link) & (2) compost/pile onto a JIT target,
like v8 or other browser-javascript-interpreters. v8 on a service worker can compile on the edge just in time for interpretation in a browser v8 environment but still on the cloudflare edge server.
Declare (FHC) Allegedly, rust provides webassembly modules with the lipid [llvm-]wrappings
that nucleic acid exocytosis needs to be a full-blown virus, err I mean
Initiation Routine needs to be a targetable JIT extension!
A compiler/transpiler still requires it's target-scope receivable. Declare (FHC) Emit is to execute as compile is to interpret, even AST.
For my understanding, node.js is a javascript-engine which is running javascript-code without using a browser(window-global). You can use javascript on a server. But I saw now a lot of tutorials(react, angular, vue etc.). In every tutorial, I have to install something with npm. I can follow there are several dev-tools which I can use on my local machine to minimize my javscript-files or compile sass to css. But in the end, when I put my files on a webserver, I just have normal javascript-files, css-files etc. No node.js code in it, right?
My question is: React, angular, vue.js etc. are written in just normal javascript without node.js right? The reason why I use npm ist just to install every dependencies with one command, right?
A question more: Is there an any recommended order to learn all these frontend-development stuff? There are so much words I have to google it: angular.js, react, vue.js, vanilla.js, typescript, backbone.js, bower, grunt, webpack, yarn etc... I dont know where I start, so I look into few tutorials, but everytime I go through these tutorials, there is a new word(technology) I have to research.
I think you're getting your terminology a little muddled.
Node.js is a JavaScript runtime, built on Google Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine. However, that is not to say that Node programs are executed in a browser. They aren’t. Rather, the creator of Node (Ryan Dahl) took the V8 engine and enhanced it with various features (such as a file system API and an HTTP library) to create a program we can use to execute JavaScript on our computers.
Node comes bundled with a package manager called npm which you can use to install packages (such as React and Angular) from the npm registry. These packages are indeed written in normal JavaScript (or a language that compiles to JavaScript, such as TypeScript).
The reason why I use npm is just to install every dependencies with one command, right?
Kinda. You can certainly use npm to install dependencies. However, it does a lot more that that. For example you can use npm scripts to carry out various build tasks, or you can create a package yourself and use npm to publish it to the registry.
A question more: Is there an any recommended order to learn all these frontend-development stuff?
As with everything, it depends. What are you trying to build? It's relatively pointless to learn about Node, npm, React and Angular if you are attempting to build a simple static website. If I were you, I'd define a clear goal and set about learning the technologies you'll need to reach that goal. Saying that, if you are doing anything with front-end development, learning about npm will be a good use of your time.
Here's an article by way of further reading that explains things a little more: https://www.sitepoint.com/an-introduction-to-node-js/
I'm working on a web application that currently uses vuejs for part of its interface. The back-end is NOT in Node, so there is currently no package.json file or any tool from the typical npm stack in this repository.
We already have a bunch of non-npm dependencies that need to be installed in order to use the repository, so my coworkers aren't too open about the idea of adding another layer of complexity. I can't blame them for that, it's the reason why I use npm scripts and not even gulp in my other projects. I'm tired of spending hours learning and configuring build tools that never end up doing what I want anyway.
But since the vue-cli tool no longer includes the build command, I'm a bit stuck. Is there really no more CLI app to build vue files at all? And if so, what would be the smart way to use vue without webpack? Template strings are not maintainable at all, and <script type="text/x-template"> don't work when you want to use multiple components from multiple files in the same page.
I realize your question says 'without webpack' but you may be interested in backpack - a CLI app i came across for building Vue.js without requiring you to write any configuration code. It is basically webpack preconfigured as a minimalistic build system for Node.js. It provides two commands, dev for live reload enabled development and build for building you project.
I would like to start using advanced JS features in an pre-existing app with a NodeJS serverside, React using the Fluxible architecture, Gulp task runner and Broserify/CommonJS front end modules.
Anybody who has been down that path or a similar path before and wants to share some insight I would much appreciate it.
babel-node compiles on-the-fly. You can use the API (babel-core) to pre-compile and then run the compiled output in node. There's also a gulp-babel plugin. At the expense of extra processing overhead at build time you could hijack browserify or use module-deps to figure out the dependency graph for you, if relevant. There's a notion of adding a feature to Babel to generate a dependency graph, but it's not available currently.